Canada under British Rule 1760-1900 Part 6

The character of the immigration varied considerably, but on the whole the thrifty and industrious formed the larger proportion. In 1833 the immigrants deposited 300,000 sovereigns, or nearly a million and a half of dollars, in the Upper Canadian banks. An important influence in the settlement of Upper Canada was exercised by one Colonel Talbot, the founder of the county of Elgin. Mrs. Anna Jameson, the wife of a vice-chancellor of Upper Canada, describes in her _Winter Studies and Summer Rambles_, written in 1838, the home of this great proprietor, a Talbot of Malahide, one of the oldest families in the parent state. The chateau--as she calls it, perhaps sarcastically--was a "long wooden building, chiefly of rough logs, with a covered porch running along the south side." Such homes as Colonel Talbot's were common enough in the country. Some of the higher cla.s.s of immigrants, however, made efforts to surround themselves with some of the luxuries of the old world. Mrs.

Jameson tells us of an old Admiral, who had settled in the London district--now the most prosperous agricultural part of Ontario--and had the best of society in his neighbourhood; "several gentlemen of family, superior education, and large capital (among them the brother of an English and the son of an Irish peer, a colonel and a major in the army) whose estates were in a flourishing state." The common characteristic of the Canadian settlements was the humble log hut of the poor immigrant, struggling with axe and hoe amid the stumps to make a home for his family. Year by year the sunlight was let into the dense forests, and fertile meadows soon stretched far and wide in the once untrodden wilderness. Despite all the difficulties of a pioneer's life, industry reaped its adequate rewards in the fruitful lands of the west, bread was easily raised in abundance, and animals of all kinds thrived.

Unhappily the great bane of the province was the inordinate use of liquor. "The erection of a church or chapel," says Mrs. Jameson, "generally preceded that of a school-house in Upper Canada, but the mill and the tavern invariably preceded both." The roads were of the most wretched character and at some seasons actually prohibitory of all social intercourse. The towns were small and ill-built. Toronto, long known as "muddy little York," had a population of about 10,000, but with the exception of the new parliament house, it had no public buildings of architectural pretensions. The houses were generally of wood, a few of staring ugly red brick; the streets had not a single side-walk until 1834, and in 1838 this comfort for the pedestrian was still exceptional.

Kingston, the ancient Cataraqui, was even a better built town than Toronto, and had in 1838 a population of perhaps 4500 persons. Hamilton and London were beginning to be places of importance. Bytown, now Ottawa, had its beginnings in 1826, when Colonel By of the Royal Engineers, commenced the construction of the Rideau Ca.n.a.l on the chain of lakes and rivers between the Ottawa and the St. Lawrence at Kingston.

The ambition of the people of Upper Canada was always to obtain a continuous and secure system of water navigation from the lakes to Montreal. The Welland Ca.n.a.l between Lakes Erie and Ontario was commenced as early as 1824 through the enterprise of Mr. William Hamilton Merritt, but it was very badly managed; and the legislature, which had from year to year aided the undertaking, was obliged eventually to acquire it as a provincial work. The Cornwall Ca.n.a.l was also undertaken, but work was stopped when it was certain that Lower Canada would not respond to the aspirations of the West and improve that portion of the St. Lawrence within its direct control. Flat-bottomed _bateaux_ and Durham boats were generally in use for the carriage of goods on the inland waters, and it was not until the completion of a ca.n.a.l system between the lakes and Montreal, after the Union, that steamers came into vogue.

The province of Upper Canada had in 1838 reached a crisis in its affairs. In the course of the seven years preceding the rebellion, probably eighty thousand or one half of the immigrants, who had come to the province, had crossed the frontier into the United States, where greater inducements were held out to capital and population. As Mrs.

Jameson floated in a canoe, in the middle of the Detroit River, she saw on the one side "all the bustle of prosperity and commerce," and on the other "all the symptoms of apathy, indolence, mistrust, hopelessness."

At the time such comparisons were made, Upper Canada was on the very verge of bankruptcy.

Turning to Lower Canada, we find that the financial position of the province was very different from that of Upper Canada. The public accounts showed an annual surplus, and the financial difficulties of the province were caused entirely by the disputes between the executive and the a.s.sembly which would not vote the necessary supplies. The timber trade had grown to large proportions and const.i.tuted the princ.i.p.al export to Great Britain from Quebec, which presented a scene of much activity in the summer. Montreal was already showing its great advantages as a headquarters of commerce on account of its natural relations to the West and the United States. Quebec and Montreal had each about 35,000 inhabitants. Travellers admitted that Montreal, on account of the solidity of its buildings, generally of stone, compared most favourably with many of the finest and oldest towns in the United States. The Parish Church of Notre Dame was the largest ecclesiastical edifice in America, and notable for its simple grandeur. With its ancient walls girdling the heights first seen by Jacques Cartier, with its numerous churches and convents, ill.u.s.trating the power and wealth of the Romish religion, with its rugged, erratic streets creeping through hewn rock, with its picturesque crowd of red-coated soldiers of England mingling with priests and sisters in sombre attire, or with the _habitants_ in _etoffe du pays_,--the old city of Quebec, whose history went back to the beginning of the seventeenth century, was certainly a piece of mediaevalism transported from northern France. The plain stone buildings of 1837 still remain in all their evidences of sombre antiquity. None of the religious or government edifices were distinguished for architectural beauty--except perhaps the English cathedral--but represented solidity and convenience, while harmonising with the rocks amid which they had risen.

