nment of the
province of Quebec, in North America." The main objects of this bill was
to ascertain the limits of that province; to form a legislative council
for all its affairs, except taxation, which council should be appointed
and be removable by the crown, and in which his majesty's Canadian Roman
Catholic subjects should have a place; to establish the old French laws,
to which the Canadians had been accustomed, including trial without
jury, in all civil cases, and the English laws with trial by jury in all
criminal cases; and to secure to the Roman Catholics those rights which
the articles of capitulation had allowed--that is, the legal enjoyments
of their lands and of their tithes, in their own community, or from
all who professed their doctrines. This bill passed through the
lords without difficulty; but in the commons it met with a storm of
opposition. On the second reading, which took place on the 20th of May,
Mr. Thomas Townshend, junior, asked why the affairs of Canada had been
so long postponed, and why the country, from the time of its conquest,
had been left a prey to anarchy and confusion? The bill proposed to
enlarge the boundaries of the province, so as to comprehend the whole
country lying between New England, New York, and Pennsylvania, to the
Ohio and eastern bank of the Mississippi; and northward, to the southern
boundary of the territory granted to the merchant adventurers of England
trading to Hudson's Bay. Of this Townshend complained, and he said that
it was the general opinion, that ministers intended to make all this
vast tract of country an essentially French colony, as the population
was almost entirely French, and the religion, laws, &c, that of
France--the only exception being that they had at their head a subject
of Great Britain as their governor. This, he opined, would one day cause
a revolution, and would tend to re-establish the dominion of France in
that country. As for the legislative council he deemed it as proposed
the very worst kind of government ministers could have invented. He
remarked:--"If it is not the proper time to give to Canada an assembly
like those which exist in our other American colonies, it is better to
let the governor be absolute--better to let him be without a council. He
will then be responsible. But what have we here? Seventeen or eighteen
gentlemen, who may be removed or suspended by the governor; so that, if
an act of oppression should come from the crown, t