distinction in his profession as a
notary, as a speaker in the Assembly, and as a soldier in the defense of
Quebec against the American invaders of 1775. In 1804 he had purchased
the seigneury of La Petite Nation, far up the Ottawa. Louis Joseph
Papineau followed in his father's footsteps. Born in 1786, he served
loyally and bravely in the War of 1812. In the same year he entered the
Assembly and made his place at a single stroke. Barely three years after
his election, he was chosen Speaker, and with a brief break he held that
post for over twenty years.

Papineau did not soon or lightly begin his crusade against the
Government. For the first five years of his Speakership, he confined
himself to the routine duties of his office. As late as 1820 he
pronounced a glowing eulogy on the Constitution which Great Britain
had granted the province. In that year he tested the extent of the
privileges so granted by joining in the attempt of the Assembly to
assert its full control of the purse; but it was not until the project
of uniting the two Canadas had made clear beyond dispute the hostility
of the governing powers that he began his unrelenting warfare against
them.

There was much to be said for a reunion of the two Canadas. The St.
Lawrence bound them together, though Acts of Parliament had severed
them. Upper Canada, as an inland province, restricted in its trade with
its neighbor to the south, was dependent upon Lower Canada for access to
the outer world. Its share of the duties collected at the Lower Canada
ports until 1817 had been only one-eighth, afterwards increased to
one-fifth. This inequality proved a constant source of friction. The
crying necessity of cooperation for the improvement of the St. Lawrence
waterway gave further ground for the contention that only by a reunion
of the two provinces could efficiency be secured. In Upper Canada the
Reformers were in favor of this plan, but the Compact, fearful of any
disturbance of their vested interests, tended to oppose it. In Lower
Canada the chief support came from the English element. The governing
clique, as the older established body, had no doubt that they could
bring the western section under their sway in case of union. But the
main reason for their advocacy was the desire to swamp the French
Canadians by an English majority. Sewell, the chief supporter of the
project, frankly took this ground. The Governor, Lord Dalhousie, and
the Colonial Office adopted his