While the Quebec Act of 1774 firmly established the French-Canadian nationality on the banks of the St. Lawrence, the Treaty of 1783, which closed the war of the American Revolution, led immediately to the migration into the British possessions, east and north of the new Republic, of a large body of people who had remained faithful to England during the unhappy struggle between the King and his rebellious subjects, and were obliged at last to seek refuge from the persistent persecution of their old friends and neighbors.

The coming of these people, generally known by the name that was appropriately given to them at a later time in recognition of their fidelity to a United Empire, was a most auspicious event for the British-American provinces, the greater part of which was still a wilderness. In the Acadian provinces, afterwards divided into New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, there was a British population of only some 14,000 souls, mostly confined to the peninsula. In the valley of the St. Lawrence there was a French population of nearly 100,000 persons, dwelling chiefly on the banks of the St. Lawrence between Quebec and Montreal. The total British population of the province of Quebec did not exceed 2, 500, residing for the most part in the towns of Quebec and Montreal. No English people were found west of Lake St. Louis, and what is now the populous province of Ontario was an entire wilderness, except where loyal refugees had gathered about the English fort at Niagara, or a few French settlers had made homes for themselves on the banks of the Detroit River and Lake St. Clair. The migration of between 30,000 and 40,000 Loyalists to the maritime provinces and the valley of the St. Lawrence was the saving of British interests in the great region which England still happily retained in North America.

No review of the political development of the Dominion can be in any sense accurate which does not fully take into account the influences of the Loyalists and their descendants-in all, probably threequarters of a million of people at the present time on the political and social conditions of the whole Dominion. For many years their dominating influence among the British population enabled the imperial authorities to carry on the government of the provinces pretty much as they pleased,

although now and then there was more than one voice of discontent raised in the province of Nova Scotia, where this class had not quite so much influence as in the provinces of New Brunswick and Upper Canada. The system of government for many years was very much what the British government had wished it to be in the old colonies, and it is quite clear that, although there was no attempt made to repeat the mistakes of the Stamp Act and similar measures of taxation, the imperial authorities altered little of their policy of keeping a steady paternal hand on the whole government, whether provincial or local. Gradually, however, with the disappearance of the original Loyalist founders, the growth of more generous and wider sentiments among their descendants, the coming in of additional population from Europe and even from the United States, a spirit of liberalism gained strength, as it must always among communities of men of British origin. Many of the men who fought most strenuously for a larger measure of self-government were the descendants of the Loyalistsnotably Joseph Howe of Nova Scotia, the son of a printer of the "Boston News Letter," the first paper permanently established in America. Responsible Government owes a deep debt of gratitude to him who, as painter and poet, orator and statesman, died lieutenant-governor of his own province in that very government house from which he was excluded in the days of conflict with the appointees of the imperial state.

It is noteworthy that the earliest and ablest advocacy of some such union of the provinces as was urged by a great Loyalist, Thomas Galloway, in the Congress of 1774, as a method of adjusting the difficulties between the parent state and her rebellious colonists, were the descendants of Loyalists. Chief Justice Sewell, of Quebec, son of Attorney-General Sewell, and grandnephew of a famous chief justice of Massachusetts; Joseph Howe, of whom I have already spoken; James W. Johnston, long the eloquent and brilliant leader of the Conservative party in Nova Scotia, and a son of a Georgia Loyalist, were among the earliest advocates of a union of the provinces as the best means of consolidating British interests on the northern half of this continent. A majority of the delegates from New Brunswick to the Quebec convention of 1864, which

settled the basis of the present federation, were sprung from the same loyal stock. It is also an interesting fact, which may be mentioned in this connection, that the relations between the parent state and the Canadian Dominion are now regulated by just such principles as were urged in the interests of England and her colonies a hundred and twenty years ago by Governor Thomas Hutchinson, a great Loyalist, to whom justice is at last being done by honest historians in the country where his motives and acts were so long misunderstood and misrepresented. "Whatever measures," he wrote to a correspondent in England, "you may take to maintain the authority of Parliament, give me leave to pray they may be accompanied with a declaration that it is not the intention of Parliament to deprive the colonies of their subordinate power of legislation, nor to exercise the supreme power except in such cases and upon such occasions as an equitable regard to the interests of the whole Empire shall make necessary." It is on such a basis that the government of the Canadian Dominion, like that of the Australasian dependencies, has been gradually established local self-government in the completest sense so far as internal affairs are concerned, and action on the part of the imperial state only when the interest of the whole Empire demand the exercise of her imperial power. But it took threequarters of a century after the coming of the Loyalists to realize the statesmanlike conceptions of Hutchinson in the colonial dominions of England to the north of the dependencies she lost in the latter part of the eighteenth century. As Professor Goldwin Smith has truly said, her statesmen appear to have profited little from the sad experiences of the Revolution, and it was only when risings of discontented people happened in two provinces that they entered on liberal policy toward Canada.

