Macdonald opposed such a demand as equivalent to
an effort for independence. Yet he himself was compelled to change
his conservative attitude. After 1877 Canada ceased to be bound by
commercial treaties made by the United Kingdom, unless it expressly
desired to be included. In 1879 Galt was sent to Europe to negotiate
Canadian trade agreements with France and Spain; and in the next decade
Tupper carried negotiations with France to a successful conclusion,
though the treaty was formally concluded between France and Britain.
By 1891 the Canadian Parliament could assert with truth that "the
self-governing colonies are recognized as possessing the right to define
their respective fiscal relations to all countries." But Canada as yet
took no step toward assuming a share in her own naval defense, though
the Australasian colonies made a beginning, along colonial rather than
national lines, by making a money contribution to the British navy.

The second task confronting the policy of imperial cooperation was a
harder one. For a partnership between colony and mother country there
were no precedents. Centralized empires there had been; colonies there
had been which had grown into independent states; but there was no
instance of an empire ceasing to be an empire, of colonies becoming
self-governing states and then turning to closer and cooperative union
with one another and with the mother country.

Along this unblazed trail two important advances were made. The
initiative in the first came from Canada. In 1880 a High Commissioner
was appointed to represent Canada in London. The appointment of Sir
Alexander Galt and the policy which it involved were significant. The
Governor-General had ceased to be a real power; he was becoming the
representative not of the British Government but of the King; and, like
the King, he governed by the advice of the responsible ministers in the
land where he resided. His place as the link between the Government of
Canada and the Government of Britain was now taken in part by the High
Commissioner. The relationship of Canada to the United Kingdom was
becoming one of equality not of subordination.

The initiative in the second step came from Britain, though Canada's
leaders gave the movement its final direction. Imperial federationists
urged Lord Salisbury to summon a conference of the colonies to discuss
the question they had at heart. Salisbury doubted the wisdom of such
a policy but agreed in 1887