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Province of Canada Province du Canada (French) | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1841–1867 | |||||||||||
| Anthem: God Save the Queen | |||||||||||
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| Status | British colony | ||||||||||
| Capital |
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| Official languages | English • French | ||||||||||
| Religion | Church of England (modernAnglican Church of Canada), the officiallyEstablished Church in Canada's West (1841–1854)[1][2] | ||||||||||
| Government | Responsible government under aconstitutional monarchy | ||||||||||
| Monarch | |||||||||||
• 1841–1867 | Queen Victoria | ||||||||||
| Governor General | |||||||||||
• 1841 | Charles Poulett Thomson, 1st Baron Sydenham | ||||||||||
• 1861–1867 | Charles Monck, 4th Viscount Monck | ||||||||||
| Premier | |||||||||||
• 1841–1842 | Samuel Harrison | ||||||||||
| Legislature | Parliament of the Province of Canada | ||||||||||
• Upper house | Legislative Council | ||||||||||
• Lower house | Legislative Assembly | ||||||||||
| Historical era | Pre-Confederation era | ||||||||||
| 10 February 1841 | |||||||||||
| 11 March 1848 | |||||||||||
| 1 July 1867 | |||||||||||
| Population | |||||||||||
• 1860–61 | 2,507,657 | ||||||||||
| Currency |
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| Today part of | |||||||||||
TheProvince of Canada (or theUnited Province of Canada or theUnited Canadas) was aBritish colony inBritish North America from 1841 to 1867. Its formation reflected recommendations made byJohn Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham, in theReport on the Affairs of British North America following theRebellions of 1837–1838.
TheAct of Union 1840, passed on 23 July 1840 by theBritish Parliament and proclaimed by theCrown on 10 February 1841,[3] merged the Colonies ofUpper Canada andLower Canada by abolishing their separate parliaments and replacing them with asingle one with two houses, aLegislative Council as the upper chamber and theLegislative Assembly as the lower chamber. In the aftermath of the Rebellions of 1837–1838, unification of the two Canadas was driven by two factors. Firstly, Upper Canada was near bankruptcy because it lacked stable tax revenues, and needed the resources of the more populous Lower Canada to fund its internal transportation improvements. Secondly, unification was an attempt to swamp the French vote by giving each of the former provinces the same number of parliamentary seats, despite the larger population of Lower Canada.
Although Durham's report had called for the Union of the Canadas and forresponsible government (a government accountable to an independent local legislature), only the first of the two recommendations was implemented in 1841. For the first seven years, the government was led by an appointed governor general accountable only to theBritish government. Responsible government was not achieved until the second LaFontaine–Baldwin ministry in 1849, when Governor GeneralJames Bruce, 8th Earl of Elgin, agreed that the cabinet would be formed by the largest party in the Legislative Assembly, making the premier the head of the government and reducing the governor general to a more symbolic role.
The Province of Canada ceased to exist atCanadian Confederation on 1 July 1867, when it was divided into theCanadian provinces ofOntario andQuebec. Ontario included the area occupied by the pre-1841 British colony of Upper Canada, while Quebec included the area occupied by the pre-1841 British colony of Lower Canada (which had includedLabrador until 1809, when Labrador was transferred to the Britishcolony of Newfoundland).[4] Upper Canada was primarily English-speaking, whereas Lower Canada was primarily French-speaking.
The Province of Canada was divided into two parts:Canada East andCanada West.
Canada East was what became of the former colony ofLower Canada after being united into the Province of Canada. It would become the province ofQuebec after Confederation.
Canada West was what became of the former colony ofUpper Canada after being united into the Province of Canada. It would become the province ofOntario after Confederation.