a more

During the period of political evolution. which went on from the establishment of representative institutions down to the passage of confederation and the formation of a Dominion covering half a continent, the political student will see how history must repeat itself under analogous conditions of national and popular struggle. In all the provinces, according as the defects of the legislative system granted by England to her colonies showed themselves in its operation, there

was a persistent contest between the popular assemblies and prerogative, as represented by the governors and upper houses appointed by the same authority. As in all similar conflicts between prerogative and people, the people won at last; and it is one of the notable facts in the careers of Lord Durham and of Lord Russell that they were among the first of English statesmen to appreciate the wants and necessities of the colonies, and to lay down general principles which, eventually, led to the complete recognition of the system of responsible government which Canada now possesses. As we look back over the one hundred and thirty-six years that have passed since the cession of Canada to England, we can see that the political development of the provinces now constituting the Dominion is owing to the passage of certain measures, and the acknowledgment of certain principles, which stand out as so many political milestones in the path of national progress. Briefly summed up, these measures and principles are as follows:

The establishment, as early as 1774, by the Quebec Act, of the principle of religious toleration, which relieved Roman Catholics of disabilities which long afterwards existed in Great Britain.

The guarantees given to the French Canadians, by the Quebec Act, for the preservation of their language and civil law.

The establishment of trial by jury in French Canada in 1785, and the right of every subject to the protection of the writ of habeas corpus.

The adoption of one system of criminal law in French and in English Canada, by the Quebec Act.

The establishment of representative institutions in Canada, in 1792- Nova Scotia and New Brunswick having received the privilege years before.

The independence of the judiciary, and its complete isolation from political conflict, by 1840.

Full provincial control over all local revenues and expenditures from 1840 to 1867.

The initiation of money grants in the people's House from 1840.

The right of Canadian legislatures to manage their purely local affairs, without any interference on the part of English officials in the parent state, from 1840 to 1867.

The establishment of municipal institutions in Canada in 1845, and the consequent increase of public spirit in all the local divisions of the upper province.

The abolition of the seigniorial tenure in 1854, and the removal of feudal restrictions

antagonistic to the conditions of settlement in a new country.

The adoption, from 1841 to 1854, of the English principle of responsibility to the legislature, under which a ministry can only retain office while it has the confidence of the people's representatives.

The establishment of a permanent civil service in old Canada.

All these valuable privileges were not won in a day, but were the results of the struggles of the people of Canada for three-quarters of a century, until the establishment of the federal union which united the provinces on the basis of a central government, having control of all matters of general or national import, and of several provinces having jurisdiction. over such matters of provincial and local concern as are necessary to their existence as distinct political entities within a federation. At the present time the Dominion of Canada may be considered subject to the following authorities:

The Queen as the head of the executive authority.

The Imperial Parliament.

The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as the court of last resource for the whole Empire.

The government of the Dominion, consisting of a governor-general, a privy council, and a parliament of two houses.

The governments of the provinces, consisting of a lieutenant-governor, an executive council, and a legislature, only of a bicameral character now in two provinces.

The courts of law, which can adjudicate on all questions depending on the construction of the written Constitution.

Professor Freeman very truly said, in a review of the Constitution of the Dominion, that "Canada, very far from purely English in blood or speech, is preëminently English in the development of its political institutions." He recognizes the fact that there is a distinct and visible element which is not English - an element which is older than anything else in the land and which shows no sign of being likely to be assimilated by anything English; but with this marked exception, or something more than an exception to the English character of Canada, the political Constitution of Canada is yet more English than that of the United States." While there is a distinct element in Canada which is not English, it is assuredly the influence and operation of English institutions which have, in a large measure, made French Canada one of the most contented com

munities of the world. The law, religion, and ecclesiastical language of Rome still remain in all their old influence in the province, but it is, after all, the political Constitution, which derives its strength from English principles, that has made this section of Canada a free and selfgoverning community, and given full scope to its civil and local rights. In its political development French Canada has been, and is, as essentially English as the purely English sections of the Dominion. The leaders of the French Canadian race are deeply attached to British connection, and I ask you to place no faith whatever in statements that appear from time to time in your newspapers *-statements too often manufactured for sensational purposes - purporting to show that there are French Canadians desirous of establishing a French republic on the banks of the St. Lawrence.

