An Unelected Senate Is Needed to Prevent Deadlocking the Constitution

The Globe's viewpoint on the constitution appears most clearly with regard to an elected upper house. At the time of Confederation, the paper strongly urged that the new federal senate be not elected but appointed, since under the British parliamentary system a second chamber should have only a minor role of amending and delaying, and should not be able to thwart the national will of the much more significant house of commons. Two elected houses on the American model, on the other hand, might claim a popular mandate, and if opposed to each other, deadlock the constitution.

--J.M.S. Careless, "Mid-Victorian Liberalism in Central Canadian Newspapers, 1850-67," in Careless at Work: Selected Canadian Historical Studies (Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1990), 51-52.