Editing Sam Hughes (section)

==Shadow defence minister==
As the defence critic in the Conservative shadow cabinet, Hughes who was widely read on military history, current military trends, and issues in the Canadian militia proved a vigorous and effective shadow defence minister, accusing the defence minister, Sir Frederick Borden, of being ineffectual in handling his portfolio.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=109}} Hughes was also well known for his attacks upon the immigration policy of the Laurier government, charging that Canada needed more immigrants of "good British stock".{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=114}} The subject of settling the Prairies much interested Hughes as he served as an agent between 1902 and 1905 for the [[Canadian Northern Railway]] headed by his friend, [[William Mackenzie (railway entrepreneur)|William Mackenzie]], travelling twice to the Prairies to select the route for the CNR.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=107-108}} Amery, having first met Hughes in the Boer War, followed him on his second trip across the Prairies, writing about how he talked with great passion about his plans to build the "finest city" on the Prairies.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=108}} In the 1904 election, the Liberals triumphed in a landslide, and even Hughes held on to his seat in Victoria County by a narrow margin.{{sfn|Cook|2010|p=33}}&nbsp;The Conservative leader, [[Robert Laird Borden|Robert Borden]], lost his own seat in [[Halifax, Nova Scotia|Halifax]], and Hughes offered to resign to allow Borden to represent Victoria County.{{sfn|Cook|2010|p=33}} Though Borden chose another safe Conservative seat in Ontario to represent, he thanked Hughes for his "kindness" in offering up his own seat.{{sfn|Cook|2010|p=33}}

Hughes was also active in the [[Imperial Federation League|Imperial Federation movement]], regularly corresponding with both [[Joseph Chamberlain]] and [[Alfred Milner, 1st Viscount Milner|Alfred Milner]] on the issue, and every year from 1905 onward, introduced a resolution in the House of Commons calling for an "equal partnership union" of the Dominions with the United Kingdom.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=117}} In this, Hughes often confounded Milner and Chamberlain, who thought he was the foremost Canadian champion of the [[Imperial Federation|Imperial Federation concept]], as what Hughes wanted was for Canada to become an equal partner in running the British empire, instead of playing the more subordinate role that Milner and Chamberlain had envisioned.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=117}}&nbsp;Hughes favoured a protectionist policy of Imperial Preference, but unlike Chamberlain, he insisted that Imperial Preference be tied to "equal partnership" with an Imperial cabinet of all the Dominion prime ministers plus the British prime minister to decide policy for the entire empire.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=106}} Hughes repeatedly objected to Chamberlain's concept of the British prime minister and cabinet deciding questions for the Dominions, and Haycock wrote what Hughes wanted sounds very similar to the [[British Commonwealth of Nations|British Commonwealth]] that emerged after 1931.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=117}}

In 1906, after repeatedly hammering the immigration minister, [[Clifford Sifton]] in debate, Hughes's motion calling for the Canadian government to give preference in handing out land in the Prairie provinces of Alberta, [[Saskatchewan]] and Manitoba to veterans of the British Army was accepted as policy.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=108}} Like other English-Canadians at the time, Hughes believed that too many immigrants from Eastern Europe were being allowed to settle on the Prairies, and instead the Prairies should be settled by immigrants from Britain, with veterans in particular encouraged to settle.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=108}} In 1907 Hughes told the House of Commons that Catholic immigrants from Europe were "a curse upon Canada".{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=114-115}} Despite being publicly censured by the Conservative leader Robert Borden for his "curse upon Canada" remark with Borden insisting that the Conservative Party was not a sectarian party, two months later in June 1907 at the Orange Order's national convention in Vancouver, Hughes repeated his thesis that Catholic immigrants were a "curse upon Canada", which was followed up with the warning that the Orangemen would never vote Conservative again if Borden expelled Hughes.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=115}} Hughes's ability to bring out the votes of the Orange Order for the Conservatives ensured that Borden did not expel him despite the way in which he kept sabotaging Borden's efforts to reach out to Catholic voters.{{sfn|Haycock|1986|p=115-116}}

Hughes, who claimed to have been offered but declined the post of Deputy Minister of Militia in 1891,<ref name=www /> was appointed Minister of Militia after the election of Borden in 1911, with the aim of creating a distinct Canadian army within the [[British Empire]], to be used in case of war. He wrote a letter to the Governor General, the [[Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn|Duke of Connaught]], about his longtime demand for the Victoria Cross. Connaught privately recommended that Borden get rid of him. Chartrand described Hughes as an individual endowed with "great charm, wit, and driving energy, allied with consummate political skills", but on the negative side called him "a stubborn, pompous racist" and a "passionate Orange Order supremacist" who did little to disguise his dislike of Catholics in general and of French-Canadians in particular.{{sfn|Chartrand|2007|p=8}} Hughes's views later did much to put off French-Canadians and Irish-Canadians from supporting the war effort in World War I.{{sfn|Chartrand|2007|p=8}} Chartrand further wrote that Hughes was a megalomaniac with a grotesquely inflated sense of his own importance who "would admit no contradiction to his views".{{sfn|Chartrand|2007|p=8}} Hughes's own son, [[Garnet Hughes|Garnet]], wrote: "God help he who goes against my father's will".{{sfn|Chartrand|2007|p=8}}