Canada under British Rule by Sir John George Bourinot (mobi ebook reader .txt) 📕

of a vote of the Reformers of that province adverse to the continuance of the court of chancery, the constitution of which had been improved chiefly by himself. When he presented himself as a candidate before his old constituency he was defeated by a nominee of the Clear Grits, who were then, as always, pressing their opinions with great vehemence and hostility to all moderate men. He illustrated the fickle character of popular favour, when a man will not surrender his principles and descend to the arts of the politician. He lived until 1858 in retirement, almost forgotten by the people for whom he had worked so fearlessly and sincerely.

In New Brunswick the triumph of responsible government must always be associated with the name of Lemuel A. Wilmot, the descendant of a famous United Empire Loyalist stock, afterwards a judge and a lieutenant-governor of his native province. He was in some respects the most notable figure, after Joseph Howe and J.W. Johnston, the leaders of the Liberal and Conservative parties in Nova Scotia, in that famous body of public men who so long brightened the political life of the maritime provinces. But neither those two leaders nor their distinguished compeers, James Boyle Uniacke, William Young, John Hamilton Gray and Charles Fisher, all names familiar to students of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick history, surpassed Mr. Wilmot in that magnetic eloquence which carries an audience off its feet, in versatility of knowledge, in humorous sarcasm, and in conversational gifts, which made him a most interesting personality in social life. He impressed his strong individuality upon his countrymen until the latest hour of his useful career.

In Prince Edward Island, the name most intimately connected with the struggle for responsible government is that of George Coles, who, despite the absence of educational and social advantages in his youth, eventually triumphed over all obstacles, and occupied a most prominent position by dint of unconquerable courage and ability to influence the opinions of the great mass of people.


SECTION 2.--Results of self-government from 1841 to 1864.


The new colonial policy, adopted by the imperial government immediately after the presentation of Lord Durham's report, had a remarkable effect upon the political and social development of the British North American provinces during the quarter of a century that elapsed between the union of the Canadas in 1841 and the federal union of 1867. In 1841 Mr. Harrison, provincial secretary of the upper province in the coalition government formed by Lord Sydenham, brought in a measure which laid the foundations of the elaborate system of municipal institutions which the Canadian provinces now enjoy. In 1843 Attorney-General Lafontaine presented a bill "for better serving the independence of the legislative assembly of this province," which became law in 1844 and formed the basis of all subsequent legislation in Canada.

The question of the clergy reserves continued for some years after the union to perplex politicians and harass governments. At last in 1854 the Hincks government was defeated by a combination of factions, and the Liberal-Conservative party was formed out of the union of the Conservatives and the moderate Reformers. Sir Allan MacNab was the leader of this coalition government, but the most influential member was Mr. John A. Macdonald, then attorney-general of Upper Canada, whose first important act was the settlement of the clergy reserves. Reform ministers had for years evaded the question, and it was now left to a government, largely composed of men who had been Tories in the early part of their political career, to yield to the force of public opinion and take it out of the arena of political agitation by means of legislation which handed over this property to the municipal corporations of the province for secular purposes, and at the same time made a small endowment for the protection of the clergy who had legal claims on the fund. The same government had also the honour of removing the old French seigniorial system, recognised to be incompatible with the modern condition of a country of free government, and injurious to the agricultural development of the province at large. The question was practically settled in 1854, when Mr. Drummond, then attorney-general for Lower Canada, brought in a bill providing for the appointment of a commission to ascertain the amount of compensation that could be fairly asked by the seigniors for the cession of their seigniorial rights. The seigniors, from first to last, received about a million of dollars, and it also became necessary to revise those old French laws which affected the land tenure of Lower Canada. Accordingly in 1856 Mr. George Cartier, attorney-general for Lower Canada in the Taché-Macdonald ministry, introduced the legislation necessary for the codification of the civil law. In 1857 Mr. Spence, post-master-general in the same ministry, brought in a measure to organise the civil service, on whose character and ability so much depends in the working of parliamentary institutions. From that day to this the Canadian government has practically recognised the British principle of retaining public officers without reference to a change of political administration.

Soon after the union the legislating obtained full control of the civil list and the post-office. The last tariff framed by the imperial parliament for British North America was mentioned in the speech at the opening of the Canadian legislature in 1842. In 1846 the British colonies in America were authorised by an imperial statute to reduce or repeal by their own legislation duties imposed by imperial acts upon foreign goods imported from foreign countries into the colonies in question. Canada soon availed herself of this privilege, which was granted to her as the logical sequence of the free-trade policy of Great Britain, and, from that time to the present, she has been enabled to legislate very freely with regard to her own commercial interests. In 1849 the imperial parliament repealed the navigation laws, and allowed the river St. Lawrence to be used by vessels of all nations. With the repeal of laws, the continuance of which had seriously crippled Canadian trade after the adoption of free trade by England, the provinces gradually entered on a new career of industrial enterprise.

