cannot be impeached: and in the application to the white of a similar
law lies the only solution of the temperance problem.




REFLECTIONS AS TO THE POSSIBLE EFFECT UPON HIM OF ENFRANCHISEMENT.


We cannot estimate the transforming power that his enfranchisement might
exert over the Indian character.

The Indian youth, who is now either a listless wanderer over the confines
of his Reserve; or who finds his highest occupation in putting in, now
and then, desultory work for some neighbouring farmer at harvest-time;
who looks even upon elementary education as useless, and as something
to be gone through, perforce, as a concession to his parents' wish, or
at those parents' bid, would, if enfranchisement were assured to him,
esteem it in its true light, as the first step to a higher training,
which should qualify him for enjoying offices or taking up callings,
from which he is now debarred, and in which, mayhap, he might achieve a
degree of honour and success which should operate, in an incalculable
way, as a stimulus to others of his race, to strive after and attain
the like station and dignity.

There can, I think, be no gainsaying of the view that the Indian, if he
were enfranchised, would avail much more generally than he does now,
of the excellent educational facilities which surround him. The very
consciousness, which would then be at work within him, of his eligibility
for filling any office of honour in the country, which enfranchisement