When framing the Constitution of the Dominion, Canadian statesmen had before them the invaluable experience of the working of two great systems of government the one in the parent state, the other in the United States. In considering the best method of consolidating the provinces under a federal system, they were necessarily guided by the experiences of the great country on their borders. At the same time, while availing themselves of the best features of the American federation, they endeavored to preserve as far as possible those English institutions which are calculated to give stability to their government. The result of their efforts is a constitution which, in the words of the original resolutions of confederation, "follows the model of the British Constitution, so far as our circumstances permit."

The Federal Union of 1867 was the inevitable sequence of the system of selfgovernment which was the immediate result of the liberal colonial policy adopted towards the colonies soon after Queen Victoria ascended the throne, and with which the names of Durham, Russell, Grey, and Gladstone must always be associated in the history of the Empire. The present Federal Constitution of Canada only enlarged the area of the political sovereignty of the provinces, and gave greater scope to their political energy,

*Such an absurd statement appeared in the Boston "Evening Transcript during my visit to Massachu

setts.

already stimulated for years previously by the influence of responsible government. The Federal Constitution has left the provinces in possession of local selfgovernment in the full sense of the term. At the base of the political structure lie those municipal institutions which, for completeness, are not excelled in any other country. It is in the enterprising province of Ontario that the system has attained its greatest development. Every

village, township, town, city, and county has its council, composed of reeves and mayors and councillors or aldermen elected by the people, and having jurisdiction over all matters of local taxation and local improvement, in accordance with statutory enactments. Under the operation of these little local parliaments

- the modern form taken by the folkmote of old English times-every community regularly organized under the law, is able to build its roads and bridges, light the streets, effect sanitary arrangements, and even initiate bonuses for the encouragement of lines of railway.

The machinery of these municipalities is made to assist in raising the taxes necessary for the support of public schools. Free libraries are provided for in every municipality whenever the people choose

- as in the cities of Toronto, Hamilton, London, Guelph, and other places-to tax themselves for the support of these liberalizing institutions. In the other provinces the system is less symmetrical than in Ontario, but even in the French section, and in the maritime provinces, where these institutions have been more recently adopted, the people have it within their power to manage all these minor local affairs which are necessary for the comfort, security, and convenience of the local divisions into which each province is divided for such purposes. Then we go up higher to the provincial organizations governed by a lieutenant-governor, nominated and removable by the Government of the Dominion, and advised by a council responsible to the people's representatives, with a legislature composed, in only two of the provinces, of two Houses

a council appointed by the Crown and an elective assembly; in all the other provinces there is simply an assembly chosen by the people, either by universal suffrage or on a very liberal franchise. The fundamental law known as the British North America Act, which was passed

by the Imperial Parliament in 1867, in response to the addresses of the provincial legislature of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, gives jurisdiction to the provincial governments over education, provincial works, hospitals, asylums, jails, administration of justice (except in criminal matters), municipal and all other purely local affairs. In the territories not constituted into provinces there is provided an efficient machinery, in the shape of a lieutenant-governor, appointed by the Dominion Government; of an advisory council to assist the lieutenant-governor; and of a small legislative body of one House elected by the people, which has the power of passing, within certain defined limits, such ordinances as are necessary for the good government and security of the sparsely settled countries under its jurisdiction. These territories are now represented in the two Houses of the Dominion Parliament. These representatives have all the rights and privileges of members of the organized provinces, and are not the mere territorial delegates of the United States Congress. The central or general government of the Dominion is administrated by a governor-general, with the assistance of a ministry responsible to a Parliament composed of a Senate of eighty-one members appointed by the Crown, and a House of Commons of two hundred and thirteen representatives, to be henceforth elected under the electoral franchise existent in each province. This government has jurisdiction over trade and commerce, post office, militia and defence, navigation and shipping, fisheries, and railways and public works of a Dominion character, and all other matters of general or national import. The appointment of a governor-general by the Crown, the power of disallowing bills, which may interfere with imperial statutes and treaty obligations, the right which Canadians still enjoy of appealing to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council from the subordinate courts of the provinces, including the Supreme Court of Canada, the obligation which rests upon England to assist the colony in time of danger by all the power of her army and fleet, together with the fact that all treaties with foreign Powers must necessarily be negotiated through the imperial authorities, will be considered as the most patent evidences of Canada still being a dependency of the Empire. Even the restraint imposed