FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   5   6   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29  
30   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   >>   >|  
aken root and never ceased to show signs of life. As time wore on, the provincial constitutions proved unsatisfactory. At each outbreak of political agitation and discontent, in one quarter or another, some one was sure to come forward with a fresh plea for intercolonial union. Nor did the entreaty always emanate from men of pronounced Loyalist convictions; it sometimes came from root-and-branch Reformers like Robert Gourlay and William Lyon Mackenzie. The War of 1812 furnished another startling proof of the isolated and defenceless position of the provinces. The relations between Upper Canada and Lower Canada, never cordial, {7} became worse. In 1814, at the close of the war, Chief Justice Sewell of Quebec, in a correspondence with the Duke of Kent (Queen Victoria's father), disclosed a plan for a small central parliament of thirty members with subordinate legislatures.[1] Sewell was a son-in-law of Chief Justice Smith and shared his views. The duke suggested that these legislatures need be only two in number, because the Canadas should be reunited and the three Atlantic colonies placed under one government. No one heeded the suggestion. A few years intervened, and an effort was made to patch up a satisfactory arrangement between Lower Canada and Upper Canada. The two provinces quarrelled over the division of the customs revenue. When the dispute had reached a critical stage a bill was introduced in the Imperial parliament to unite them. This was in 1822. But the proposal to force two disputing neighbours to dwell together in the same house as a remedy for disagreements failed to evoke enthusiasm from either. The friends of federation then drew together, and Sewell joined hands with Bishop Strachan {8} and John Beverley Robinson of Upper Canada in reviving the plea for a wider union and in placing the arguments in its favour before the Imperial government. Brenton Halliburton, judge of the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia (afterwards chief justice), wrote a pamphlet to help on the cause. The Canada union bill fell through, the revenue dispute being settled on another basis, but the discussion of federation proceeded. To this period belongs the support given to the project by William Lyon Mackenzie. Writing in 1824 to Mr Canning, he believed that a union of all the colonies, with a government suitably poised and modelled, so as to have under its eye the resources of our whole territory and having the
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   5   6   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29  
30   31   32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Canada

 

government

 

Sewell

 

Justice

 

parliament

 

provinces

 
federation
 

Mackenzie

 
William
 
legislatures

dispute

 
revenue
 
Imperial
 

colonies

 
customs
 

friends

 
enthusiasm
 

quarrelled

 
Bishop
 

Strachan


satisfactory

 
joined
 

arrangement

 

division

 

failed

 

proposal

 

introduced

 

disputing

 

neighbours

 

remedy


disagreements

 

critical

 

reached

 
project
 
Writing
 

Canning

 

support

 

proceeded

 

period

 

belongs


believed

 

resources

 
territory
 

suitably

 
poised
 
modelled
 

discussion

 
Brenton
 
Halliburton
 

Supreme