The location of the capital city of the Province of Canada and of its bureaucracy changed six times in its 26-year history, because its elected politicians could not agree on a permanent seat of government.[5] The first capital was inKingston (1841–1844). The seat of government and the bureaucracy moved toMontreal (1844–1849) until rioters, spurred by a series of incendiary articles published inThe Gazette, protested against theRebellion Losses Bill andburned down Montreal's parliament buildings. It then moved toToronto (1849–1851). It moved toQuebec City from 1851 to 1855, then returned to Toronto from 1855 to 1859 before returning to Quebec City from 1859 to 1865. In 1857,Queen Victoria was asked to select a permanent seat of government. Her decision to makeOttawa as the permanent capital of the Province of Canada was announced in February 1858. The government subsequently initiated construction of Canada's first parliament buildings, onParliament Hill. The first stage of this construction was completed in 1865, just in time to host the final session of the lastparliament of the Province of Canada beforeConfederation in 1867.[6]
The Governor General remained the head of the civil administration of the colony, appointed by the British government, and responsible to it, not to the local legislature. He was aided by the Executive Council and the Legislative Council. The Executive Council aided in administration, and the Legislative Council reviewed legislation produced by the elected Legislative Assembly.
Sydenham came from a wealthy family of timber merchants, and was an expert in finance, having served on the English Board of Trade which regulated banking (including the colony). He was promised a barony if he could successfully implement the union of the Canadas, and introduce a new form of municipal government, the District Council. The aim of both exercises in state-building was to strengthen the power of the Governor General, to minimise the effect of the numerically superior French vote, and to build a "middle party" that answered to him, rather than the Family Compact or the Reformers. Sydenham was aWhig who believed in rational government, not "responsible government". To implement his plan, he used widespread electoral violence through theOrange Order. His efforts to prevent the election ofLouis LaFontaine, the leader of the French reformers, were foiled byDavid Willson, the leader of theChildren of Peace, who convinced the electors of the 4th Riding of York to transcend linguistic prejudice and elect LaFontaine in an English-speaking riding in Canada West.[7]
Bagot was appointed after the unexpected death of Thomson, with the explicit instructions to resist calls for responsible government. He arrived in the capital, Kingston, to find that Thomson's "middle party" had become polarised and he therefore could not form an executive. Even the Tories informed Bagot he could not form a cabinet without including LaFontaine and the French Party. LaFontaine demanded four cabinet seats, including one for Robert Baldwin. Bagot became severely ill thereafter, and Baldwin and Lafontaine became the first real premiers of the Province of Canada.[8] However, to take office as ministers, the two had to run for re-election. While LaFontaine was easily re-elected in 4th York, Baldwin lost his seat in Hastings as a result of Orange Order violence. It was now that the pact between the two men was completely solidified, as LaFontaine arranged for Baldwin to run inRimouski, Canada East. This was the union of the Canadas they sought, where LaFontaine overcame linguistic prejudice to gain a seat in English Canada, and Baldwin obtained his seat in French Canada.[9][10]
The Baldwin–LaFontaine ministry barely lasted six months before Governor Bagot also died in March 1843. He was replaced by Charles Metcalfe, whose instructions were to check the "radical" reform government. Metcalfe reverted to the Thomson system of strong central autocratic rule. Metcalfe began appointing his own supporters to patronage positions without Baldwin and LaFontaine's approval, as joint premiers. They resigned in November 1843, beginning a constitutional crisis that would last a year. Metcalfe refused to recall the legislature to demonstrate its irrelevance; he could rule without it. This year-long crisis, in which the legislature was prorogued, "was the final signpost on Upper Canada's conceptual road to democracy. Lacking the scale of the American Revolution, it nonetheless forced a comparable articulation and rethinking of the basics of political dialogue in the province."[11] In the ensuing election, however, the Reformers did not win a majority and thus were not called to form another ministry. Responsible government would be delayed until after 1848.[12]
Cathcart had been a staff officer with Wellington in the Napoleonic Wars, and rose in rank to become commander of British forces in North America from June 1845 to May 1847. He was also appointed as Administrator then Governor General for the same period, uniting for the first time the highest Civil and military offices. The appointment of this military officer as Governor General was due to heightened tensions with the United States over theOregon boundary dispute. Cathcart was deeply interested in the natural sciences, but ignorant of constitutional practice, and hence an unusual choice for Governor General. He refused to become involved in the day-to-day government of the conservative ministry of William Draper, thereby indirectly emphasising the need for responsible government. His primary focus was on redrafting the Militia Act of 1846. The signing of the Oregon Boundary Treaty in 1846 made him dispensable.[13]
