The Durham Meetings: Swinging Upper Canadian Public Opinion Against the Existing System of Government

"Lord Durham," commented Upper Canadian Lieutenant-Governor Sir George Arthur, "has thrown a firebrand amongst the People." Aghast at Lord Durham's success in swinging Upper Canadian public opinion against the existing system of government, Arthur railed against the Durham meetings, powerful expressions of a new spirit of political reform. These Durham meetings -- sixteen in all -- were held throughout the province in the summer and fall of 1839. They attracted huge crowds in support of the principal recommendations of Lord Durham's recently published report: responsible government and the union of the Canadas.

--Carol Wilton, Popular Politics and Political Culture in Upper Canada, 1800-1850 (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2000), 194.