The parliament of Lower Canada still met in the Bishop's Palace, which was in want of repair. The old Chateau St. Louis had been destroyed by fire in 1834, and a terrace bearing the name of Durham was in course of construction over its ruins. It now gives one of the most picturesque views in the world on a summer evening as the descending sun lights up the dark green of the western hills, or brightens the tin spires and roofs of the churches and convents, or lingers amid the masts of the ships moored in the river or in the coves, filled with great rafts of timber.

As in the days of French rule, the environs of Quebec and Montreal, and the north side of the St. Lawrence between these two towns, presented French Canadian life in its most picturesque and favourable aspect.

These settlements on the river formed one continuous village, with tinned spires rising every few miles amid poplars, maples and elms.

While the homes of the seigniors and of a few professional men were more commodious and comfortable than in the days of French rule, while the churches and presbyteries ill.u.s.trated the increasing prosperity of the dominant religion, the surroundings of the _habitants_ gave evidences of their want of energy and enterprise. But crime was rare in the rural districts and intemperance was not so prevalent as in parts of the west.

Nearly 150,000 people of British origin resided in Lower Canada--a British people animated for the most part by that spirit of energy natural to their race. What prosperity Montreal and Quebec enjoyed as commercial communities was largely due to the enterprise of British merchants. The timber trade was chiefly in their hands, and the bank of Montreal was founded by this cla.s.s in 1817--seven years before the bank of Upper Canada was established in Toronto. As political strife increased in bitterness, the differences between the races became accentuated. Papineau alienated all the British by his determination to found a "_Nation Canadienne_" in which the British would occupy a very inferior place. "French and British," said Lord Durham, "combined for no public objects or improvements, and could not harmonise even in a.s.sociations of charity." The French Canadians looked with jealousy and dislike on the increase and prosperity of what they regarded as a foreign and hostile race. It is quite intelligible, then, why trade languished, internal development ceased, landed property decreased in value, the revenue showed a diminution, roads and all cla.s.ses of local improvements were neglected, agricultural industry was stagnant, wheat had to be imported for the consumption of the people, and immigration fell off from 52,000 in 1832 to less than 5000 in 1838.

In the maritime provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, there were no racial antagonisms to affect internal development; and the political conflict never reached such proportions as to threaten the peace and security of the people. In New Brunswick the chief industry was the timber trade--deals especially--which received its first stimulus in 1809, when a heavy duty was placed on Baltic timber, while that from the colonies came free into the British Isles. Shipbuilding was also profitably followed in New Brunswick, and was beginning to be prosecuted in Nova Scotia, where, a few years later, it made that province one of the greatest ship-owning and ship-sailing communities of the world until iron steamers gradually drove wooden vessels from the carrying trade. The cod, mackerel, and herring fisheries--chiefly the first--were the staple industry of Nova Scotia, and kept up a large trade with the British West Indies, whence sugar, mola.s.ses and rum were imported. Prince Edward Island was chiefly an agricultural community, whose development was greatly r.e.t.a.r.ded by the wholesale grant of lands in 1767 to absentee proprietors. Halifax and St. John had each a population of twenty thousand. The houses were mostly of wood, the only buildings of importance being the government house, finished in 1805, and the provincial or parliament house, considered in its day one of the handsomest structures in North America.

In the beautiful valleys of Kings and Annapolis--now famous for their fruit--there was a prosperous farming population. Yarmouth ill.u.s.trated the thrift and enterprise of the Puritan element that came into the province from New England at an early date in its development. The eastern counties, with the exception of Pictou, showed no sign of progress. The Scotch population of Cape Breton, drawn from a poor cla.s.s of people in the north of Scotland, for years added nothing to the wealth of an island whose resources were long dormant from the absence of capital and enterprise.

Popular education in those days was at the lowest possible ebb. In 1837 there were in all the private and public schools of the provinces only one-fifteenth of the total population. In Lower Canada not one-tenth could write. The children of the _habitants_ repeated the Catechism by rote, and yet could not read as a rule. In Upper Canada things were no better. Dr. Thomas Rolph tells us that, so late as 1833, Americans or other anti-British adventurers carried on the greater proportion of the common schools, where the youth were taught sentiments "hostile to the parent state" from books used in the United States--a practice stopped by statute in 1846.

Adequate provision, however, was made for the higher education of youth in all the provinces. "I know of no people," wrote Lord Durham of Lower Canada, "among whom a larger provision exists for the higher kinds of elementary education." The piety and benevolence of the early possessors of the country founded seminaries and colleges, which gave an education resembling the kind given in the English public schools, though more varied. In Upper Canada, so early as 1807, grammar schools were established by the government. By 1837 Upper Canada College--an inst.i.tution still flourishing--offered special advantages to youths whose parents had some money. In Nova Scotia King's College--the oldest university in Canada--had its beginning as an academy as early as 1788, and educated many eminent men during its palmy days. Pictou Academy was established by the Reverend Dr. McCulloch as a remonstrance against the sectarianism of King's; and the political history of the province was long disturbed by the struggle of its promoters against the narrowness of the Anglicans, who dominated the legislative council, and frequently rejected the grant made by the a.s.sembly. Dalhousie College was founded in 1820 by Lord Dalhousie, then governor of Nova Scotia, to afford that higher education to all denominations which old King's denied. Acadia College was founded by the Baptists at Wolfville, on a gently rising ground overlooking the fertile meadows of Grand Pre. The foundations of the University of New Brunswick were laid in 1800. McGill University, founded by one of those generous Montreal merchants who have always been its benefactors, received a charter in 1821, but it was not opened until 1829. The Methodists laid the foundation of Victoria College at Cobourg in 1834, but it did not commence its work until after the Union; and the same was the case with King's College, the beginning of the University of Toronto.

