As Sir John A. Macdonald intended, the federal government must be recognized as the nation's voice.

Power. It is the capacity to inspire while encouraging and enabling change, and it matters. When handled in a positive way, power is the key to the state's ability to strengthen the nation and improve lives. But state power, John Boyko argues forcefully, works best when concentrated on a federal level, as Sir John A. Macdonald and Canada's other founders intended.

Provincial governments are essential, tending to local matters, administering and helping to fund...