The Quebec Conference drafted a federal constitution for all of Britain’s North American colonies. The next stage was having the assemblies of the five colonies adopt it and requesting the British Parliament pass it into law. The process failed almost immediately, and it took two and a half years of very difficult work to cobble together a union of just three of the five colonies. Only two colonies followed the prescribed process: the Province of Canada, which approved the resolutions, and PEI, which rejected them. The New Brunswick elections of 1865 and 1866 were fought on the issue, the first one rejecting it and the second one endorsing it. But the campaigns involved many other issues, and elections had been ruled out as a means of approving the deal. The Nova Scotia government did not submit the Resolutions to the Assembly or even make Confederation an issue in an election, and Britain forced the colony to join. The resolutions were never submitted to the Newfoundland Assembly, but Confederation was rejected in the 1869 election. This chapter will examine the convoluted process by which three of the five BNA colonies were united into one, forming the basis of modern Canada.
The resolutions were published on November 8, 1864, and immediately copied in newspapers throughout the colonies. That was the first time politicians who had not been part of the delegations knew exactly what had been agreed. There followed an immediate outburst of debate, newspaper articles, speeches, meetings, and conversations. On November 23, Alexander T. Galt, one of the chief architects of the scheme, defended it in a major speech that was widely distributed. He said that the deal was really quite simple: the old colonies were being rolled into one, and a new order of government was being created alongside the existing ones, which would retain control of local issues. All that was needed to implement the change, he suggested, was for the colonies to ask London to do so, and there was no need for conventions, elections, or ratification. That optimistic, overly simplistic, and somewhat false view was immediately challenged.
Upper and Lower Canada Approve Confederation
In the Province of Canada, the motion to approve the resolutions was introduced to the Assembly on February 3, 1865. Macdonald said it was a treaty and that, as such, it could be accepted or rejected, but not amended. That was a good debating position, but the resolutions were not a treaty and they were changed. Since the plan called for the division of the colony into two provinces, there were really two debates, one by the MLAs from Upper Canada and another by those from Lower Canada. Upper Canada was most enthusiastic about the new dispensation as it was the homeland of George Brown’s Reformers, who had obtained almost everything they wanted. The new province was given control of matters of local importance, where laws would reflect the values of English-speaking Protestants. Macdonald’s smaller Conservative faction could boast of a powerful central government. For Upper Canada, the Quebec Resolutions were a “win-win” proposition, and on March 11, their MLAs approved them by an overwhelming vote of 54–8.
In Lower Canada, French Canadians were much less favourably disposed to the deal. The restoration of a separate provincial government dominated by French Canadians was certainly welcome, but the main debate was over whether the new province would have the power and autonomy to protect French-Canadian culture from a central government overwhelmingly dominated by British-Canadian Protestants. The Rouges did not believe la survivance was sufficiently protected or that British Canadians would not use their preponderance in Ottawa to interfere with French-Canadian rights. Rouge leader A.A. Dorion said that the seventy-two resolutions really created a unitary government and represented the latest attempt to assimilate French Canadians.
This position was given credence by the fact that some English-speaking Canadians were saying that Confederation would create a new nationality, which implied that their “old” nationality would disappear. British Canadians also were saying that the central government would be very powerful, which implied that the provinces would be relatively weak. Some Canadiens criticized the adoption of rep by pop since it would put them in a permanent and growing minority position. They said that provincial control of education was an illusion since the central government could veto provincial legislation, and they flagged the potential abuse of the federal power of disallowance.
The Bleu press defended the deal. On July 11, 1864, Le Courrier du Canada said that a new general government would not have the right to interfere in a provincial legislature. Cartier’s paper, La Minèrve de Montréal, said that the local government would have all the powers necessary to handle economic, civil, and religious affairs. The Bleu papers argued that French-Canadian MPs would be able to prevent the central government from interfering in the provinces, echoing the views of the three French-Canadian cabinet ministers, Cartier, Taché, and Hector-Louis Langevin. To deal with criticisms of the scheme in the Maritimes, pro-confederates there said that the resolutions could be changed. That undermined Cartier, who was trying to convince French Canadians that the rights guaranteed them could not be changed.