We need not linger on the literary output of those early times. Joseph Bouchette, surveyor-general, had made in the first part of the century a notable contribution to the geography and cartography of Lower Canada.

Major Richardson, who had served in the war of 1812 and in the Spanish peninsula, wrote in 1833 "Wacousta or the Prophecy," a spirited romance of Indian life. In Nova Scotia the "Sayings and Doings of Sam Slick, of Slickville"--truly a remarkable original creation in humorous literature--first appeared in a Halifax paper. The author, Judge Haliburton, also published as early as 1829 an excellent work in two volumes on the history of his native province. Small libraries and book stores could only be seen in the cities.

In these early times of the provinces, when books and magazines were rarities, the newspaper press naturally exercised much influence on the social and intellectual conditions of the people at large. By 1838 there were no less than forty papers printed in the province of Upper Canada alone, some of them written with ability, though too often in a bitter, personal tone. In those days English papers did not circulate to any extent in a country where postage was exorbitant. People could hardly afford to pay postage rates on letters. The poor settler was often unable to pay the three or four shillings or even more, imposed on letters from their old homes across the sea; and it was not unusual to find in country post-offices a large acc.u.mulation of dead letters, refused or neglected on account of the expense. The management of the post-office by imperial officers was one of the grievances of the people of the provinces generally. It was carried on for the benefit of a few persons, and not for the convenience or solace of the many thousands who were anxious for news of their kin across the ocean.

CHAPTER VII.

A NEW ERA OF COLONIAL GOVERNMENT (1839--1867).

SECTION I.--The union of the Canadas and the establishment of responsible government.

Lord Durham's report on the affairs of British North America was presented to the British government on the 31st January, 1839, and attracted an extraordinary amount of interest in England, where the two rebellions had at last awakened statesmen to the absolute necessity of providing an effective remedy for difficulties which had been pressing upon their attention for years, but had never been thoroughly understood until the appearance of this famous state paper. A legislative union of the two Canadas and the concession of responsible government were the two radical changes which stood out prominently in the report among minor suggestions in the direction of stable government. On the question of responsible government Lord Durham expressed opinions of the deepest political wisdom. He found it impossible "to understand how any English statesman could have ever imagined that representative and irresponsible government could be successfully combined....To suppose that such a system would work well there, implied a belief that the French Canadians have enjoyed representative inst.i.tutions for half a century, without acquiring any of the characteristics of a free people; that Englishmen renounce every political opinion and feeling when they enter a colony, or that the spirit of Anglo-Saxon freedom is utterly changed and weakened among those who are transplanted across the Atlantic[3]."

[3: For the full text of Lord Durham's report, which was laid before Parliament, 11 February, 1839, see _English Parliamentary Papers_ for 1839.]

In June, 1839, Lord John Russell introduced a bill to reunite the two provinces, but it was allowed, after its second reading, to lie over for that session of parliament, in order that the matter might be fully considered in Canada. Mr. Poulett Thomson was appointed governor-general with the avowed object of carrying out the policy of the imperial government. Immediately after his arrival in Canada, in the autumn of 1839, the special council of Lower Canada and the legislature of Upper Canada pa.s.sed addresses in favour of a union of the two provinces. These necessary preliminaries having been made, Lord John Russell, in the session of 1840, again brought forward "An act to reunite the provinces of Upper and Lower Canada, and for the government of Canada," which was a.s.sented to on the 23rd of July, but did not come into effect until the 10th of February in the following year.

The act provided for a legislative council of not less than twenty members, and for a legislative a.s.sembly in which each section of the united provinces would be represented by an equal number of members--that is to say, forty-two for each or eighty-four in all. The number of representatives allotted to each province could not be changed except with the concurrence of two-thirds of the members of each house.

The members of the legislative council were appointed by the crown for life, and the members of the a.s.sembly were chosen by electors possessing a small property qualification. Members of both bodies were required to hold property to a certain amount. The a.s.sembly had a duration of four years, subject of course to be sooner dissolved by the governor-general.

Provision was made for a consolidated revenue fund, on which the first charges were expenses of collection, management and receipt of revenues, interest of public debt, payment of the clergy, and civil list. The English language alone was to be used in the legislative records. All votes, resolutions or bills involving the expenditure of public money were to be first recommended by the governor-general.

The first parliament of the United Canadas was opened on the 14th June, 1841, in the city of Kingston, by the governor-general, who had been created Baron Sydenham of Sydenham and of Toronto. This session was the commencement of a series of parliaments which lasted until the confederation of all the provinces in 1867, and forcibly ill.u.s.trated the capacity of the people of Canada to manage their internal affairs. For the moment, I propose to refer exclusively to those political conditions which brought about responsible government, and the removal of grievances which had so long perplexed the imperial state and distracted the whole of British North America.

