The Canadian Pacific Railway was completed at the end of 1885, and it began to prove a competitor with the railways in the United States for the through traffic across the continent. This competition affected the great financial interests of New York, for the United States railroads were subject to regulations as to the long and the short haul, while the Canadian Pacific Railway was free from them, and thereby had a very great advantage in the struggle for business. This direct present pecuniary interest, added to the belief that Canada was likely to prove a much greater factor on this continent than had ever been anticipated by the people of the United States, was the cause of the inception of the Commercial Union Movement, which attracted so much attention at the time, and has had such far-reaching influence on the affairs of the British Empire ever since.

The originator of this movement, Erastus Wiman of New York, was born at Churchville, near Toronto, and was educated and lived in Toronto for a number of years in his early life. He was connected with the Press and for a time kept a small book shop on King Street. He served a year in the Toronto City Council. He became Toronto manager of R. G. Dun and Company’s Commercial Agency in 1860, and afterwards went to New York and became manager of it there, and a member of the firm. He was also president of the Great North Western Telegraph Company, which controlled almost all the telegraph lines in Canada. He had not taken the oath of allegiance to the United States, and he was suited in every way to lead the insidious scheme which was started under the name of Commercial Union, but was intended to bring about peacefully the annexation of Canada to the United States.

The movement was planned and launched with remarkable skill. Mr. Wiman, who was posing as a true-hearted Canadian, was, I believe, working for great financial interests in the States, headed by Jay Gould. Of course, of this there is no proof, but only the deduction that can be drawn from a close study of all the information that can be had. The first step was to establish the Canadian Club of New York, to be a home for welcoming Canadians visiting that city. The next was still more ingenious. A number of the most prominent Canadians, principally literary men, orators, &c., were invited to New York as guests of the Club, to address the members. These visitors were treated with the warmest hospitality, and no indication given that Mr. Wiman had any ulterior motives. About the same time, in 1886, Mr. Wiman gave some public baths to the citizens of Toronto, at a cost of about $6,000, as a proof of his warm feeling towards the city in which his early life had been spent.

After all this preparation he came to Canada in the spring of 1887, and aided by Goldwin Smith, Valancy Fuller, Henry W. Darling, President of the Toronto Board of Trade, and a few others, he proposed in the interests of Canada a scheme of Commercial Union between Canada and the United States which he claimed would be a great boon and lasting advantage to Canada. During the whole summer of 1887 an active campaign was being conducted, meetings were held in many places, and addressed by Mr. Goldwin Smith, Mr. Wiman, Congressman Butterworth, of Ohio, and others. The members of the Canadian Parliament were furnished with circulars, articles, and reports of speeches in profusion. Mr. Wiman, as a member of the firm of Dun, Wiman and Company, had an influence over the business men of Canada that could hardly be overestimated. It would have been a serious thing for any ordinary business man in any city, town, or village in Canada, if dependent upon his credit for the profitable conduct of his business, to incur the hostility of the mercantile agency, on whose reports his credit would largely depend.

The result was that at first the plausible speeches of its advocates, and the friendly assistance of some newspapers, caused the movement to acquire a considerable amount of success. It was not thoroughly understood. It had been inaugurated as in the direct interest of Canada by a friendly and successful Canadian, and was being discussed in a friendly way, and many good men at first supported the idea, not suspecting any evil, and not fearing that it might result in annexation. I was away on a visit to England from the 19th May until the 21st August, 1887, and heard very little of what was going on, and not enough to understand the details or real facts of the scheme. After my return to Canada I asked my brother, the late Lt.-Colonel Fred C. Denison, then a member of the House of Commons for West Toronto, what it all meant. He was not at all favourably impressed. He had been supplied with copies of the literature that was distributed, and I read it over, and we discussed the question very fully during some weeks. We both agreed that it was a very dangerous movement, likely to bring about the annexation of Canada to the United States, and designed for that purpose by its originators, and we considered very carefully how it could be met and defeated. I felt that, in view of the way in which it was being taken up at the time by the people, it would be hopeless to attack the scheme and endeavour to check its movement by standing in front of it and fighting it. I was afraid we might be overrun and probably beaten. I felt that the only way to defeat it was to get in front, and lead the movement in another direction. My brother agreed with me in this, and we decided to take a course of action based on those lines.