Neighborhood Watch

With their busy global and domestic agendas, many Americans have a benign but unfortunate ignorance about Canada, up in North America’s attic. Or they do until there’s trouble--say, an awful Arctic storm bearing down or rumors of terrorists leaking into the lower 48. So it was good but hardly widespread news this week when the U.S. and Canadian governments announced tough measures to enhance border security.

For many years, American border concerns focused more on Mexico. The northern border--5,524 miles of farm fields, forests, rivers and even houses sliced by the official boundary--is an undefended point of pride between the world’s two largest trading partners.

Among other things, new Canadian legislation will allow expanded police surveillance and easier arrests of suspected terrorists. Besides hosting more than 35,000 diverted U.S. air travelers after the Sept. 11 attacks and mobilizing its largest overseas military deployment since the Korean War, Canada is also spending $280 million on heightened security.

North American security is complicated by the neighborly intimacy of the two nations. Across the U.S.-Canada border every single day flows $1.3 billion in goods, not to mention 200 million people a year in myriad cultural, family, business and sports links. Vital blackout-preventing electricity and 26% of California’s natural gas flow south invisibly, plus a million Canadian tourists annually. Thirty-eight states ship more goods to Canada than to any other country. Locking down that border--even drastically slowing crossings--would be economically disastrous.

In a Los Angeles business speech last week Prime Minister Jean Chretien rightly described Canadians and Americans as “family,” envisioning a smarter, more secure border. In his remarks, Gov. Gray Davis also praised the close ties and included a quote from the late Canadian Prime Minister Lester Peterson. Unfortunately for the governor, the Canadian leader’s name was Pearson.