Elgin's second wife, Lady Mary Louisa Lambton, was the daughter ofLord Durham and niece ofLord Grey, making him an ideal compromise figure to introduce responsible government. On his arrival, the Reform Party won a decisive victory at the polls. Elgin invited LaFontaine to form the new government, the first time a Governor General requested cabinet formation on the basis of party. The party character of the ministry meant that the elected premier – and no longer the governor – would be the head of the government. The Governor General would become a more symbolic figure. The elected Premier in the Legislative Assembly would now become responsible for local administration and legislation. It also deprived the Governor of patronage appointments to the civil service, which had been the basis of Metcalfe's policy.[14] The test of responsible government came in 1849, when the Baldwin–Lafontaine government passed the Rebellion Losses Bill, compensating French Canadians for losses suffered during theRebellions of 1837. Lord Elgin grantedroyal assent to the bill despite heatedTory opposition and his own personal misgivings, sparking riots in Montreal, during which Elgin himself was assaulted by an English-speaking Orange Order mob and the Parliament buildings were burned down.[14]
It was under Head, that true political party government was introduced with theLiberal-Conservative Party ofJohn A. Macdonald andGeorge-Étienne Cartier in 1856. It was during their ministry that the first organised moves toward Canadian Confederation took place.[15]
It was under Monck's governorship that theGreat Coalition of all of the political parties of the two Canadas occurred in 1864. The Great Coalition was formed to end the political deadlock between predominantly French-speaking Canada East and predominantly English-speaking Canada West. The deadlock resulted from the requirement of a "double majority" to pass laws in the Legislative Assembly (i.e., a majority in both the Canada East and Canada West sections of the assembly). The removal of the deadlock resulted in three conferences that led to confederation.[16]
Thomson reformed the Executive Councils of Upper and Lower Canada by introducing a "President of the Committees of Council" to act as a chief executive officer for the council and chair of the various committees. The first wasRobert Baldwin Sullivan. Thomson also systematically organised the civil service into departments, the heads of which sat on the Executive Council. A further innovation was to demand that every Head of department seek election in the Legislative Assembly.
The Legislative Council of the Province of Canada was theupper house. The 24 legislative councillors were originally appointed. In 1856, a bill was passed to replace the process of appointing members by a process of electing members. Members were to be elected from 24 divisions in each of Canada East and Canada West. Twelve members were elected every two years from 1856 to 1862. Members previously appointed were not required to relinquish their seats.
| Year | 1841 | 1844 | 1848 | 1851 | 1854 | 1858 | 1861 | 1863 | |||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CW | CE | Total | CW | CE | Total | CW | CE | Total | CW | CE | Total | CW | CE | Total | CW | CE | Total | CW | CE | Total | CW | CE | Total | ||
| Reform | 29 | 29 | 12 | 12 | 23 | 23 | 20 | 20 | 19 | 19 | |||||||||||||||
| Clear Grits | 14 | 14 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| Radical Reform | 6 | 6 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| Moderate Reform | 5 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 2 | 2 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Patriote | 21 | 21 | 23 | 23 | 23 | 23 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Rouges | 4 | 4 | 19 | 19 | 10 | 10 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Liberal | 5 | 5 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 34 | 5 | 39 | 29 | 29 | 58 | 39 | 25 | 64 | ||||||||||
| Family Compact | 10 | 10 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tory | 17 | 17 | 28 | 13 | 41 | 18 | 6 | 24 | 20 | 3 | 23 | ||||||||||||||
| Ministerialist | 23 | 23 | 35 | 35 | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Bleus | 33 | 33 | 27 | 27 | 25 | 25 | |||||||||||||||||||
| Liberal-Conservative | 25 | 9 | 34 | 24 | 15 | 39 | 29 | 8 | 37 | 24 | 11 | 35 | |||||||||||||
| Independent | 3 | 4 | 7 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 5 | 1 | 4 | 5 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 4 | ||
| Total | 42 | 42 | 84 | 42 | 42 | 84 | 42 | 42 | 84 | 42 | 42 | 84 | 65 | 65 | 130 | 65 | 65 | 130 | 65 | 65 | 130 | 65 | 65 | 130 | |
Canada West, with its 450,000 inhabitants, was represented by 42 seats in the Legislative Assembly, the same number as the more populated Canada East, with 650,000 inhabitants.
