THIS year is studded with anniversaries for English-speaking peoples. It marks the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the drafting of the American constitution; the centenary of the Canadian rebellions, which were responsible for the ablest state paper in British colonial policy, Lord Durham's report; and the fiftieth anniversary of the Imperial Conference. The least attention has been paid to the last of these anniversaries, fact which appears somewhat surprising in view of the area and importance of the British Commonwealth of Nations, and its oft-repeated claim to have reconciled unity and freedom, the imperial connection and dominion nationalisms. The absence of celebrations may be due to the sobering realization that the golden years of unchallenged British supremacy have passed, or to the uneasy apprehension that this ambitious experiment in empire organization is presenting as serious problems of both machinery and policy as the federations which were established in Canada and Australia. When the Colonial conference assembled in i887, during the Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria's reign, it counted for little, and, in fact, owed its very existence to the activities of one of those unofficial political associations which play so great part in British history. The Imperial Federation League interviewed Lord Salisbury, the Prime Minister, in August i886 with the request that he call conference with the colonies to discuss trade, communications, naval policy and any other means for securing the closer federation or union of all parts of the empire. Lord Salisbury agreed and his colonial secretary, Sir Henry Holland, prominent member of the League, acted as chairman. The delegates were chosen in rather casual fashion, those from Canada for instance being the Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario and Sir Sanford Fleming, the distinguished engineer; and the conference was in Mr. Duncan Hall's words a casual and amorphous thing. Few took its proceedings seriously. True, Lord Salisbury solemnly hailed