Delphi Complete Works of Stephen Leacock, page 539
The letter concludes with some interesting paragraphs in which the writer discusses the strictures that had been passed in the course of the debate in the House of Commons upon the leaders of the Canadian ministry. “Nothing can be more untrue,” writes Hincks, “than the allegation that any member of the present administration was implicated in the rebellion. No reward was ever offered for the apprehension of any one of them. Baldwin never was a fugitive from justice. Such absurd statements as I have heard regarding occurrences in Canada, only prove that it is very unsafe for parties at a distance of three thousand miles to interfere in our affairs. I confess, however, that I was not very sorry that the members of the House of Commons had an opportunity afforded them of hearing at least one speech in the true Canadian Tory spirit, as they are enabled to judge of the manner in which the passions of the mob of Montreal were inflamed.
“Let me, in conclusion,” wrote Hincks, “say a word or two regarding ‘French domination.’ I should imagine that the author of Coningsby [Mr. Disraeli] understands the meaning of getting up a ‘good cry’ to serve party purposes. The cry of the Canadian Tory party is ‘French domination,’ and it is especially intended to excite the sympathy of people in England who understand little about our politics, but who are naturally inclined to sympathize with a British party governed by French influence. A little reflection would convince them that ‘French domination’ cannot exist in the united province. I need scarcely say that it is wholly untrue that it does exist. The administration consists of five members from Upper Canada and five from Lower Canada. The former represent some of the most important constituencies in Upper Canada. If the administration of the government or of the legislature were made subservient to French influence, is it probable, I would ask, that the government would be supported by the British people of Upper Canada? All I shall say in conclusion is, that I claim for myself and my colleagues from Upper Canada — and in truth and justice I should say for my Lower Canadian colleagues also — that we have as THE FINANCIAL OUTLOOK much true British feeling as any member of that party which seems to wish to monopolize it.”
The financial purpose of Hincks’s visit to England — the strengthening of the credit of the colony in the London market — was accomplished with marked success. The inspector-general realized that the agitation occasioned by recent events, and the pervading ignorance in reference to the economic position and prospects of Canada, seriously prejudiced the securities of the province in the eyes of the British investors. To meet this situation, Hincks prepared and published in London a pamphlet entitled, Canada and its Financial Resources. In this publication he shows that the money hitherto borrowed by the Canadian government had been employed in public works of a sound and reproductive character. The imperial guarantee loan of £1,500,000 and the issue of provincial debentures of a somewhat larger sum make a gross total of £3,223,839, and represent the larger part of the cost of the public works of the province, the total cost being estimated by Hincks at £3,703,781 sterling. In order to show the utility and profitableness of the expenditure thus made, Hincks composed a series of tables showing the growth and progress of the colony for the last twenty-five years. The population of Upper Canada had risen, between 1824 and 1848, from 151,097 to 723,292 inhabitants: Lower Canada, whose population in 1825 had stood at 423,630, now contained 766,000 souls. The land under cultivation in Upper Canada had increased during the same period from 535,212 to 2,673,820 acres: the yield of local taxation in Upper Canada had increased from £10,235 to £86,058; while the estimated revenue for the united province in the current year stood at £574,640, a sum whose proportion to the public debt showed the stable condition of the provincial finances. Although financial and fiscal discussion forms the major part of Hincks’s pamphlet, he deals also with the political situation, reasserts the essential loyalty of the Reform party, urges the necessity for the further development of the province and calls for imperial aid in the building of an intercolonial railway. The effect of this pamphlet and of the series of letters of a similar character which Hincks contributed to the Daily Mail in the following August, was most happy. An increasing confidence on the part of the British public in the financial soundness of the Canadian government tended to offset the unfortunate effect produced by the agitation over the Act of Indemnification.