In Lord John Russell's despatches of 1839,--the sequence of Lord Durham's report--we can clearly see the doubt in the minds of the imperial authorities whether it was possible to work the system of responsible government on the basis of a governor directly responsible to the parent state, and at the same time acting under the advice of ministers who would be responsible to a colonial legislature. But the colonial secretary had obviously come to the opinion that it was necessary to make a radical change which would insure greater harmony between the executive and the popular bodies of the provinces. Her Majesty, he stated emphatically, "had no desire to maintain any system of policy among her North American subjects which opinion condemns", and there was "no surer way of gaining the approbation of the Queen than by maintaining the harmony of the executive with the legislative authorities." The new governor-general was expressly appointed to carry out this new policy. If he was extremely vain, at all events he was also astute, practical, and well able to gauge the public sentiment by which he should be guided at so critical a period of Canadian history. The evidence is clear that he was not individually in favour of responsible government, as it was understood by men like Mr. Baldwin and Mr. Howe, when he arrived in Canada. He believed that the council should be one "for the governor to consult and no more"; and voicing the doubts that existed in the minds of imperial statesmen, he added, the governor "cannot be responsible to the government at home" and also to the legislature of the province, if it were so, "then all colonial government becomes impossible." The governor, in his opinion, "must therefore be the minister [i.e. the colonial secretary], in which case he cannot be under control of men in the colony."

When the a.s.sembly met it was soon evident that the Reformers in that body were determined to have a definite understanding on the all-important question of responsible government; and the result was that the governor-general, a keen politician, immediately recognised the fact that, unless he yielded to the feeling of the majority, he would lose all his influence. There is every reason to believe that the resolutions which were eventually pa.s.sed in favour of responsible government, in amendment to those moved by Mr. Baldwin, had his approval before their introduction. The two sets of resolutions practically differed little from each other, and the inference to be drawn from the political situation of these times is that the governor's friends in the council thought it advisable to gain all the credit possible with the public for the pa.s.sage of resolutions on the all-absorbing question of the day, since it was obvious that it had to be settled in some satisfactory and definite form. These resolutions embodying the principles of the new const.i.tution of Canada, were as follows: (1) "That the head of the executive government of the province, being within the limits of his government the representative of the sovereign, is responsible to the imperial authority alone, but that, nevertheless, the management of our local affairs can only be conducted by him with the a.s.sistance, counsel, and information of subordinate officers in the province. (2) That, in order to preserve between the different branches of the provincial parliament that harmony which is essential to the peace, welfare and good government of the province, the chief advisers of the representative of the sovereign, const.i.tuting a provincial administration under him, ought to be men possessed of the confidence of the representatives of the people; thus affording a guarantee that the well-understood wishes and interests of the people, which our gracious sovereign has declared shall be the rule of the provincial government, will on all occasions be faithfully represented and advocated. (3) That the people of this province have, moreover, the right to expect from such provincial administration, the exertion of their best endeavours that the imperial authority, within its const.i.tutional limits, shall be exercised in the manner most consistent with their well-understood wishes and interests."

On the 4th September, 1841, Lord Sydenham met with a serious accident while riding, and as his const.i.tution had been impaired for years he died a fortnight later, to the regret of all political parties. He was succeeded by Sir Charles Bagot, a Conservative and High Churchman, whose brief administration was notable for the display of infinite discretion on his part, and for his desire to do justice to the French Canadians even at the risk of offending the ultra-loyal party, who claimed special consideration in the management of public affairs. Responsible government was in a fair way of being permanently established when Sir Charles Bagot unhappily died in 1843 of dropsy, complicated by heart-disease; and Lord Metcalfe was brought from India to create--as it soon appeared--confusion and discord in the political affairs of the province. His ideas of responsible government were those which had been steadily inculcated by colonial secretaries since 1839, and were even entertained by Lord Sydenham himself, namely, that the governor should be as influential a factor as possible in the government, and should always remember that he was directly responsible to the crown, and should consider its prerogatives and interests as superior to all local considerations.

When Lord Metcalfe a.s.sumed the responsibilities of his post, he found in office a Liberal administration, led by Mr. Baldwin, the eminent Reform leader of Upper Canada, and Mr. Louis Hippolyte Lafontaine, afterwards chief justice of Lower Canada and a baronet, who had been at the outset, like all his countrymen, opposed to the union, as unjust to their province. What originally excited their antagonism were the conditions exacted by the legislature of Upper Canada: an equality of representation, though the French section had a population of two hundred thousand more than the western province, the exclusion of the French language from the legislature, and the imposition of the heavy debt of Upper Canada on the revenues of the united provinces. But unlike Mr. Papineau, with whom he had acted during the political struggles in Lower Canada, Mr. Lafontaine developed a high order of discreet statesmanship after the union, and recognised the possibility of making French Canada a force in government. He did not follow the example of Mr. John Neilson, who steadily opposed the union--but determined to work it out fairly and patiently on the principles of responsible government.