Overall, the Bleu response to the Rouge criticisms was that Confederation would not create a strong and dominant central government, that Lower Canada would be liberated from the Union of 1840, and that the colony would be a distinct and autonomous province in a loose and decentralized federation. Rep by pop would not make Upper Canada dominant as two-thirds of the senators would come from Lower Canada and the Maritimes. Since the House of Commons would only be concerned with general issues, it did not matter that it was based on rep by pop. Cartier argued that federalism was the only viable solution because the current system could not continue, restoring a separate colony of Lower Canada was not realistic, and the only alternative to Confederation was annexation by the United States. Langevin and Cartier said that the central government would not deal with matters of race, nationality, religion, or local issues, and French Canadians “would have their own province with their own parliament and their own government.” There would be “a state within a state,” with the “full exercise of [French] rights” and recognition of “national independence.”
In spite of misgivings, the arrangements were satisfactory to a majority of French-Canadian politicians, to the Catholic Church, to the English-speaking business class in Montreal, and to the British minorities whose culture and distinctiveness were well protected. On March 11, the MLAs from Lower Canada approved the resolutions 37–25, with French-Canadian MLAs voting 27–21 in favour. The Rouges claimed that a majority of French Canadians opposed Confederation, but the facts suggest otherwise as pro-confederates won all the by-elections between 1864 and 1867. Of the twenty-one French-Canadian MLAs who voted against the resolutions, seven were defeated in the 1867 election, three switched sides and won re-election as pro-confederates, and the seats of three others who did not run were won by the pro-Confederation side. Only five of the twenty-one anti-confederates were re-elected, indicating that French Canadians definitely endorsed Confederation.
Overall, the vote in the Assembly of the Province of Canada was 91–33. The MLAs had voted their province out of existence, transferring half its responsibilities to the new central government and half to the new provinces of Quebec and Ontario. On July 1, 1867, thirty years of political and constitutional confusion came to an end, along with a century of failed attempts at assimilation. Lower Canada became Quebec once more, this time as one of four provinces in the new Dominion of Canada. Champlain’s settlement at Quebec City was once more the capital of a province stretching from Gaspé to the Ottawa River, and Toronto was once more the capital of Upper Canada under its new name of Ontario.
The Flawed Approval Process in New Brunswick
The Quebec Resolutions had a very different reception in the Maritimes. Opposition began to mount as details and rumours circulated during the Quebec Conference. The main concerns were a likely increase in tariffs and taxes, the effects on trade, the idea of the Maritimes paying part of the cost of a railway to the Pacific, and the inadequate representation the provinces would have in the super-colony. One of the main demands, the building of the Intercolonial Railway, had not been fully addressed, and it was not clear that Britain was committed to providing the necessary financing. The debate over defence suggested that the Maritimes would help defend central Canada, not the other way around, and the idea that union would protect the Atlantic provinces from the United States was ridiculed.
When the New Brunswick delegates returned from Quebec, they discovered that they had mishandled the negotiations and misread public opinion. People immediately grasped that New Brunswick would be virtually powerless in the new federation, with almost no representation in Ottawa. A storm of protest erupted, and Premier Samuel Leonard Tilley decided not to submit the Quebec Resolutions to the Assembly as required by the agreed process. The second most powerful minister, Albert Smith, declared his opposition to the scheme. He argued that it would decrease the province’s influence and increase taxes. He said the subsidy of eighty cents per capita was inadequate, and pointed out a major flaw in the trade-off of customs for the subsidy, namely that customs revenue for Ottawa would grow over time, but Ottawa’s subsidy to the province would not. His position was supported by the mercantile classes, because the province traded mainly with the United States.