The Legislature's effectiveness was further hampered by the requirement of a "double majority" where a majority of votes for the passage of a bill had to be obtained from the members ofboth Canada East and West.
Each administration was led by two men, one from each half of the province. Officially, one of them at any given time had the title ofPremier, while the other had the title ofDeputy.
Municipal government in Upper Canada was under the control of appointed magistrates who sat inCourts of Quarter Sessions to administer the law within a District. A few cities, such as Toronto, were incorporated by special acts of the legislature.Governor Thomson, 1st Baron Sydenham, spearheaded the passage of the District Councils Act which transferred municipal government to District Councils. His bill allowed for two elected councillors from each township, but the warden, clerk and treasurer were to be appointed by the government. This thus allowed for strong administrative control and continued government patronage appointments. Sydenham's bill reflected his larger concerns to limit popular participation under the tutelage of a strong executive.[17] The Councils were reformed by the Baldwin Act in 1849 which made municipal government truly democratic rather than an extension of central control of the Crown. It delegated authority to municipal governments so they could raise taxes and enactby-laws. It also established a hierarchy of types of municipal governments, starting at the top with cities and continued down past towns, villages and finally townships. This system was to prevail for the next 150 years.[18]
During the year-long constitutional crisis in 1843–44, when Metcalfe prorogued Parliament to demonstrate its irrelevance, Baldwin established a "Reform Association" in February 1844, to unite the Reform movement in Canada West and to explain their understanding of responsible government. Twenty-two branches were established. A grand meeting of all branches of the Reform Association was held in the Second Meeting House of the Children of Peace inSharon. Over three thousand people attended this rally for Baldwin.[19] the Association was not, however, a true political party and individual members voted independently.
TheParti rouge (alternatively known as the Parti démocratique) was formed in Canada East around 1848 by radicalFrench Canadians inspired by the ideas ofLouis-Joseph Papineau, theInstitut canadien de Montréal, and the reformist movement led by theParti patriote of the 1830s. The reformistrouges did not believe that the 1840Act of Union had truly granted aresponsible government to former Upper and Lower Canada. They advocated important democratic reforms, republicanism,separation of the state and the church. In 1858, the electedrouges allied with theClear Grits. This resulted in the shortest-lived government in Canadian history, falling in less than a day.
The Clear Grits were the inheritors of William Lyon Mackenzie'sReform movement of the 1830s. Their support was concentrated among southwestern Canada West farmers, who were frustrated and disillusioned by the 1849Reform government ofRobert Baldwin and Louis-Hippolyte Lafontaine's lack of democratic enthusiasm. The Clear Grits advocateduniversal male suffrage,representation by population, democratic institutions, reductions in government expenditure, abolition of theClergy reserves,voluntarism, andfree trade with the United States. Their platform was similar to that of the BritishChartists. The Clear Grits and theParti rouge evolved into theLiberal Party of Canada.[20]
The Parti bleu was a moderate political group in Canada East that emerged in 1854. It was based on the moderate reformist views of Louis-Hippolyte Lafontaine.
The Liberal-Conservative Party emerged from a coalition government in 1854 in which moderateReformers and Conservatives fromCanada West joined withbleus from Canada East under the dual prime-ministership ofAllan MacNab andA.-N. Morin. The new ministry were committed to secularise the Clergy reserves in Canada West and to abolishseigneurial tenure in Canada East.[21] Over time, the Liberal-Conservatives evolved into the Conservative party.[20]
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No provision for responsible government was included in the Act of Union 1840. Early Governors of the province were closely involved in political affairs, maintaining a right to makeExecutive Council and other appointments without the input of the legislative assembly.[citation needed]
However, in 1848 theEarl of Elgin, then Governor General, appointed a Cabinet nominated by the majority party of the Legislative Assembly, the Baldwin–Lafontaine coalition that had won elections in January. Lord Elgin upheld the principles of responsible government by not repealing the Rebellion Losses Bill, which was highly unpopular with some English-speakingLoyalists who favoured imperial over majority rule.