Lord Metcalfe, at the very outset, decided not to distribute the patronage of the crown under the advice of his responsible advisers, but to ignore them, as he declared, whenever he deemed it expedient. No responsible ministers could, with any regard to their own self-respect, or to the public interests, submit to a practice directly antagonistic to responsible government, then on its trial. Consequently, all the members of the Baldwin-Lafontaine government, with the exception of Mr.

Daly, immediately resigned, when Lord Metcalfe followed so unconst.i.tutional a course. Mr. Dominick Daly, afterwards knighted when governor of Prince Edward's Island--who had no party proclivities, and was always ready to support the crown in a crisis--became nominally head of a weak administration. The ministry was only completed after a most unconst.i.tutional delay of several months, and was even then only composed of men whose chief merit was their friendliness to the governor, who dissolved the a.s.sembly and threw all the weight of the crown into the contest. The governor's party was returned with a very small majority, but it was a victory, like that of Sir Francis Bond Head in 1835, won at the sacrifice of the dignity of the crown, and at the risk of exciting once more public discontent to a dangerous degree. Lord Metcalfe's administration was strengthened when Mr. Draper resigned his legislative councillorship and took a seat in the a.s.sembly as leader.

Lord Metcalfe's conduct received the approval of the imperial authorities, who elevated him to the peerage--so much evidence that they were not yet ready to concede responsible government in a complete sense. The result was a return to the days of old paternal government, when the parliamentary opposition was directed against the governor himself and the British government of which he was the organ. Lord Metcalfe had been a sufferer from cancer, and when it appeared again in its most aggravated form he returned to England, where he died a few months later (1846). The abuse that followed him almost to the grave was a discreditable exhibition of party rancour, but it indicated the condition to which the public mind had been brought by his unwise and unconst.i.tutional conduct of public affairs--conduct for which his only apology must be the half-hearted, doubtful policy of the imperial authorities with regard to the province, and his own inability to understand the fundamental principles of responsible government.

Lord Metcalfe's successor was Lord Cathcart, who had served with distinction in the Peninsular War, and was appointed with a view to contingencies that might arise out of the dispute between England and the United States on the Oregon boundary question, to which I shall refer in another chapter. He pursued a judicious course at a time when politics were complicated by the fact that the industry and commerce of the country were seriously deranged by the adoption of free trade in England, and the consequent removal of duties which had given the preference in the British market to Canadian wheat, flour and other products. What aggravated the commercial situation was the fact that the navigation laws, being still in force, closed the St. Lawrence to foreign shipping and prevented the extension of trade to other markets so as to compensate Canadians for the loss of that with the parent state. Lord Cathcart was recalled within less than a year, when all prospect of war with the United States had disappeared, and was followed (1847) by a civil governor, the Earl of Elgin, who was chosen by the Whig ministry, in which Lord John Russell was prime minister, and Earl Grey the secretary of state for the colonies. It had dawned upon English statesmen that the time had come for giving the colonists of British North America a system of responsible government without such reserves as had so seriously shackled its beginnings. In all probability they thought that the free-trade policy of England had momentarily weakened the ties that had bound the colonies to the parent state, and that it was advisable to follow up the new commercial policy by removing causes of public discontent in the province.

Lord Elgin was happily chosen to inaugurate a new era of colonial self-government. Gifted with a judicial mind and no ordinary amount of political sagacity, able to originate as well as carry out a statesmanlike policy, animated, like Lord Durham--whose daughter he had married--by a sincere desire to give full scope to the aspirations of the people for self-government, so far as compatible with the supremacy of the crown, possessed of eloquence which at once charmed and convinced, Lord Elgin was able to establish on sure foundations the principles of responsible government, and eventually to leave Canada with the conviction that no subsequent representative of the crown could again impair its efficient operation, and convulse the public mind, as Lord Metcalfe had done. On his arrival he gave his confidence to the Draper ministry, who were still in office; but shortly afterwards its ablest member was elevated to the bench, and Mr. Sherwood became attorney-general and head of a government, chiefly interesting now for the fact that one of its members was Mr. John Alexander Macdonald, who, on becoming a member of the a.s.sembly in 1844, had commenced a public career which made him one of the most notable figures in the history of the colonial empire of England.

Parliament was dissolved, and the elections were held in January, 1848, when the government were defeated by a large majority and the second Lafontaine-Baldwin ministry was formed; a ministry conspicuous for the ability of its members, and the useful character of its legislation during the four years it remained in power. It is noteworthy here that Lord Elgin did not follow the example of his predecessors and select the ministers himself, but followed the strict const.i.tutional usage of calling upon Mr. Lafontaine as a recognised leader of a party in parliament to form a government. It does not fall within the scope of this chapter to go into the merits of this great administration, whose coming into office may be considered the crowning of the principles adopted by Lord Elgin for the unreserved concession of responsible government, and never violated from that time forward by any governor of Canada.

We must now direct our attention to the maritime provinces, that we may complete this review of the progress of responsible government in British North America. In 1836 the revenues of New Brunswick had been placed at the disposal of the legislature, and administrative power entrusted to those who possessed the confidence of the a.s.sembly. The lieutenant-governor, Sir John Harvey, who had distinguished himself in the war of 1812-15, recognised in Lord John Russell's despatches "a new and improved const.i.tution," and by an official memorandum informed the heads of departments that "thenceforward their offices would be held by the tenure of public confidence"; but after his departure (in 1841) an attempt was made by Sir William Colebrooke to imitate the example of Lord Metcalfe. He appointed to the provincial secretaryship a Mr. Reade, who had been only a few months in the province, and never represented a const.i.tuency or earned promotion in the public service. The members of the executive council were never consulted, and four of the most popular and influential councillors soon resigned. One of them, Mr. Lemuel A.

