d to live at peace. They
would all have denied sympathy either with Gallicanism or with Catholic
Liberalism, but they were men of tolerance and breadth of sympathy,
very doubtful whether such militant activity would advance the
permanent interests of their Church.

There broke out a violent struggle between the two political parties in
1871, with the issue {43} of the _Catholic Programme_. This famous
document was a manifesto prepared by a group of editors and lawyers,
who, in their own words, 'belonged heart and soul to the ultramontane
school'--Trudel, Desjardins, M'Leod, Renault, Beausoleil, and
others--and was drawn up by A. B. Routhier, then a lawyer in
Kamouraska. It sought to lay down a policy to govern all good
Catholics in the coming elections. The doctrine of the separation of
church and state, the document declared, was impious and absurd. On
the contrary, the authorities of the state, and the electors who chose
them, must act in perfect accord with the teachings of the Church, and
endeavour to safeguard its interests by making such changes in the laws
as the bishops might demand. To secure this end the Conservative party
must be supported. When two Conservatives or two Liberals were
running, the one who accepted the _Programme_ was to be elected; where
a Conservative and a Liberal were opposed, the former would be
supported; if it happened that a Conservative who opposed the
_Programme_ was running against a Liberal who accepted it, 'the
situation would be more delicate'--and Catholics should not vote at all.

{44}

This frank declaration of war on the Liberal party, this attempt to
throw the solid Catholic vote to the Conservatives, at once aroused
violent controversy. Bishops Bourget and Lafleche announced that they
approved the manifesto in every point, while Archbishop Taschereau and
the bishops of St Hyacinthe and Rimouski declared that it had not their
authorization.

The Liberal party was sorely pressed. In the emergency some of its
moderate members determined to throw off the incubus of their
anti-clerical traditions by reorganizing and renaming the party. So in
1871 Louis Jette and other leading Quebec Liberals undertook to secure
a fresh start by organizing the _Parti National_, and the result of the
following elections gave some ground for hope. 'This evolution of the
Liberal party,' declared Bishop Lafleche later in a memorial to the
Cardinals of the Sacred Congregation, 'had the