What Appeared to Be a Post-Confederation Political Culture Had Been Moulded in the Pre-1867 Colonial Period

The need for a fresh look at the origins of Canadian politics struck me with some force as I examined, over the last five years or so, the papers of John A. Macdonald, Wilfrid Laurier, and their cabinet colleagues of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As I read the views and came to understand the assumptions and beliefs of these post-Confederation Canadian politicians on such matters as patronage deployment, the role of the prime minister, party leadership, and the nature of government power, I became convinced that what appeared to be a post-Confederation political culture had been largely moulded in the pre-1867 colonial period of Canadian history.

--Gordon T. Stewart, preface to The Origins of Canadian Politics: A Comparative Approach (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1986), vii.

The Red River Settlement: The View from the Outside

As the Red River Settlement approached its formal transfer from the Hudson's Bay Company to Canada in 1869, it appeared to the outside world to be a small, isolated, frontier community teetering precariously on the edge between civilization and savagery. Certainly this was the view of the settlement held by the Canadians, who intended to take it over and run it as a colony in tutelage to civilization. In some ways the perception was accurate.... But at the same time, appearances were in some senses deceiving.

--J.M. Bumsted, "Reporting the Resistance of 1869-1870," in Thomas Scott's Body: And Other Essays on Early Manitoba History (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 2000), 179.

Canada's Political Obsession with National Unity

Rather a dissociative federalism is raised to the level of a quasi-religious political dogma, and polarization to right and left in Canadian politics is regarded as disruptive. Consequently the main focus of Canadian politics has been to the right and the maintenance of the status quo. The reason that the Liberal party in Canada was in office so many years until 1957 was not because it was a progressive party, but because it served Canada's major goal of national unity.

--John Porter, The Vertical Mosaic: An Analysis of Social Class and Power in Canada, Studies in the Structure of Power: Decision-Making in Canada 2 (1965; repr., Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1992), 369.

Equating Western Expansion with the Spread of Civilization

Howe's reference to "civilization" was common among the promoters of the Northwest. By this word, they meant primarily the complex social and cultural institutions of Great Britain and Canada—the manners and mores, the schools, the representative institutions, and above all, the churches. This cultural imperialism was most explicit in the persistent efforts to civilize the Indian. But civilization was more than that. It also encompassed the whole economic paraphernalia of railways, banks, mines, and particularly modern agriculture. Howe and The Globe lamented that it was a "blot upon our civilization" that the enormous expanse of grass and parklands of the Northwest was idle and unproductive. The land had to be civilized; it had to be integrated into the economy of the new technological society. The principle of efficiency, the goal of progress, and the drive for expansion had to be applied to the western plains. In other words, they equated western expansion with the very spread of civilization itself.

--A. A. den Otter, preface to Civilizing the West: The Galts and the Development of Western Canada (Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1986), x.

Empire Ontario Wants Autonomy

The major causes of conflict between Ontario and the federal government became clear during the premiership of Sir Oliver Mowat which lasted an amazing twenty-four years from 1872 to 1896. His successors in office, regardless of party affiliation, continued to pursue similar goals up to the Second World War and after. Mowat recognized that the province occupied a unique place within the Canadian federation, owing to its size, its wealth, and its population. The poorer provinces might look upon federalism as a means of overcoming regional disparities, but Ontario politicians have always valued autonomy more than equality. The province wished to be left alone to develop its bountiful resources, provided that national policies guaranteed it access to markets in other parts of the country. Leaders from Mowat onward, therefore, set out to extend the sway of 'Empire Ontario' and in so doing to increase their own power and authority.

--Christopher Armstrong, introduction to The Politics of Federalism: Ontario's Relations with the Federal Government, 1867-1942, Ontario Historical Studies (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981), 4.

The York Riots of March 23,1832

The rapid rise and increasing militancy of the Reform party in Upper Canada in the late 1820s inevitably resulted in the rallying of those conservative forces who believed their own way of life to be threatened, or felt that the maintenance of the British connection was endangered.... After the Reformers' brief period of power in the House of Assembly from 1828 to 1830, this opposition began to coalesce more rapidly, goaded on by William Lyon Mackenzie's constant barrage of resolutions. By 1832 the two factions were on the verge of a head-on collision aross the province. York — or Toronto, as it was soon to be renamed—was the scene of a major confrontation on Friday, March 23, which took place at a public meeting called by Mackenzie. There both groups fought for ascendency and the town was shaken by a series of riots, which, for the time being at least, left the Tories politically in control.

--Frederick H. Armstrong, A City in the Making: Progress, People and Perils in Victorian Toronto (Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1988), 79.

‘Gladstonian’ Budgetary Orthodoxy and a Preference for ‘Reproductive’ or ‘Remunerative’ Works

Cain and Hopkins argue that British investors required colonial governments to adhere to a ‘Gladstonian’ budgetary orthodoxy composed of balanced budgets and a regime of low taxation.... The City preferred to finance ‘reproductive’ or ‘remunerative’ works: infrastructure projects which would generate additional revenues.... Canada’s economic boom caused Ottawa’s purse to swell, and justified expanding expenditure. The Times commented in 1900, ‘Canada, a young and imperfectly developed country, is committed to a large capital expenditure, to a great extent in reproductive works’.

--Andrew Dilley, Finance, Politics, and Imperialism: Australia, Canada, and the City of London, c.1896-1914, Cambridge Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies (Houndmills, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 79-80.

Governments Need Some Myth to Act as the Foundation for Their Authority

In an annex to Queen's Park, several rooms are devoted to exhibits illustrating the growth of parliamentary democracy. The display begins with Magna Carta and continues through Upper Canadian times with copies of the Colonial Advocate and other voices of reform. The exhibits give the impression that in the early nineteenth century Ontario escaped from the oppression of Family Compact rule and entered into that best of all possible worlds, liberal democracy. If it is true that governments need some myth to act as the foundation for their authority, then this memorial to responsible government in Queen's Park is a superb manifestation of the prevailing myth.

