Speech #500148557

The fact that the FrenchCanadian is a Catholic is no objection to him in my own mind. and if it were I should prefer him and his whole church under our political jurisdiction rather than partly within and partly without. The Catholic Church must and will conform to the spirit of the age and yield to the impulses of modern liberty. There is nothing about this FrenchCanadian population which. to my mind. is objectionable. and so far as the Canadian immigrant is concerned. he is not wholly of FrenchCanadian extraction. he is not wholly of the Catholic Church. They come to us from the provinces. but the blood of many thousands of them is of other nativity or other extraction than that of the French population of Canada. They fought for us and defended us in the recent war. and they have come in large numbers since. and as the Senator from Connecticut well stated. there is every reason to expect that in future collisions (if we should be so unfortunate as to have a collision with any foreign power whatever) the FrenchCanadian and the Canadian of whatever extraction is as likely to seek the flag of the United States and to defend it as is the foreign citizen of any other country whatever. and today. sir.