In response to such criticisms, Tilley and other delegates suggested that taxes and tariffs would not be increased, that the Maritimes would have enough political strength in Ottawa to prevent it from spending money in central Canada and on acquiring Rupert’s Land, and that the Intercolonial Railway might terminate in Saint John rather than Halifax. They had no proof for any of these assertions because none of them were true. The pro-confederates said that New Brunswick’s industries would gain access to the larger central Canadian market, but the Saint John merchants were skeptical. Tilley said that Britain favoured Confederation, but he could not provide any evidence since Britain’s actions had been discreet and behind the scenes.
Instead of asking for a vote in the Assembly, Tilley called an election for February–March 1865. The main newspapers came out against the agreement. Irish Catholics opposed it because they saw Upper Canada as dominated by Protestant Orangemen, and Acadians had no interest in being an even smaller linguistic minority in a much larger, English-dominated federation. There was skepticism about the worth of Canadian promises, since Canada had reneged on previous agreements. The pro-Confederation side used the threat of potential invasion by the United States, but the American government made clear that no such threat existed, and British governors had always had full authority to move troops between colonies.
Smith and the anti-confederates won the election. Every delegate to the Quebec Conference was defeated. The popular vote was fairly close, however, because most objections related to the detailed provisions rather than the concept of Confederation itself. The best alternative to Confederation was closer relations with the United States. The United States, however, was not interested in building railways from Maine to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and in the spring of 1865, it announced the termination of the free-trade agreement that had sustained New Brunswick’s prosperity for a decade. Increased trade with Canada and Nova Scotia was a poor alternative, but it was the only one. Smith’s coalition began to weaken, and a by-election in Saint John in November became a crucial barometer of opinion. Tilley told Macdonald that it would take considerable money to tip the scales, and Macdonald duly sent $5,000, which helped the pro-Confederation candidate win by a substantial margin.
The outcome was still very much in doubt, so Britain intervened openly. A dispatch of June 24, 1865, ordered all the lieutenant governors in the Maritimes to use their influence to impose the Confederation scheme. In June, Premier Smith visited London, where he met Colonial Secretary Edward Cardwell. The latter made it clear that Britain was fully in support of Confederation. The actions and attitudes of the British government became a significant, if not crucial factor. London had not previously made its pro-Confederation views public because it had hoped that the colonial assemblies would decide to unite on their own initiative. Now Lieutenant Governor Gordon was ordered to intervene, and he published correspondence with London that proved the British government was solidly behind Confederation. It now seemed unpatriotic to oppose the mother country’s wishes, especially for the Loyalist province. Britain also suggested that its support for the Intercolonial Railway depended on Confederation being adopted, a rather heavy-handed hint for the province.
Smith still commanded a majority in the Assembly, so Lieutenant Governor Gordon precipitated a crisis. On April 6, he arranged for the Legislative Council to send an address to Queen Victoria, urging Britain to unite the colonies. There was no precedent for an appointed council to address the monarch on a political issue. Smith resigned because Gordon’s actions indicated a lack of confidence in his government and a blatant interference in politics. A resolution stating that Gordon had engaged in unconstitutional conduct was signed by a majority of MLAs, but Gordon called for a new election for June to resolve the alleged constitutional crisis that he had precipitated.
At that point New Brunswick found itself threatened by invasion by an Irish political faction known as the Fenians. They were Irish-Catholic veterans of the American Civil War who entertained the notion that they could advance the cause of Irish independence by attacking British colonies such as New Brunswick. They posed no military threat, but they did cross the border and burn a customs house. A few troops sent from Halifax put a quick end to the alleged threat, but the incident diverted attention from Gordon’s questionable call for an election. The incident was used to reinforce the dubious argument that Confederation would make all the colonies more secure. Fenian appeals to Irish Catholics in New Brunswick backfired as the Catholics felt that they had to demonstrate their loyalty to Britain, which meant endorsing Confederation.