The attitude of Lord Elgin in regard to the Rebellion Losses Bill has been much discussed. At the time of the adoption of the measure his conduct was made the subject of mistaken censure from various quarters. He was blamed for not having refused his assent to the bill: he was LORD ELGIN JUSTIFIED blamed for not having dissolved the parliament: he was blamed for having afterwards remained for weeks at “Monklands” without having insisted on forcing his way into the city under military protection. But time has justified his conduct in every respect. One must read the journals of the time to appreciate how much the governor-general was called upon to bear, and with what grave responsibility the office of constitutional head of the country becomes invested in moments of danger. The Tory press was filled with bitter personal attacks. “This man’s father,” said the Montreal Courier, “was denounced by the noblest bard, but one, that England ever produced, as the Robber of the Greek Temples; his son will be heard of in future times as the man who lost for England the noble colony won by the blood of Wolfe.” Compare with this the utterance of Lord Elgin made at the same time. “I am prepared to bear any amount of obloquy that may be cast upon me, but, if I can possibly prevent it, no stain of blood shall rest upon my name.”
In his treatment of the Rebellion Losses Bill and his firm conviction that it was his duty to give his assent, Lord Elgin achieved for Canada one of the greatest victories of its constitutional progress. “By reserving the bill,” wrote Lord Elgin afterwards, “I should only throw on Her Majesty’s government a responsibility which rests, and I think, ought to rest, on me. . . . If I had dissolved parliament, I might have produced a rebellion, but assuredly I should not have procured a change of ministry.” As the sight of flame and the sound of riots drifts into the past, a momentous achievement appears written large on the surface of our history by Lord Elgin’s acceptance of the Act of Indemnification. It signified that, from now on, the government of Canada, whether conducted ill or well, was at least to be conducted by the people — the majority of the people — of Canada itself. The history of the struggle for responsible government in our country reaches here its culmination.
3 Vict. c. 76.
The Act is 12 Vict. c. 58.
9 Vict. c. 65.
3 Vict. c. 76.
Lord Elgin (Makers of Canada Series), .
An excellent account of the debate is given by Dent, The Last Forty Years, vol. ii, p ff. (Toronto, 1881).
March 23rd, 1849.
March 29th, 1849.
The Times, March 21st, 1849.
Hincks went out to “Monklands” to request the governor-general to assent at once to the tariff bill. Reminiscences, .
Montreal Courier.
The Times, June 20th, 1849.
See especially Cochrane’s speech (The Times, June 15th, 1849) and his reference to Baldwin, LaFontaine, Papineau, and the “arch-traitor Mackenzie.”
The reference is, of course, to the collection of the Elgin marbles.
CHAPTER XI. THE END OF THE MINISTRY
THE STORY OF responsible government, with which the present volume is mainly concerned, practically ends, as has just been said, with the passage of the Rebellion Losses Bill. The history of the concluding sessions of the LaFontaine-Baldwin administration, of the disintegration of the ministry and of the reconstruction of the Reform government under Hincks and Morin, belongs elsewhere. It has, moreover, already received ample treatment in other volumes of the present series. We are here approaching the days of the Clear Grits, of Radicals breaking from Reformers, of a Parti Rouge, of recrudescent Toryism and the political match-making of the coalition era. But some brief account of the decline and end of the LaFontaine-Baldwin administration may here be appended.
Union in opposition is notoriously easier than union in office. Opposition is a negative function, the work of government is positive. It was but natural, therefore, that with the accession of the Reform party to power and the definite acceptance of the great principle which had held them together, differences of opinion which had been held in abeyance during the struggle for power, now began to make themselves felt. The Reformers were by profession a party of progress, and it was natural that some among them should aim at a more rapid rate of advance than others. “It cannot be expected,” wrote Hincks, reviewing in later days the period before us, “that there will be the same unanimity among the members of a party of progress as in one formed to resist organic changes. In the former there will always be a section dissatisfied with what they think the inertness of their leaders.”