As Canada East and Canada West each held 42 seats in theLegislative Assembly, there was a legislative deadlock between English (mainly from Canada West) and French (mainly from Canada East). The majority of the province was French, which demanded "rep-by-pop" (representation by population), which the Anglophones opposed.
The granting of responsible government to the colony is typically attributed to reforms in 1848 (principally the effective transfer of control over patronage from the Governor to the elected ministry). These reforms resulted in the appointment of the second Baldwin–Lafontaine government that quickly removed many of the disabilities on French-Canadian political participation in the colony.
Once the English population, rapidly growing through immigration, exceeded the French, the English demanded representation-by-population. In the end, the legislative deadlock between English and French led to a movement for a federal union which resulted in the broader Canadian Confederation in 1867.
In "The Liberal Order Framework: A Prospectus for a Reconnaissance of Canadian History" McKay argues that "the category 'Canada' should henceforth denote a historically specific project of rule, rather than either an essence we must defend or an empty homogeneous space we must possess. Canada-as-project can be analyzed as the implantation and expansion over a heterogeneous terrain of a certain politico-economic logic—to wit, liberalism."[22] The liberalism of which McKay writes is not that of a specific political party, but of certain practices of state building which prioritise property, first of all, and the individual.
TheBaldwin Act 1849, also known as the Municipal Corporations Act, replaced the local government system based on district councils in Canada West by government at the county level. It also granted more autonomy to townships, villages, towns and cities.
Despite the controversy, the government compensated landowners in theRebellion Losses Bill of 1849 for the actions during the Rebellion.
TheCanadian–American Reciprocity Treaty of 1854, also known as the Elgin–Marcy Treaty, was a trade treaty between the United Province of Canada and the United States. It covered raw materials and was in effect from 1854 to 1865. It represented a move toward free trade.
Education in Canada West was regulated by the province through the General Board of Education from 1846 until 1850, when it was replaced by the Department of Public Instruction, which lasted until 1876.[23]The province improved the educational system in Canada West underEgerton Ryerson.
French was reinstated as an official language of the legislature and the courts. The Legislature also codified theCivil Code of Lower Canada in 1866, and abolished the seigneurial system in Canada East.
In 1849, King's College was renamed the University of Toronto and the school's ties with the Church of England were severed.[24]
TheGrand Trunk Railway was incorporated by the Legislature in the 1850s. Exploration of Western Canada andRupert's Land with a view to annexation and settlement was a priority of Canada West politicians in the 1850s leading to thePalliser Expedition and the Red River Expedition ofHenry Youle Hind, George Gladman andSimon James Dawson.
In 1857, the Legislature introduced theGradual Civilization Act, putting into law the principle that Indigenous persons should become British subjects and discard their Indian status, in exchange for a grant of land.
| Year | Population (Upper) Canada West[25] | Population (Lower) Canada East[25] |
|---|---|---|
| 1841 | 455,688 | n/a |
| 1844 | n/a | 697,084 |
| 1848 | 725,879 | 765,797–786,693 estimates |
| 1851–52 | 952,004 | 890,261 |
| 1860–61 | 1,396,091 | 1,111,566 |
Labrador Act 1809. – An imperial act (49 Geo. III, cap. 27), 1809, provided for the re-annexation to Newfoundland of 'such parts of the coast of Labrador from the River St John to Hudson's Streights, and the said Island of Anticosti, and all other smaller islands so annexed to the Government of Newfoundland by the said Proclamation of the seventh day of October one thousand seven hundred and sixty-three (except the said Islands of Madelaine) shall be separated from the said Government of Lower Canada, and be again re-annexed to the Government of Newfoundland.
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