--Patrick Brode, preface to Sir John Beverley Robinson: Bone and Sinew of the Compact, Osgoode Society for Canadian Legal History (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1984), ix.

The Extant Documentation of the Upper Canada Rebellion of 1837

This book of documents is designed to help satisfy the continuing interest in the risings and to shed new light on areas which, though often much discussed, have not always been closely examined.

Perhaps surprisingly there is a large amount of documentation extant on the rebellions, much of which has not been considered. The editors have attempted to produce in whole, or in part, all the important documents of the period from 1836 to the end of the rebellions' immediate aftermath, even those reproduced elsewhere. We have also tried to survey all of the province and, consequently, have canvassed a wide spectrum of material. Faced with an abundance of documentation, we have typically opted for contemporary material over reminiscences and the like, which are often coloured by time and self-interest. Inevitably, we have omitted many documents which we could have included, but we feel that this collection presents those which best represent the range of available materials and which canvass the issues of the day most clearly and comprehensively.

--Colin Read and Ronald J. Stagg, eds., preface to The Rebellion of 1837 in Upper Canada: A Collection of Documents, Carleton Library 134 (Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1988), ix.

The Founding Fathers and Founding Families of Ontario

This study seeks to unearth the neglected period in the lives of the founding fathers of the Province of Ontario and their families. The myth, related in countless versions, tells that after the revolution ended, thousands of the King's friends in the former Thirteen Colonies left their homes to settle in the wilds of Canada. Such a statement has some validity for loyalists who gathered at New York City and were transported to the Maritime provinces, but it will not suffice for Ontario. While the migration of loyalists into British territory continued until the end of the century, many of Ontario's founding families were in Canada all through the war.

--Mary Beacock Fryer, preface to King's Men: The Soldier Founders of Ontario (Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1980), 9.

Empire Is the Default Mode of State Organization

There is no need to take up a dogmatic position on the truth or untruth of these various claims (some of which are discussed later) to see their limitations as a depiction of empire and of Britain’s in particular. The underlying assumption, on which almost all else hangs, is that empires are abnormal, a monstrous intrusion in a usually empire-free world. No error could be more basic, or perhaps more revealing of an unconscious Eurocentrism. Empire – as the assertion of mastery (by influence or rule) by one ethnic group, or its rulers, over a number of others – has been the political rule of the road over much of the world and over most of world history: the default mode of state organization. Nor was it just the modern world that was created by empire. This suggests that the conditions that give rise to empires are neither peculiarly modern, nor peculiarly rooted in European behaviour, technology or values.

--John Darwin, Unfinished Empire: The Global Expansion of Britain (London: Penguin Books, 2013), 6-7.

Toronto's Orange-Dominated Politics

Toronto, with its Orange-dominated politics, was probably the closest Canadian equivalent of the machine politics of American cities. The peak period of Orange power in Toronto (1860– 1930) is remarkably coterminous with that of Tammany Hall in New York, and in their patterns of patronage distribution there were many similarities between the two organizations.

--William J. Smyth, Toronto, the Belfast of Canada: The Orange Order and the Shaping of Municipal Culture (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2015), 119.

Upper Canada Considers a Policy of Indian Removal and Indian Extinction in the 1830s

In the Lake Simcoe region the experiments at Coldwater and the Narrows (Orillia) were frustrated, in large part because the surrounding white settlers demanded that the government remove the Indians to some distant northern location.

Indeed, British Indian policy in Upper Canada suffered an aberration in the 1830s by actually entertaining for a time the idea of removal. The moving spirit behind this concept was Sir Francis Bond Head, who arrived in the province in 1836 as lieutenant-governor. He reckoned that as far as the Indians were concerned, "we have only to bear patiently with them for a short time, and with a few exceptions, principally half-castes, their unhappy race beyond our power of redemption, will be extinct."

--Robert S. Allen, His Majesty's Indian Allies: British Indian Policy in the Defence of Canada, 1774-1815 (Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1992), 182.

Rules of Construction, Stare Decisis, and the Doctrine of Precedent are of Limited Value Because of the Charter

Prior to her appointment to the Supreme Court of Canada, current Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin wrote:

The Charter means that judges are called upon to answer questions they never dreamed they would have to face, such as the right to abortion, the right to work after sixty-five and the right to practice one’s profession as one wishes. To make matters more difficult, the Charter has deprived judges of their traditional methods of answering the questions that are put before them. Rules of construction, stare decisis and the doctrine of precedent are of limited value when one is not only confronted by new issues, but required to make fundamental value choices in deciding them.

--Emmett Macfarlane, introduction to Governing from the Bench: The Supreme Court of Canada and the Judicial Role, Law and Society (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2013), 11.

The Supreme Court of Canada Is a Political Institution and Its Justices Are Important Political Actors

This book proceeds from the premise that the Supreme Court of Canada is a political institution and that its justices are important political actors. This is not to equate the institution with elected legislatures or its justices with politicians. Indeed, one of the main objectives of this study is to examine the multitude of ways in which the judges of the Court are bound by their conceptions of their appropriate role and that of the institution in which they work. Nevertheless, the analysis that follows supports the argument put forward by many political scientists that judicial policy making is not an accidental by-product of the Court’s adjudicative function. Rather, it is a result of the justices’ determination that one set of legal rules is more socially beneficial than another.

--Emmett Macfarlane, introduction to Governing from the Bench: The Supreme Court of Canada and the Judicial Role, Law and Society (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2013), 5.