Wilmot, the recognised leader of the Liberals, addressed a strong remonstrance to the lieutenant-governor, and vindicated those principles of colonial government "which require the administration to be conducted by heads of departments responsible to the legislature, and holding their offices contingently upon the approbation and confidence of the country, as expressed through the representatives of the people." The colonial secretary of state disapproved of the action of the lieutenant-governor, and const.i.tutional government was strengthened in this province of the Loyalists. From that time there was a regularly organised administration and an opposition contending for office and popular favour.

In Nova Scotia a despatch from Lord Glenelg brought to a close in 1838 the agitation which had been going on for years for a separation of the executive from the legislative functions of the legislative council, and the formation of two distinct bodies in accordance with the existing English system. In this state paper--the first important step towards responsible government in the province--the secretary of state, Lord Glenelg, stated that it was her Majesty's pleasure that neither the chief justice nor any of his colleagues should sit in the council, that all the judges should entirely withdraw from all political discussions; that the a.s.sembly's claim to control and appropriate all the revenues arising in the province should be fully recognised by the government; that the two councils should be thereafter divided, and that the members of these bodies should be drawn from different parts of the province--Halifax previously having obtained all the appointments except one or two--and selected without reference to distinctions of religious opinions. Unfortunately for Nova Scotia there was at that time at the head of the executive a brave, obstinate old soldier, Sir Colin Campbell, who had petrified ideas on the subject of colonial administration, and showed no disposition to carry out the obvious desire of the imperial authorities to give a more popular form to the government of the province. One of his first official acts was to give to the Anglican Church a numerical superiority to which it had no valid claim. As in Upper Canada, at that time, there was a combination or compact, composed of descendants of English Tories or of the Loyalists of 1783, who belonged to the Anglican Church, and were opposed to popular government. Two men were now becoming most prominent in politics. One of these was Mr. James William Johnston, the son of a Georgia Loyalist, an able lawyer, gifted with a persuasive tongue which chimed most harmoniously with the views of Sir Colin. On the other side was Mr. Joseph Howe, the son of a Loyalist printer of Boston, who had no such aristocratic connections as Mr. Johnston, and soon became the dominant influence in the Reform party, which had within its ranks such able and eloquent men as S.G.W. Archibald, Herbert Huntington, Lawrence O'Connor Doyle, William and George R. Young, and, very soon, James Boyle Uniacke. Sir Colin Campbell completely ignored the despatches of Lord John Russell, which were recognised by Sir John Harvey as conferring "an improved const.i.tution" upon the colonies. In February, 1840, Mr. Howe moved a series of resolutions, in which it was emphatically stated that "no satisfactory settlement of questions before the country could be obtained until the executive council was remodelled," and that, as then const.i.tuted, "it did not enjoy the confidence of the country." The motion was carried by a majority of eighteen votes, in a house of forty-two members, and indeed, so untenable was the position of the executive council that Mr. James Boyle Uniacke, a member of the government, retired, rather than vote, and subsequently placed his resignation in the hands of the lieutenant-governor, on the ground that it was his duty to yield to the opinions of the representative house, and facilitate the introduction of a better system of government, in accordance with the well-understood wishes of the people. From that time Mr. Uniacke became one of Mr. Howe's ablest allies in the struggle for self-government. Sir Colin, however, would not recede from the att.i.tude he had a.s.sumed, but expressed the opinion, in his reply to the address of the legislature, that he could not recognise in the despatch of the colonial secretary of state "any instruction for a fundamental change in the colonial const.i.tution." The a.s.sembly then prayed her Majesty, in a powerful and temperate address, to recall Sir Colin Campbell. Though Lord John Russell did not present the address to the Queen, the imperial government soon afterwards appointed Lord Falkland to succeed Sir Colin Campbell, whose honesty of purpose had won the respect of all parties.

Lord Falkland was a Whig, a lord of the bedchamber, and married to one of the Fitzclarences--a daughter of William IV and Mrs. Jordan. He arrived at Halifax in September, 1840, and his first political act was in the direction of conciliating the Liberals, who were in the majority in the a.s.sembly. He dismissed--to the disgust of the official party--four members of the executive who had no seats in either branch of the legislature, and induced Mr. Howe and Mr. James MacNab to enter the government, on the understanding that other Liberals would be brought in according as vacancies occurred, and that the members of the council should hold their seats only upon the tenure of public confidence. A dissolution took place, the coalition government was sustained, and the Liberals came into the a.s.sembly with a majority. Mr.