Gordon’s actions touched off a nasty electoral campaign. Smith attacked Gordon for misusing his authority. Gordon published accounts of his meetings with Smith showing that they had been discussing the implementation of Confederation. Tilley used his significant influence with the Prohibitionist movement to lock up the Protestant vote on the side of Confederation. Though Smith’s alternatives to Confederation lay in ruins, Tilley was still not certain of victory. He telegraphed Macdonald asking for $40,000 to $50,000 to help persuade the undecided. This was a very substantial sum per voter, but Macdonald willingly complied. Tilley also promised that he would fix the other problems that had been raised in the final negotiations scheduled for that winter in London. Confederation was but one issue in the election that reversed the 1865 vote, with Tilley winning thirty-three seats and the anti-confederates reduced to eight.
The new Assembly met in June 1866, but Tilley was still afraid to submit the Quebec Resolutions, and they were approved instead by the appointed Legislative Council. In August, Tilley and his delegation sailed for London for the final round of negotiations. A few minor changes were made, but Tilley failed to fix the problems as he had promised. He was, however, allegedly instrumental in selecting a name for the new political creation. He remembered a verse in the Bible that stated that God had “dominion also from sea to sea.” No one knew what a dominion actually was, but it sounded quite fine and so the new federation was named the Dominion of Canada. It was a wise decision as it differentiated the new entity from the colony of Canada, which had been established in 1791. On July 1, 1867, New Brunswick became one of the four provinces in the new Dominion of Canada.
Nova Scotia Fails to Approve Confederation
Nova Scotia followed a completely different course in its evolution into a Canadian province. There, the 1863 election was arguably the most important in the history of the province and one of the most important in Canada. Charles Tupper’s Conservatives won a majority on a platform that included the idea of uniting the three Maritime colonies. His main goal was a union of the five colonies, and he never deviated from that vision, never questioned its wisdom, never weighed the advantages against the disadvantages. Over the next four years, he did everything he could to make it happen, and he succeeded. He and the other Nova Scotian delegates agreed with the outline for the new federation and did not fight particularly hard to strengthen the Senate, to obtain equal representation, or to obtain a larger per-capita grant.
When Nova Scotians learned of the terms on November 8, the main Halifax papers supported them, but opposition immediately developed among ordinary people. Indeed, there was not actually much of a debate because few people had anything good to say about the proposal. One of the Liberal politicians, William Annand, pointed out the most serious flaw, namely that the eighty-cent subsidy represented only 25 per cent of the customs revenue Nova Scotia had previously collected and could not possibly cover the responsibilities left to the province. He argued that Canada would spend the customs revenue collected in Nova Scotia buying Rupert’s Land and building transportation elsewhere. Nova Scotia’s contingent of nineteen MPs would not be able to influence federal policy, and Nova Scotians would have to emigrate to find jobs. A major concern was that Nova Scotia’s tariff rate was 10 per cent and that would almost certainly increase with Confederation. Having fought for and won democratic government, it would now lose control over many matters to a parliament dominated by central Canadians.
This opposition developed into a well-financed and organized political movement. Since January 1865, the prominent politician Joseph Howe had been criticizing the arrangements in a series of letters published anonymously in the Novascotian, letters that brilliantly summed up all the criticisms being made, and he became the leader of the Antis. Tupper knew that the Assembly would not approve the resolutions so, like Tilley in New Brunswick, he did not submit them for approval. Confederation was not even mentioned in the 1866 Speech from the Throne. Like Tilley, Tupper said he would fix any problems in the next round of negotiations in London. Neither Tupper nor other supporters made an adequate effort to explain the deal, and some of the arguments they made were specious.