No part of the constitution of 1840 gave greater offence to the French Canadian population than the clause restricting the use of the French language in the legislature. It was considered as a part of the policy, foreshadowed in Lord Durham's report, to denationalise, if possible, the French Canadian province. The repeal of the clause, in 1848, was one evidence of the harmonious operation of the union, and of a better feeling between the two sections of the population. Still later, provision was made for the gradual establishment of an elective legislative council, so long and earnestly demanded by the old legislature of Lower Canada.

The members of the Lafontaine-Baldwin government became the legislative executors of a troublesome legacy left to them by a Conservative ministry. In 1839 acts had been passed by the special council of Lower Canada and the legislature of Upper Canada to compensate the loyal inhabitants of those provinces for the loss they had sustained during the rebellions. In the first session of the union parliament the Upper Canadian act was amended, and money voted to reimburse all persons in Upper Canada whose property had been unnecessarily, or wantonly, destroyed by persons acting, or pretending to act, on behalf of the crown. An agitation then commenced for the application of the same principle to Lower Canada, and in 1845 commissioners were appointed by the Draper administration to inquire into the nature and value of the losses suffered by her Majesty's loyal subjects in Lower Canada. When their report was presented in favour of certain claims the Draper ministry brought in some legislation on the subject, but went out of office before any action could be taken thereon. The Lafontaine-Baldwin government then determined to set the question at rest, and introduced legislation for the issue of debentures to the amount of $400,000 for the payment of losses sustained by persons who had not been convicted of, or charged with, high treason or other offences of a treasonable nature, or had been committed to the custody of the sheriff in the gaol of Montreal and subsequently transported to the island of Bermuda. Although the principle of this measure was fully justified by the action of the Tory Draper government, extreme Loyalists and even some Reformers of Upper Canada declaimed against it in the most violent terms, and a few persons even declared that they would prefer annexation to the United States to the payment of the rebels. The bill, however, passed the legislature by a large majority, and received the crown's assent through Lord Elgin on the 25th April, 1849. A large crowd immediately assembled around the parliament house--formerly the St. Anne Market House--and insulted the governor-general by opprobrious epithets, and by throwing missiles at him as he drove away to Monklands, his residence in the country. The government and members of the legislature appear to have been unconscious of the danger to which they were exposed until a great crowd rushed into the building, which was immediately destroyed by fire with its fine collection of books and archives. A few days later, when the assembly, then temporarily housed in the hall of Bonsecours Market, attempted to present an address to Lord Elgin, he was in imminent danger of his life while on his way to the government house--then the old Château de Ramesay in Nôtre-Dame Street--and the consequences might have been most serious had he not evaded the mob on his return to Monklands. This disgraceful affair was a remarkable illustration not simply of the violence of faction, but largely of the discontent then so prevalent in Montreal and other industrial centres, on account of the commercial policy of Great Britain, which seriously crippled colonial trade and was the main cause of the creation of a small party which actually advocated for a short time annexation to the United States as preferable to the existing state of things. The result was the removal of the seat of government from Montreal, and the establishment of a nomadic system of government by which the legislature met alternately at Toronto and Quebec every five years until Ottawa was chosen by the Queen as a permanent political capital. Lord Elgin felt his position keenly, and offered his resignation to the imperial government, but they refused to entertain it, and his course as a constitutional governor under such trying circumstances was approved by parliament.

The material condition of the provinces--especially of Upper Canada, which now became the first in population and wealth--kept pace with the rapid progress of the people in self-government. The population of the five provinces had increased from about 1,500,000, in 1841, to about 3,200,000 when the census was taken in 1861 The greatest increase had been in the province of Upper Canada, chiefly in consequence of the large immigration which flowed into the country from Ireland, where the potato rot had caused wide-spread destitution and misery. The population of this province had now reached 1,396,091, or nearly 300,000 more than the population of Lower Canada--an increase which, as I shall show in the next chapter, had important effects on the political conditions of the two provinces. The eastern or maritime provinces received but a small part of the yearly immigration from Europe, and even that was balanced by an exodus to the United States. Montreal had a population of 100,000, or double that of Quebec, and was now recognised as the commercial capital of British North America. Toronto had reached 60,000, and was making more steady progress in population and wealth than any other city, except Montreal. Towns and villages were springing up with great rapidity in the midst of the enterprising farming population of the western province. In Lower Canada the townships showed the energy of a