# What If New Brunswick Decided to Join The USA? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 13, 2012, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783 "2012-05-13T17:13:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/81 "2012-05-18T01:28:54Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Not that there weren’t [good](http://www.galactanet.com/comic/view.php?strip=532) [reasons](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qfcPJS5IBc) . . . > [@foolsguinea](#): > > They interned Mennonites? Mennonites? Good grief! FF 2/3 of the way into the toon in the second link, where Bluto locks Popeye in a safe and hurls it into an “Orphanage.” (Hint: Those babies ain’t really babies.) ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/82 "2012-05-18T02:04:34Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > Newfoundland and Labrador were originally colonies of the UK- I believe they did not become part of Canada until after WWII. Would they be adverse to leaving? As a gross generalization, discontent in Newfoundland takes the form of complaining about Ontario. Succeeding from Canada to be a Republic is a recurrent fantasy, you can get[tee-shirts with a nationalist Newfoundland flavour](http://www.harbourcitygeneralstore.com/). Joining the US is not on most people’s minds. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/83 "2012-05-18T02:27:19Z")
> [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](#): > > As a gross generalization, discontent in Newfoundland takes the form of complaining about Ontario. Succeeding from Canada to be a Republic is a recurrent fantasy, you can get[tee-shirts with a nationalist Newfoundland flavour](http://www.harbourcitygeneralstore.com/). Joining the US is not on most people’s minds. But, the Newfies are baby-seal-killers! They **belong** in the Union! ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/84 "2012-05-18T03:16:24Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > Yes, this might get a bit awkward. The US is already discontinuous on land (some areas are inaccessible from the rest of the country except by air, sea, or Canada). Imagine the mess if NS and PEI suddenly find themselves cut off. I don’t even think there is a land connection between NS and PEI, only a ferry, so travel _between them_ is now a hassle. So you’d have an awkward situation where if J. Random Haligonian needs to get to Charlottetown for a meeting, he has to choose between flying, taking the ferry, or driving into the USA in order to make it to the only bridge to PEI. Using US highways to get from one place in Canada to another is nothing new. We didn’t have a road connection between eastern and western Canada until WWII (Highway 11), and didn’t have a second road connection until 1960 (Highway 17). Both still share the same bridge at Nipigon, which is the only bit of road that connects the two halves of the country (there are also to railroads, one at the top and one at the bottom of Lake Nipigon). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/85 "2012-05-18T03:21:36Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > I don’t even think there is a land connection between NS and PEI . . . Well, of course not. Prince Edward Island is an **island.** (A **real** one, not like Rhode Island.) And I think it’s too far from NS for a bridge. (Maybe a tunnel . . .) ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/86 "2012-05-18T04:49:32Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > And I think it’s too far from NS for a bridge. (Maybe a tunnel . . .) I think a bridge stopping at Pictou Island might be doable. It would break it into a 10 mile bridge from PEI to Pictou Island and a 4-6 mile bridge from Pictou Island to mainland Nova Scotia. It would be _stupid_ to build a second bridge when there are better options (like the US and Canada doing something about the border, or even just letting people who can’t/won’t enter the US take a ferry or an airplane), but I don’t think it would necessarily involve any feats of engineering that weren’t involved in the building of the current bridge. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/87 "2012-05-18T05:56:50Z")
Newfoundland only joined Canada in 1948. Before that they were part of Britain, if I understand wiki correctly. They benefited from US military spending during the war. For a brief moment, they considered joining the US, but ended up opting for Canada (with England’s encouragement). So they might form the basis of a better thought experiment. > **[History of Newfoundland and Labrador](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Newfoundland_and_Labrador)** > > The province of Newfoundland and Labrador covers the period from habitation by Archaic peoples thousands of years ago to the present day. > Prior to European colonization, the lands encompassing present-day Newfoundland and Labrador were inhabited for millennia by different groups of Indigenous peoples. The first brief European contact with Newfoundland and Labrador came around 1000 AD when the Vikings briefly settled in L'Anse aux Meadows. In 1497, European explorers and fishermen from England... What do I think would happen? Canadians are very reasonable. They would discuss the matter among themselves for 40 years, put the matter to referendum, reject it, then pause before discussing the matter for another 40 years. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2012, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/88 "2012-05-18T06:01:13Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Newfoundland only joined Canada in 1948. Before that they were part of Britain, if I understand wiki correctly. Well, no. No British colony or dominion was really “part of Britain,” the way Hawaii is part of the U.S. Even the remaining [Overseas Territories](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_territory_of_the_United_Kingdom) are not, they just **belong** to Britain. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2012, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/89 "2012-05-19T21:24:52Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Well, no. No British colony or dominion was really “part of Britain,” the way Hawaii is part of the U.S. Even the remaining [Overseas Territories](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_territory_of_the_United_Kingdom) are not, they just **belong** to Britain. And then there’s Ireland, which constitutionally **was** part of the UK, but a colony really. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/90 "2012-05-20T02:23:34Z")
