Newfoundland Rejects Union With Canada in 1949?

SlickWilly

Newfoundland is regarded as the most Irish part of the world outside of Ireland, indeed even St. Patrick's day is a national holiday there as it is in Montserrat and Ireland of course!
You sometimes hear the natives state Newfi first Canadian last.
You can hear hints of an Irish accent when the old-timers speak and it's close to Hiberno-English when they do very often.
It's links with Ireland particularily the South East of Ireland go back at least to the 17th Century when Irish Fishermen used to go for long periods over to what is termed in the Irish language - the fishing ground, tallamh an eisc. Indeed a particular Nefoundland dialect of Irish was once spoken there along with a special native dialect of English!
So a couple of questions what if the Newfoundlanders reject as they had done in 1869, the notion of becomming the 10th province in what is regarded as the most civilised country in the world - Canada in the 1949 vote?
Also any possibility they could have formed a union, if that's not a bad word in this context with Ireland?
 
Beedok

Beedok

If you can get over the significant English population (39.9% when the 53.41% Canadian are counted). Still not likely, expecially with Quebec still eyeing most of Larbrador.
 

Farnsworth

I would think that there would be another referendum not to long after, although an option for union with the United States doesn't seem like it would be too unreasonable this go around.
 
RogueBeaver

RogueBeaver

US wouldn't want it. Whether they are inside Confederation or not, they are still our economic dependents until oil is discovery. UK was ditching all their colonies and it had been a perennial drain of financial resources throughout the CoG anyways.
 

Andrew Hudson

Newfoundland had been under administration since 1934 and had already narrowly voted for restoration of Dominion status in 1948. However the country was economically unviable. The alternative to confederation was dominion status but Britain was trying to get the Newfoundlaners of its hands and Sir Gordon Macdonald was sent with an agenda of getting them to accept confederation.

Union with Ireland was unlikely as sectarian feeling were raised after the first referendum with the priests being accused of supporting the continuation of administration. Protestants outnumber Cahtolics by 2 to 1 which may have affected the second referendum and if this is the case no way were the Protestants going to vote for union with a predominatly catholic country.

The other options. Currently offshore oil and fisheries might have mader Newfoundland viable but not in the interim possibly union with the UK although it would have set a precedent as Britain has not tried the French model and didn't want to make a similar arrangment with Malta in the late 50's. So administration again followed by eventual union with Canada
 

Strategos' Risk

Assume WWI didn't wipe out the heart of Newfoundland's youth in the Battle of Somme. Could the country have remained viable, and thus independent, without thinking of joining Canada?

I mean, why did New Zealand bother staying apart from Australia? Rhodesia from South Africa?
 

Arachnid

Strategos' Risk said:
I mean, why did New Zealand bother staying apart from Australia? Rhodesia from South Africa?
Click to expand...

New Zealand was big enough to be viable on its and was separated by 2000kms of sea from Australia.

There was a referendum on Rhodesia joining the Union of South Africa and it was defeated because the British settlers in Rhodesia were unwilling to join a polity that was dominated by the Afrikaners and the Afrikaners were unwilling to threaten their majority among whites and also weaken the sustainability of their state by admitting an even more blacks.
 

The Gunslinger

Strategos' Risk said:
Assume WWI didn't wipe out the heart of Newfoundland's youth in the Battle of Somme. Could the country have remained viable, and thus independent, without thinking of joining Canada?

I mean, why did New Zealand bother staying apart from Australia? Rhodesia from South Africa?
Click to expand...

Those countries have a lot more economic opportunities than Newfoundland. Newfoundland has fishing, some mining, and now oil.

if you avoid the disaster at the Somme, it might be viable, but I still think Canada would eventually step in.
 

Strategos' Risk

I just want to see Newfoundland as an independent member within NATO and ECHELON and so on.

The funny thing is there is a really extensive timeline out there (Tripartite Alliance Earth) where not only Newfoundland is independent, but Prince Edward Island as well.
 

Coyote Knight

Well as it happened IRL, there was considerable support in Newfoundland for joining the United States due to all the Americans being stationed in Newfoundland during the war. Canada essentially stepped in and told Britain that Canada might not be so loyal and helpful to Britain if Britain allowed Canada to be surrounded on three sides by America. Consequently, the option of joining with the United States was never presented on the referendum.
 
Thande

Thande

Donor
You could have an island somewhere populated entirely by Gaelic-speaking recent Irish immigrants who vote Fianna Fail and the Republic of Ireland still wouldn't want union with it. They don't do anything that could endanger their neutrality.
 

Dunois

I have often wondered under which conditions a full integration of Newfoundland into the United Kingdom could be attempted. The province is not so far away from the British Isles after all, especially with the invention of jetliners and transatlantic telephone cables.
Economically the Grand Banks were still thriving at the time and who knows, having three countries sharing them (don't forget that Saint Pierre et Miquelon is French), might butterfly away their collapse (which was avoidable).
 

Strategos' Risk

Economic issues aside, would Newfoundland have enough of a distinct cultural and national identity to want to not be part of Canada? Just the very fact that it was always a separate polity should give it more legitimacy than say Quebec.
 
Plumber

Plumber

I always thought an American Newfoundland would be interesting if other states started to copy the parliamentary system from Newfoundland...
 

Coyote Knight

Strategos' Risk said:
Economic issues aside, would Newfoundland have enough of a distinct cultural and national identity to want to not be part of Canada? Just the very fact that it was always a separate polity should give it more legitimacy than say Quebec.
Click to expand...

Well the main grievance was that Newfoundland was essentially an Irish Dominion, relatively free of British meddling unlike the real Ireland. Some feared that integration with Canada, which was was creepily in love with all things British would end up marginalizing and supplanting the irish culture of Newfoundland.
 
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