Moreover, the great upheaval of the Rebellion Losses agitation tended to throw into a strong light all existing differences of opinion and to intensify political feeling. The movement towards annexation with the United States in the summer of 1849, which led a number of the British residents of Montreal to sign a manifesto in its favour, was doubtless dictated as much by political spite as by serious conviction. But it is characteristic, none the less, of the precipitating influence exercised upon the formation of parties by the great agitation. In addition to this, the recent events in Europe — chartism and the repeal movement A SUCCESSFUL ADMINISTRATION in the British Isles, and the democratic revolutions on the continent — gave a strong impulse to the doctrines of Radicalism, and at the same time repelled many people from the party of progress and directed them towards the party of order and stability. The years of the mid-century were consequently an era in which the formation and movements of parties were modified under new and powerful impulses.
In despite of this, the LaFontaine-Baldwin administration throughout the years 1849 and 1850 remained in a position of exceptional power. It suffered indeed to some extent from the desertion of Malcolm Cameron who resigned his place in a ministry that moved too slowly for his liking (December, 1849), and from the elevation of so strong a combatant as Mr. Blake to the calmer atmosphere of the bench. But it gained something also from the propitious circumstances of the time. The cloud of commercial depression that had hung over Canada was passing away. The removal of the last of the British Navigation Acts in 1849 — for which Baldwin, a convinced free trader, and his fellow-Reformers had long since petitioned the imperial government — brought to the ports of the St. Lawrence in the ensuing year an entry of nearly one hundred foreign vessels: the completion of the works on the Welland Canal, on which in all some $6,269,000 had been expended, seemed to inaugurate a new era for the shipping trade of the Great Lakes, while the prospect of an early reciprocity with the United States and the Maritime Provinces, and the extension of the railroad system, were rapidly reviving the agriculture and commerce of the united provinces. The bountiful harvest of 1850 came presently to add the climax to the national prosperity.
The ministry, therefore, in despite of the progress of Radicalism, which was soon to threaten its existence, was able in the session of 1850 to carry out several reform measures of great importance. The seat of government had meantime, in accordance with an address from the legislature, been transferred to the city of Toronto, which was henceforth to alternate with Quebec, in four year periods, in the honour of being the provincial capital. The appearance of Lord Elgin at the old parliament buildings on Front Street was greeted with loud acclamations from a loyal population, and the Tory party, after one or two unsuccessful attempts to undo the Act of Indemnification by further legislation, found themselves compelled to accept the inevitable. The reorganization of the postal system, now transferred to the control of Canada, with the lowering of postal rates, was one of the leading reforms effected in the session. A new school law for Upper Canada carried out more completely the system inaugurated under Draper’s Act, and confirmed the principle of granting separate schools TWIN RIDDLES OF THE SPHINX to Roman Catholics. An improved jury system, a reorganization of the division courts and certain amendments in the election law, were also among the results of the session’s work. It was noted with congratulation by the friends of the ministry that not a single bill adopted by the legislature was reserved by the governor-general. The Globe in calling attention to the fact, “unprecedented in Canadian history,” declared that it proved “the practical existence of responsible government.”
The legislative success of the session of 1850 was perhaps more apparent than real. Some great questions of practical reform — notably those of the Clergy Reserves and of Seigniorial Tenure — were still pressing for solution. In these two vexed problems, which had stood before the politicians of the two Canadas for a generation past like twin riddles of the sphinx, were contained the eternal problem of the Church and the State, and the like problem of landed aristocracy against unlanded democracy. On these the party of the Reformers could find no common ground of agreement. These two issues and the natural drift of political thought of the time were bringing out more clearly each day the difference between Radicals and Reformers. Neither Baldwin nor LaFontaine had anything of the complexion of a Radical. The former, indeed, showed in his private walk of life much of that reverence for the things and ideas of the past, which is often a part of the inconsistent equipment of the Liberal politician. In his Municipal Act his resuscitation of the Saxon term “reeve” had excited the kindly ridicule of his contemporaries. LaFontaine too had much that was conservative in his temperament, and though in his younger years no over zealous practitioner of religion, he set his face strongly against anything that savoured of spoliation of the rightful claims of the Church. As against the moderation and tempered zeal of the chiefs, the intemperate haste and unqualified doctrines of some of their followers now began to stand in rude contrast. The latter urged the full measure of the Democratic programme. “Take from the churches,” they said, “their reserved lands that are merely a relic of old time ecclesiastical privilege, change this mediæval seignior of Lower Canada and his tenants into ordinary property-holders, and give us in our constitutions a full and untrammelled application of the principles of popular election, — an elected assembly, an elected Upper House and an elected governor at the head.”