Howe was elected speaker of the a.s.sembly, though an executive councillor--without salary; but he and others began to recognise the impropriety of one man occupying such positions, and in a later session a resolution was pa.s.sed against the continuance of what was really an un-British and unconst.i.tutional practice. It was also an ill.u.s.tration of the ignorance that prevailed as to the principles that should guide the words and acts of a cabinet, that members of the executive, who had seats in the legislative council, notably Mr. Stewart, stated openly, in contradiction of the a.s.sertions of Mr. Howe and his Liberal colleagues, that "no change had been made in the const.i.tution of the country, and that responsible government in a colony was responsible nonsense, and meant independence." It was at last found necessary to give some sort of explanation of such extraordinary opinions, to avert a political crisis in the a.s.sembly. Then, to add to the political embarra.s.sment, there was brought before the people the question of abandoning the practice of endowing denominational colleges, and of establishing in their place one large non-sectarian University. At this time the legislature voted annual grants to five sectarian educational inst.i.tutions of a high cla.s.s. The most important were King's College, belonging to the Anglican Church, and Acadia College, supported by the Baptists. The Anglican Church was still influential in the councils of the province, and the Baptists had now the support of Mr. Johnston, the able attorney-general, who had seceded from the Church of England. This able lawyer and politician had won the favour of the aristocratic governor, and persuaded him to dissolve the a.s.sembly, during the absence of Mr. Howe in the country, though it had continuously supported the government, and the people had given no signs of a want of confidence in the house as then const.i.tuted. The fact was, Mr. Johnston and his friends in the council thought it necessary to lose no time in arousing the feelings of the supporters of denominational colleges against Mr. Howe and other Liberals, who had commenced to hold meetings throughout the country in favour of a non-sectarian University. The two parties came back from the electors almost evenly divided, and Mr. Howe had an interview with Lord Falkland. He consented to remain in the cabinet until the a.s.sembly had an opportunity of expressing its opinion on the question at issue, when the governor himself precipitated a crisis by appointing to the executive and legislative councils Mr. M.B. Almon, a wealthy banker, and a brother-in-law of the attorney-general. Mr. Howe and Mr. MacNab at once resigned their seats in the government on the ground that Mr.

Almon's appointment was a violation of the compact by which two Liberals had been induced to join the ministry, and was most unjust to the forty or fifty gentlemen who, in both branches, had sustained the administration for several years. Instead of authorising Mr. Johnston to fill the two vacancies and justify the course taken by the governor, the latter actually published a letter in a newspaper, in which he boldly stated that he was entirely opposed to the formation of a government composed of individuals of one political party, that he would steadily resist any invasion of the royal prerogatives with respect to appointments, and that he had chosen Mr. Almon, not simply on the ground that he had not been previously engaged in political life to any extent, but chiefly because he wished to show his own confidence in Mr.

Johnston, Mr. Almon's brother-in-law. Lord Falkland had obviously thrown himself into the arms of the astute attorney-general and his political friends.

It was now a political war _a outrance_ between Lord Falkland and Mr.

Howe, from 1842 until the governor left the province in 1846. Lord Falkland made strenuous efforts to detach Mr. MacNab, Mr. Uniacke and other Liberals from Mr. Howe, and induce them to enter the government, but all to no purpose. He now gave up writing letters to the press, and attacked his opponents in official communications addressed to the colonial office, which supported him, as it did Lord Metcalfe, under a.n.a.logous circ.u.mstances. These despatches were laid without delay on the tables of the houses, to be used far and wide against the recalcitrant Liberals. Mr. Howe had again renewed his connection with the press, which he had left on becoming speaker and councillor, and had become editor of the _Nova Scotian_, and the _Morning Chronicle_, of which Mr. Annand was the proprietor. In these influential organs of the Liberal party--papers still in existence--Mr. Howe attacked Lord Falkland, both in bitter prose and sarcastic verse. All this while the governor and his council contrived to control the a.s.sembly, sometimes by two or three votes, sometimes by a prorogation when it was necessary to dispose summarily of a troublesome question. Public opinion began to set in steadily against the government. The controversy between Lord Falkland and Mr. Howe reached its climax on the 21st February, 1846, when a despatch was brought down to the house, referring to the speaker, Mr. William Young, and his brother, George R. Young, as the a.s.sociates of "reckless" and "insolvent" men--the reference being to Mr. Howe and his immediate political friends. When the despatch had been read, Mr.

Howe became greatly excited, and declared amid much disorder that if "the infamous system" of libelling respectable colonists in despatches sent to the colonial office was continued, "without their having any means of redress ... some colonist would by-and-by, or he was much mistaken, hire a black fellow to horsewhip a lieutenant-governor."

It was time that this unhappy conflict should end. The imperial authorities wisely transferred Lord Falkland to Bombay, where he could do no harm, and appointed Sir John Harvey to the government of Nova Scotia. Like Lord Elgin in Canada, he was discreetly chosen by the Reform ministry, as the sequel showed. He was at first in favour of a coalition government like his predecessors, but he wisely dissolved the a.s.sembly when he found that the leading Liberals positively refused to go into an alliance with the members of the executive council, or any other set of men, until the people had decided between parties at the polls. The result was a victory for the Liberals, and as soon as the a.s.sembly met a direct motion of want of confidence was carried against the government, and for the first time in the history of the country the governor called to his council men exclusively belonging to the opposition in the popular branch. Mr. Howe was not called upon to form a cabinet--his quarrel with Lord Falkland had to be resented somehow--but the governor's choice was Mr. James Boyle Uniacke, who gave a prominent position in the new government to the great Liberal, to whom responsible government owed its final success in this maritime province.

Responsible government was not introduced into Prince Edward Island until 1851, when an address on the prosperous state of the island was presented to the imperial authorities, who at once consented to concede responsible government on the condition that adequate provision was made for certain public officers affected by the new order of things. The leader of the new government was the Honourable George Coles.

