St. Lawrence Deep Waterway negotiations, treaty and rejection: 1919-1934

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to look at the events, issues and processes surrounding the St. Lawrence Deep Waterway Treaty of 1932. For a decade and a half the question of the dual purpose development of the St. Lawrence held centre stage in the relationship between Canada and the United states. The rejection of the Treaty by the United states Senate delayed development on the river for twenty years. Despite the scale of the proposal and the controversy that it evoked in both countries, historians have given it only passing notice. It is the goal of this study to shed new light on an important phase in Canada-U.S. relations and the domestic consequences of that relationship.