“Great ideas,” said Wilson, “at last have captured the hearts of the common people and directed into positive channels and constructive programmes the very energies which otherwise may have spent themselves in the acts of retributive destruction.”  Reconstruction!  This is now the world’s watch-word.  It sums up the various problems with which nations will have to grapple in every realm of human activity.  It speaks of conditions that are no more and suggests new outlines of the social order.  Our present and pressing duty then is to weigh the anchor, to swing out into the middle stream and take our course on the permanent principles of Catholic Truth.  These principles stand on the shores of History as the great revolving lights that sweep the high seas in the darkness of night.

Canada, after having bravely and generously solved the problems of war, is now also facing “the greater problems of peace.”  This period of reconstruction, more than that of the war, will test our national fibre.  The strain will be greater for the conflict is being lifted to a higher plane, that of ideas.  But nowhere in Canada will this vast work of readjustment be more tangible than in our Great West.  The youth of that part of the country, and the dominating factors of the national problem will, we believe, make the West the classical land of reconstruction.  A gradual evolution will bring our Eastern Provinces to readjust themselves to the changing conditions of political and economic life.  The West, on the contrary, has in such matters the beautiful qualities, the unlimited resources of youth, but also its dangerous shortcomings.  Daring, venturous, over-confident in democracy, the Western mind is frequently most hasty and radical in its conclusions.  It has not been matured by time, that great teacher of patience and moderation; experience has not, as yet, tempered that feverish and progressive youthfulness, so prone to speedy and often drastic legislation.  The heat of fever is often mistaken for the glow of health.  And as legislation is in the minds of the Western people the panacea of all evils in society, will not the common tendency be to carry on the work of reconstruction by parliament bills and orders-in-council?  Is there not here a great danger?  “The danger of premature commitment is much greater than that of more cautious policy, proving a stumbling block in the way of future progress.”

Moreover, the most vital factors of reconstruction in Canada will affect more particularly the Prairie Provinces.  The back-to-the-land movement, demobilization, settlement of returned soldiers on the farm, intensive immigration policy, extensive agricultural production are indeed Western problems.

The choice of the Hon. J. A. Calder of Saskatchewan, as chairman of the Reconstruction Committee in the Federal Cabinet; the prominent part given to him and to the Hon. Mr. Meighen of Manitoba, in the formation and discussion of plans at the recent meeting of the Premiers of the Provinces; these are in themselves striking illustrations of our contention in the matter.