Conflicts that happened between Canada and its immigration

More like this

ISTE Standards for Teachers

by Jaime Speregen

Muhammad Ali(1942-2016)

by Harrison Rutter

Role of the Teacher-Librarian

by Sheila Mattar

NETSA

by David Reilly

7

French Canadian Nationalism

CONSEQUENCES: Québec’s demand for increased provincial powers was mirrored elsewhere in Canada. Other provincial leaders claimed the right to acquire any new constitutional powers Québec might receive. Challenges to the growing power of the federal government mounted in the provinces, but several federal-provincial constitutional conferences to try to resolve these issues, notably in 1964 and 1971, ended in deadlocks.

Meanwhile, René Lévesque, left the Liberals and founded the Parti Québécois (PQ) to seek sovereignty-association. This was envisioned as a union in which Québec would be an economic partner with the rest of Canada but otherwise Québec would be fully independent. One group, the Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ), resorted to terrorism to achieve that end. The violence discredited the FLQ’s revolutionary approach to Québec nationalism, and the independence movement united behind the PQ’s approach.

In 1960 a new Liberal government led by Jean Lesage took power in Québec. Lesage planned to use state power to promote better education, health care, public industries, and French Canadian culture. The state replaced the church as the guardian of Québec society. A ministry of education was established to modernize the curriculum and make postsecondary education more broadly available through a new system of community colleges. The government of this new Québec was also determined to secure new powers and reduce the role of the federal government within the province,advocate complete separation from Canada.

Political leader Maurice Duplessis, premier from 1936 to 1939 and from 1944 to 1959, staunchly defended the old belief that preservation of a traditional rural society was the best way to protect French Canada from British and secular influences. Religion and agriculture, not government, were considered the vital defenses. The priests, nuns, and other religious figures of Romania Catholic Church ran educational, health, social, and cultural programs that were government-run in the rest of Canada.

Japanese Internment

CONSEQUENCES: Just over 90 percent of Japanese Canadians — some 21,000 people — were uprooted during the war. The majority were Canadian citizens by birth. In 1946, nearly 4,000 former internees sailed to a bombed-out Japan. About 2,000 were aging first-generation immigrants — 1,300 were children under 16 years of age.

The last controls on Japanese Canadians were not lifted until 1948, when they were granted the right to vote. Finally, Canadian society began to open to the Japanese.

Special trains then carried the Japanese detainees to Slocan, New Denver, Kaslo, Greenwood and Sandon — ghost towns in the BC interior. Others were offered the option of working on sugar beet farms in Alberta and Manitoba (see Sugar Industry), where they would be able to keep their families intact, but under a very bad living condition.

On 16 March, the first Japanese Canadians were transported from areas 160 km inland from the Pacific coast — deemed a “protected area” — and brought to Hastings Park. More than 8,000 detainees moved through Hastings Parks, where women and children were housed in the Livestock Building. All property that could not be carried was taken into government custody, and then were sold to built their internment camp.

Japanese people had long suffered the sting of racism in Canada by that point. Then on 7 December 1941, Japan’s attacks on Pearl Harbor and Hong Kong, where Canadian troops were stationed. Distrust of Japanese Canadians spread along Canada. Government soon impounded Japanese_owned fishing boats, closed their schools and shut down their newspapers.

Chines Head Tax

CONSEQUENCES: Families were separated apart. A lot of families can't afford the huge amount of tax for the whole family. Women were expected to stay behind to look after their children, most of the Chinese immigrants were men. Their meager savings were sent regularly to their families in China, who endured decades of poverty, starvation, banditry and civil wars.

By 1903, the Royal Commission on Chinese and Japanese Immigration, recommended that the head tax be increased to $500. This last fee, instituted by Parliament in 1903, was the equivalent of two years’ salary or the purchase of two homes.

By 1902, the amount of Chinese immigrants didn't decrease because of the $50 head tax. Government then double the tax from $50 to $100.

The Canadian government quickly enacted the Chinese Immigration Act on 20 July 1885, which included a $50 head tax. This amount was deliberately set to be a financial hardship. Based on the findings of the Royal Commission, the average Chinese labourer earned $300 a year and saved a modest $43 after living expenses.

From 1881 to 1885, more than 15,00 Chinese labours arrived to Canada for the construction of the Canada Pacific Railway. Prime Minister Sir John A. MacDonald acknowledged the necessity of Chinese labour, but as construction of the railway neared completion, he willingly yielded to prejudiced and discriminatory politicians, trade unionists and public opinion. In 1884, MacDonald appointed the Royal Commission on Chinese Immigration to investigate the restriction of Chinese immigrants.