In the history of the past there is much to deplore, the blunders of English ministers, the want of judgment on the part of governors, the selfishness of "family compacts," the arrogance of office-holders, the recklessness of Canadian politicians. But the very trials of the crisis through which Canada pa.s.sed brought out the fact, that if English statesmen had mistaken the spirit of the Canadian people, and had not always taken the best methods of removing grievances, it was not from any studied disposition to do these countries an injustice, but rather because they were unable to see until the very last moment that, even in a colony, a representative system must be worked in accordance with those principles that obtained in England, and that it was impossible to direct the internal affairs of dependencies many thousand miles distant through a colonial office, generally managed by a few clerks.

Of all the conspicuous figures of these memorable times, which already seem so far away from Canadians of the present day, who possess so many political rights, there are several who stand out more prominently than all others, and represent the distinct types of politicians, who influenced the public mind during the first half of the nineteenth century, when responsible government was in slow process of evolution from the political struggles which arose in the operation of representative inst.i.tutions. Around the figure of Louis Joseph Papineau there has always been a sort of glamour which has helped to conceal his vanity, his rashness and his want of political sagacity, which would, under any circ.u.mstances, have prevented his success as a safe statesman, capable of guiding a people through a trying ordeal. His eloquence was fervid and had much influence over his impulsive countrymen, his sincerity was undoubted, and in all likelihood his very indiscretions made more palpable the defects of the political system against which he so persistently and so often justly declaimed. He lived to see his countrymen enjoy power and influence under the very union which they resented, and to find himself no longer a leader among men, but isolated from a great majority of his own people, and representing a past whose methods were antagonistic to the new regime that had grown up since 1838. It would have been well for his reputation had he remained in obscurity on his return from exile in 1847, when he and other rebels of 1837 were wisely pardoned, and had he never stood again on the floor of the parliament of Canada, as he did from 1848 until 1854, since he could only prove, in those later times, that he had never understood the true working of responsible government. While the Lafontaine-Baldwin ministry were in power, he revived an agitation for an elective legislative council and declared himself utterly hostile to responsible government; but his influence was at an end in the country, and he could make little impression on the a.s.sembly. The days of reckless agitation had pa.s.sed, and the time for astute and calm statesmanship had come. Lafontaine and Morin were now safer political guides for his countrymen. He soon disappeared entirely from public view, and in the solitude of his picturesque chateau, amid the groves that overhang the Ottawa River, only visited from time to time by a few staunch friends, or by curious tourists who found their way to that quiet spot, he pa.s.sed the remainder of his days with a tranquillity in wondrous contrast to the stormy and eventful drama of his life. The writer often saw his n.o.ble, dignified figure--erect even in age--pa.s.sing unnoticed on the streets of Ottawa, when perhaps at the same time there were strangers, walking through the lobbies of the parliament house, asking for his portrait.

William Lyon Mackenzie is a far less picturesque figure in Canadian history than Papineau, who possessed an eloquence of tongue and a grace of demeanour which were not the attributes of the little peppery, undignified Scotchman who, for a few years, played so important a part in the English-speaking province. With his disinterestedness and unselfishness, with his hatred of political injustice and oppression, Canadians who remember the history of the const.i.tutional struggles of England will always sympathise. Revolt against absolutism and tyranny is permissible in the opinion of men who love political freedom, but the conditions of Upper Canada were hardly such as justified the rash insurrection into which he led his deluded followers, many to misery and some to death. Mackenzie lived long enough to regret these sad mistakes of a reckless period of his life, and to admit that "the success of the rebellion would have deeply injured the people of Canada," whom he believed he was then serving, and that it was the interest of the Canadian people to strengthen in every way the connection with England.

Like Papineau, he returned to Canada in 1849 to find himself entirely unequal to the new conditions of political life, where a large const.i.tutional knowledge, a spirit of moderation and a statesmanlike conduct could alone give a man influence in the councils of his country.

One historian has attempted to elevate Dr. Rolph at his expense, but a careful study of the career of those two actors will lead fair-minded readers to the conclusion that even the reckless course followed at the last by Mackenzie was preferable to the double-dealing of his more astute colleague. Dr. Rolph came again into prominence as one of the founders of the Clear Grits, who formed in 1849 an extreme branch of the Reform party. Dr. Rolph's qualities ensured him success in political intrigue, and he soon became a member of the Hincks-Morin government, which was formed on the reconstruction of the Lafontaine-Baldwin ministry in 1851, when its two moderate leaders were practically pushed aside by men more in harmony with the aggressive elements of the Reform party. But Mr. Mackenzie could never win such triumphs as were won by his wily and more manageable a.s.sociate of old times. He published a newspaper--_The Weekly Message_--replete with the eccentricities of the editor, but it was never a financial success, while his career in the a.s.sembly from 1851 until 1858 only proved him almost a nullity in public affairs. Until his death in 1861 his life was a constant fight with poverty, although his closing years were somewhat soothed by the gift of a homestead. He might have received some public position which would have given him comfort and rest, but he would not surrender what he called his political freedom to the men in office, who, he believed, wished to purchase his silence--the veriest delusion, as his influence had practically disappeared with his flight to the United States.