> [@apollonia](#): > > Although certainly the Wood Islands ferry, which runs a seasonal service between Wood Island, PEI, and Caribou, NS, would see a huge boom in business and possibly extend its service out-of-season contingent on being able to afford icebreaker ferries. The federal government might actually be obligated to pay them to run all year round. There [has to be a ferry service](http://www.solon.org/Constitutions/Canada/English/peitu.html) “between the Island and the mainland of the Dominion, Winter and Summer,” but since 1993 that requirement has been met by the bridge. The [constitutional amendment](http://www.solon.org/Constitutions/Canada/English/cap_1993pei.html) allowing the ferries to be dropped after construction of the bridge just says “mainland,” but I don’t know if the USA would qualify as being the mainland, especially since the original requirement was clear that it had to be mainland Canada. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/91 "2012-05-20T03:11:29Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > Using US highways to get from one place in Canada to another is nothing new. > We didn’t have a road connection between eastern and western Canada until WWII (Highway 11), and didn’t have a second road connection until 1960 (Highway 17). Both still share the same bridge at Nipigon, which is the only bit of road that connects the two halves of the country (there are also to railroads, one at the top and one at the bottom of Lake Nipigon). And there is no road other than the TCH connecting Kenora ON with the Manitoba border. It is the only road which crosses the Ontario-Manitoba border other than one minor link between a town in ON about 25 miles north with no surface-travel connections other than backpacking to the rest of the province but a short road to the nearest locale in MB. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/92 "2012-05-20T03:15:56Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > And then there’s Ireland, which constitutionally **was** part of the UK, but a colony really. If you mean it was treated as though it were a colony, say so. It was in fact for 122 years a constituent part of the UK of GB and I, entitled to MPs in Commons, to have peers created, and to elect a representative slate of Irish peers (with those not elected to Lords eligible to stand for Commons). I can agree it was terribly mishandled socioculturally, but not in the legal sense. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/93 "2012-05-20T03:39:18Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > If you mean it was treated as though it were a colony, say so. It was in fact for 122 years a constituent part of the UK of GB and I, entitled to MPs in Commons, to have peers created, and to elect a representative slate of Irish peers (with those not elected to Lords eligible to stand for Commons). I can agree it was terribly mishandled socioculturally, but not in the legal sense. All true. In fact, I still think the Irish nationalists were wrong and things would have gone much better for Ireland if they had not succeeded. But it’s not at all hard to understand their POV. Especially after the Potato Famine, all during which Ireland was growing food (on land owned by English absentee landlords) and exporting it, to England. In hindsight, though, the problem wasn’t so much a national problem as a class problem. ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/94 "2012-05-20T08:11:03Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > I still think the Irish nationalists were wrong and things would have gone much better for Ireland if they had not succeeded Much better in which sense? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 8:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/95 "2012-05-20T08:37:22Z")
> [@gamerunknown](#): > > Much better in which sense? They might have avoided The Troubles, for one thing. And the Irish Civil War. And the division between NI and the Republic. And isn’t Ireland’s economy still pretty closely intertwined with the UK’s? Westminster decisions still affect them and they have no representation there any more. In more general terms, I think T.H. White was right when he used Merlin as his mouthpiece (transparently in connection with the Irish Question) in _The Once and Future King:_ (which I recently quoted in [this GQ thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=651944)): > [@](#): > > “About three thousand years ago,” [Merlin] said [to Arthur], “the country you are riding through belonged to a Gaelic race who fought with copper hatchets. Two thousand years ago they were hunted west by another Gaelic race with bronze swords. A thousand years ago there was a Teuton invasion by people who had iron weapons, but it didn’t reach the whole of the [British] Isles because the Romans arrived in the middle and got mixed up with it. The Romans went away about eight hundred years ago, and then another Teuton invasion – of people mainly called Saxons – drove the whole rag-bag west as usual. The Saxons were just beginning to settle down when your father the Conqueror arrived with his pack of Normans, and that is where we are today. Robin Wood was a Saxon partizan.” > > \ > > “Uther,” he said at length, “your lamented father, was an aggressor. So were his predecessors the Saxons. But if