Many of the leaders of the new Radicalism were men not without influence in the community. There was, in Upper Canada, William Lyon Mackenzie, now returned from his ungrateful exile to fish in the troubled waters as an Independent, and aspiring again to popular leadership; Dr. John Rolph, the agitator of the pre-rebellion days, who had ridden out with Baldwin to interview the THE CLEAR GRITS’ PLATFORM rebels at Montgomery’s tavern, and who, like Mackenzie, had known the bitterness of exile; Macdougall, a lawyer by title but by predilection a politician and journalist, once a contributor to the Examiner but now the editor of a Radical publication called the North American. With these was Malcolm Cameron, the recently resigned commissioner of public works. Out of this material was being formed the new party of the Radicals, a party that boasted that it wanted only men of “clear grit,” and whose members presently became known as the Clear Grits. Their platform, which shows the infection of European democratic movements, consisted of the following demands: The application of the elective principle to all the officials and institutions of the country, from the head of the government downwards; universal suffrage; vote by ballot; biennial parliaments; abolition of the property qualification for members of parliament; a fixed term for the holding of general elections and for the meeting of the legislature; retrenchment; abolition of pensions to judges; abolition of the courts of common pleas and chancery and the enlargement of the jurisdiction of the court of queen’s bench; reduction of lawyers’ fees; free trade; direct taxation; an amended jury law; abolition or modification of the usury laws; abolition of primogeniture; secularization of the Clergy Reserves and the abolition of the rectories that had been created out of that endowment.
Such was the original group of the Clear Grits. In later times their designation — or at least the term “Grit” — was applied to the Reformers generally and especially to the adherents of George Brown. But in the beginning Brown had little sympathy with the new party and remained, in spite of certain Radical leanings, an adherent of LaFontaine and Baldwin till the last. His paper, the Globe, at first denounced the Grits as “a miserable clique of office-seeking, bunkum-talking cormorants, that met in a certain lawyer’s office on King Street [Macdougall’s] and announced their intention to form a new party on Clear Grit principles.”
At the same time in Lower Canada a Radical party, following the lead of Papineau, was being formed in opposition to the policy of LaFontaine. The career of Papineau has been the subject of so many conflicting opinions, has met with such extremes of approbation and censure, that it is difficult to hazard an opinion on the merit of his political conduct at this time. With LaFontaine and the ministry he was entirely out of sympathy. Lord Elgin, who spoke of him as “Guy Fawkes,” THE PARTI ROUGE viewed him with dislike. But among his compatriots a group of the younger men, now called the Parti Rouge and including A. A. Dorion, Doutre, Dessaules and others, followed the lead of Papineau and advocated a programme of an equally Radical character to that of the Clear Grits. In their party organ, L’Avenir, they demanded universal suffrage, the repeal of the union with Upper Canada, the abolition of the church tithes and election of the Upper House, while many of them openly advocated republicanism and annexation to the United States. In the legislature of 1850 Papineau maintained against the measures of LaFontaine an unremitting opposition, and made common cause with MacNab and his party in voting against the government. To add to the difficulties that were gathering about the administration, Brown, of the Globe (hitherto their firm supporter), incited by the agitation in England over the Ecclesiastical Titles controversy, commenced an outcry against Roman Catholicism and all its works. His vigorous articles had a wide appeal and strongly influenced the electors.