The key factor in Nova Scotia’s road to Confederation was Britain’s determination to force the colonies to unite. Lieutenant Governor Richard MacDonnell was ordered to support Confederation. He refused to do so because that meant siding with one party in a domestic political debate, a violation of democratic government. He was removed and his successor, Sir Fenwick Williams, had no such qualms. He interfered with the anti-Confederation campaign and supported Tupper by providing lavish entertainment and strong hints of appointments for MLAs who might be persuaded to favour the scheme. A number of MLAs were seen visiting Government House, and it was noted that they changed sides on the issue and later received rewards such as Senate appointments.
Though there was no debate on the Quebec Resolutions, some reference to it could hardly be avoided. William Miller, who had opposed Confederation, introduced a motion calling for the appointment of a delegation to attend the final round of negotiations in London, where it could seek better terms. Appointing such a delegation could possibly be interpreted as approval of the proposed union. The crucial vote carried 31–19, with seven MLAs who had previously opposed Confederation switching sides. Without their change of heart, the motion would have been defeated 26–24. It was not clear why Miller and the others changed sides, but strong suspicion was that they were bought off. That was as close as Nova Scotia ever came to approving Confederation.
The London Conference
The centre of action then moved to London, where the British government had the task of turning the Quebec Resolutions into legislation. In July 1866, cabinet approved a draft act that identified the cost of Britain’s contribution to the deal. Accordingly, London would provide guarantees for Canada to borrow £5 million to help build the Intercolonial Railway and purchase Rupert’s Land. These guarantees finally solved problems that had lingered for a decade. The officials then awaited the final revisions the colonial delegates might make once they arrived in London. In the meantime, Britain united the colonies of Vancouver Island and British Columbia in preparation for the expansion of the new super-colony to the Pacific.
The third and final meeting, the London Conference, lasted officially from December 4 to 21, though colonial delegates were debating the issues with British officials and politicians from the time they arrived in London until the legislation was approved by Parliament in March 1867. There was more debate over the major issues, but no substantive changes were made, and Maritime delegates had no significant success obtaining the changes they had promised. Neither, apparently, did Macdonald, who remained determined to make the federal government even more powerful. His Conservative colleague Langevin said he had to watch Macdonald like a hawk to ensure that he did not slip in language strengthening the central government.
The delegates’ final draft was then sent to the Colonial Office. There, experts turned it into legislation, a process that went through a number of stages. One major change was that fisheries were made a federal responsibility, rather than a shared one like agriculture. The debate over responsibility for residual power was renewed, but the final draft confirmed the decision of the Quebec Conference so that power remained divided between the two orders of government. The legislation was introduced into the House of Lords in early February 1867, passed by the House of Commons on March 8, given royal assent on March 29, and implemented on July 1. During this period, Britain appointed Macdonald as the Dominion’s first prime minister, and he got on with the job of selecting the first cabinet, identifying future senators and judges, and finalizing the arrangements to create the new central government and the provinces of Ontario and Quebec.
The three colonies that formed the Dominion of Canada thus entered Confederation by very different routes. The process that called for the Quebec Resolutions to be approved by each Assembly was only followed in the Province of Canada and PEI. The government of New Brunswick knew it could not obtain the approval of the Assembly, so it called an election but was overwhelmingly defeated. That new government was undermined by its own failures and the actions of Britain, the Province of Canada, and the pro-confederates. It was manipulated into a new election, which it lost and New Brunswick was then arguably on board. Nova Scotia never approved the Quebec Resolutions, but Britain forced it to join Confederation anyway. The Assembly of Prince Edward Island debated the Quebec Resolutions on March 29, 1865, and rejected the deal by a vote of 23–5. Newfoundland rejected the deal in the election of 1869 and did not change its mind for another eight decades. But with approval of the Province of Canada, the manipulation of the vote in New Brunswick, and the overriding of opinion in Nova Scotia by the British, the Dominion of Canada was born on July 1, 1867. The various processes followed indicate just how difficult a task it was and how great an achievement the politicians had accomplished. And though there was misrepresentation, manipulation, and bribery, Confederation was achieved without violence, warfare, or conquest, a sharp contrast to the way nations were being united or preserved in Europe and the United States.