we go on living backward like that, we shall never come to the end of it. The Old Ones themselves were aggressors, against the earlier race of copper hatchets, and even the hatchet fellows were aggressors, against some earlier crew of esquimaux who lived on shells. You simply go on and on, until you come to Cain and Abel. But the point is that the Saxon Conquest did suceed, and so did the Norman Conquest of the Saxons. Your father settled the unfortunate Saxons long ago, however brutally he did it, and when a great many years have passed one ought to be ready to accept a status quo. Also I would like to point out that the Norman Conquest was a process of welding small units into bigger ones – while the present revolt of the Gaelic Confederation is a process of disintegration. They want to smash up what we may call the United Kingdom into a lot of piffling little kingdoms of their own. That is wny their reason is not what you might call a good one.” > > He scrathed his chin again, and became wrathful. > > “I never could stomach these nationalists,” he exclaimed. “The destiny of Man is to unite, not to divide. If you keep on dividing you end up as a collection of monkeys throwing nuts at each other out of separate trees.” I could never stomach nationalists either. I’ve always found myself wishing the **American Revolution** could have been avoided. (If only they’d just let the Colonies **have** representation in Parliament already . . . well, then the British Empire would be the American Empire by now.) The divisions worth fighting over are class, not national. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 8:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/96 "2012-05-20T08:47:31Z")
I’m no Communist, but no political song stirs my soul like “The Internationale.” ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/97 "2012-05-20T09:02:10Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Westminster decisions still affect them and they have no representation there any more. To the extent that Westminster decisions still affect the rest of the Eurozone. As a republican in principle and someone born in Northern Ireland, I must admit I am biased, but I believe in autonomy. I feel the same way about Ireland as I do about India (though there were no events in Irish history equivalent to the Amritsar massacre as far as I can tell). I am of the opinion that had Ireland not seceded, the Irish Republican Army would have continued to operate in the country, perpetuating the same level of violence as prior to the war. That’d continue indefinitely, making avoiding the “Troubles” inconsequential. Unless you meant they’d be routed completely and Seán MacBride never got to found Clann na Plobachta. If you believe in international solidarity, we can clearly see that the historically worst route to obtaining it is subservience to an imperial force (as a dominion, their head of state would still be a monarch and their Governor-General appointed). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/98 "2012-05-20T09:50:44Z")
> [@gamerunknown](#): > > To the extent that Westminster decisions still affect the rest of the Eurozone. As a republican in principle and someone born in Northern Ireland, I must admit I am biased, but I believe in autonomy. I feel the same way about Ireland as I do about India (though there were no events in Irish history equivalent to the Amritsar massacre as far as I can tell). Aren’t there?! What about Cromwell?! > [@gamerunknown](#): > > If you believe in international solidarity, we can clearly see that the historically worst route to obtaining it is subservience to an imperial force (as a dominion, their head of state would still be a monarch and their Governor-General appointed). That works well enough for Canada, doesn’t it? I wouldn’t mind living in the Kingdom (not Dominion – fully equal status) of America, a state of the British Empire with a ceremonial GG or Viceroy representing HM in the capital (probably NY or Philadelphia) while American pols do the real work of running things here – and more American pols represent us at Westminster (a point on which Canada also should have insisted). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/99 "2012-05-20T09:57:05Z")
I must admit, also, that “autonomy” tends to raise my hackles a bit because it calls to mind “states’ rights.” And I’m a “republican in principle” too (or a “democrat in principle,” if anyone cares to draw the distinction), but the UK **is** a republic/democracy for all practical purposes. Are the peerage and monarchy and other colorful medieval survivals really all that burdensome? ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2012, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783/100 "2012-05-20T11:04:31Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > What about Cromwell? Well, there were differences in form between the massacres of civilians, in that those gathered at Jalianwala Bagh had an explicitly peaceful motivation for remaining there. The civilians Cromwell’s troops massacred had been part of a siege. > [@BrainGlutton](#): > > I wouldn’t mind living in the Kingdom > [@BrainGlutton](#): > > And I’m a “republican in principle” too I’m not seeing it I’m afraid. Hereditary succession is no basis for a system of government, even if the regent’s position is nominal. Autonomy is simply the natural correlate to democratic and republican principles. If the people of a state choose to federate, that should be entirely up to them. The principle in international law is known as “[self-determination](http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/self-det/ch01.htm)”. Historically, it was synonymous with [Swaraj](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swaraj). Currently I can think of one advocate for Palestinian self-determination, Norm Finkelstein. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-new-brunswick-decided-to-join-the-usa/621783.md?page=6)