In 1959, then Democratic Senator from Massachusetts, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, wrote A Nation of Immigrants. The thesis of the book was that America was a melting pot made up, for the most part, of immigrants who had assimilated to Yankee Protestant culture and democracy, and had enriched that Yankee Protestant culture and democracy with the richness of their diverse customs and philosophies, culinary skills, and sheer craft, cunning and intellectuality.

This Kennedy book shamelessly glorified the role of immigrants in American life. Never really stated, but implicit in the book, was the argument that in 20th century America, immigrant power was political power.

Kennedy's book also spun out, for the first time, the major role one immigrant group in particular played in American life. Only one immigrant group, millions and millions in number, had jumped fiercely into the American melting pot causing very interesting and considerable spillovers. Since the Potato Famine of the mid 19th century, Irish Catholics had poured into America, as the first major immigrant group in a wave after wave of immigration that lasted for decades.

The Irish had one unique contribution to make to the nation of immigrants' story Kennedy was writing about. The Irish Catholics of the United States, more despised really than any of the other ethnic groups, was still the only ethnic group in America and in Canada who could speak English. Because of this English speaking facility, the Irish were the only immigrants who could form a mainstream political organization and participate fully in American political life. Because they could speak English, the Irish and their political machines could welcome non-English speaking immigrants to their political organizations and political clubs.

It is the Irish who created Tammany Hall and the legendary Boston political machine that at the turn of the century elected John F. "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald, Rose Kennedy's father, as mayor of Boston. It is Tammany Hall that helps settle Jewish immigrants in their huge numbers in New York and gets them their citizenship, and of course their all important right to vote.

In the John Ford movie, "The Last Hurrah," the Boston Irish mayor played by Spencer Tracy boasts an Italian, Jewish and Greek lieutenant. It is a similar Boston Irish organization, still relying on remnants of 'Honey Fitz''s organization that made Michael Dukakis, governor of Massachusetts and the first Greek American to run for the presidency.

In Canada's political culture, apart from Trudeau, there are no writer-prime ministers and very little talk or writing of Canada being a nation of immigrants. That kind of Kennedy political tribute to immigrants is not made here in Canada because we are far, far less a nation of immigrants than our American neighbours. Our percentage of immigrants is smaller, their significance is lesser.

Canadians are still so insecure about our immigrants, past and present, that even one of the greatest Canadian political statesmen of all time, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, finds it necessary to come up with the concept of multiculturalism. That policy is basically a maladroit cover for second class citizenship for our Canadian immigrants and ethnic populations.

Not only has Trudeau failed to give Canada a nation of immigrants, but so have the Irish Catholics of Canada. Still, great Irishmen have plied their political trade in this country.

D'Arcy McGee, a Father of Confederation, was assassinated by a Fenian in Ottawa because of his modern views on Ireland. 'Chubby' Power, the Quebec City Irishman, was an outstanding star in the King cabinet. 'Chubby' was also a man beloved by the Quebecois because his fighting Irish heart joined the Quebecois in their fight against conscription in the Second World War. My friend, the late Senator Grattan O'Leary, the Tory senator and publisher of the Ottawa Journal, is my all-time Irish Canadian hero, especially when, in his early 80s, I watched him squiring beautiful women in their late 40s.

In Canada, given the riding by riding system, the non-Irish immigrants could win seats without the help of Irish political machines. Canadian born Sam Jacobs, a Jew, was sitting for Laurier as early as 1916. Montreal born Peter Bercovitch was the first elected Jew in the Quebec Assembly in 1916. The first Jew elected anywhere in Canada was S. Hart Green in 1905 in Winnipeg North as a provincial Manitoba Liberal.

Oddly enough, the one politician that has truly taken a giant step forward in making Canada go from the ghetto of multiculturalism to a true nation of immigrants is Prime Minister Jean Chretien. In the Globe and Mail, August 5, 1999, there is a wonderful photograph -- you can call it photograph one, day one, of Canada, a future 'nation of immigrants.'

In the photo, a huge painting of Queen Elizabeth looks down on a smiling governor general, Romeo Leblanc and a sombre but satisfied Jean Chretien. They are both watching Elinor Caplan, "whose grandparents arrrived from Poland at the turn of the century," being sworn in as federal minister of Citizenship and Immigration. Ms. Caplan is being sworn in by the most powerful bureaucrat in the land, Mel Kapp, clerk of the Privy Council, himself a descendant of immigrants.

The appointment of Elinor Caplan, the first descendant of immigrants to preside over immigration, is indeed day one of Canada becoming truly a nation of immigrants. The rest of the way may be rocky.

But, Elinor, you can count on the help of Adrienne Clarkson, Peter Newman, Wayne Gretzky, Leonard Cohen, the ghost of Italo-Canadian Bruno Gerussi, CBC's Greek fisherman - and meek and humble columnist extraordinaire, yours truly.

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