Confederation

1. Confederation

3. Why would the provinces join to form a country? Well, there are many reasons! • Some of the provinces started out totally against confederation because they did not really see the benefits for their regions. • There were some real good reasons to join: • War and expansionism in the United States • Fenian raids • Trouble with trade • The need for railway links • Changing British attitudes • Political Deadlock in the Canadas

4. War and Expansionism in the United States • Since America had fought Britain to gain its independence the relationship between British North America and the United States had never been stable. The relationship became even worse when Britain supported the South in the American Civil War. The North won the war and was angry at Britain for helping the South. Many Americans wanted to take over all of what is now Canada.

5. Meanwhile, Britain didn't want to have to pay for the cost of defending its colonies. It decided to encourage the colonies to join together, because the United States would be less likely to attack Canada if it were a self-governing country rather than separate colonies of Britain. The fear of the United States helped to strengthen the call for Confederation.

7. Fenian Raids • Fenians were Irish Catholics in the US who wanted to end British rule in Ireland. • Since they could not attack Britain directly, they decided to attack Britain’s North American colonies. • 1866-Fenians from the US made several armed raids across the border into British North America.

8. Trouble with Trade • From 1854-1865 there was free trade between British North America and the US under the Reciprocity Treaty. This allowed agricultural products and raw material to be traded without high tariffs. However, the treaty was ended in 1865 by the US. • In order for their economies to do well, the colonies needed to be able to sell their goods to other markets. At this time there were very few places that they could sell to. One solution was to bring all the colonies together. In this way they could more easily sell their goods to each other.

9. Need for Railway • By 1860, Canada East and West, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick had their own railway. • However, no railways joined the colonies. • United Canada was separated from Atlantic colonies due to mountains. • As the colonies grew, they were building railroads and roads, which cost a great deal of money. If several smaller colonies combined, they would have more taxes and more money to pay their debts as they grew.

10. Trade would be much easier, distance much shorter, and in case of American attack troops could move quickly from one colony to another.

11. Changing: British Attitudes • In mid-1860s Great Britain’s attitude toward the colonies began to change. • Britain wanted to become less involved in the government of their colonies, because it was very time-consuming and expensive. • It was time for the colonies to become more independent.

12. The reasons for keeping the colonies were: source of raw material, market for manufactured goods, opportunity to emigrate. • The reasons against were: Burden on British taxpayers, should pay for their own government and defence.

13. Fathers of Confederation • The men who engineered Canada's Confederation formed an unlikely alliance. Like the colonies they represented, they were divided by religious, political, and regional animosities.

14. John A. Macdonald

15. In 1860, John A. Macdonald was Upper Canada's most prominent politician, a flawed and witty man with great organizational skills, an enviable stamina and a public taste for alcohol. Within the decade, Macdonald would be instrumental in creating the Dominion of Canada and become its first prime minister. In the 1860s, John A. Macdonald was instrumental in creating the Dominion of Canada and became its first prime minister. (Courtesy of the National Archives of Canada) Macdonald was tall and loose-limbed, with dark, unruly hair and a bulbous nose which cartoonists loved to caricaturize. His was manner was courtly and flirtatious and he had many female admirers. Born in Scotland, Macdonald had a Celtic's distrust of Englishmen. He was a clever, calculating man who joined the anti-Catholic Orange Lodge to maintain his political career but he was not personally prejudiced. "Politics is a game requiring... an utter abnegation of prejudice and personal felling... if we get the right man in the right place, it does not matter what his race or religion might be," wrote Macdonald. In his personal life, Macdonald had to overcome great sadness. He was born in Glasgow in 1815 and came to Upper Canada at the age of five. Two of his siblings died young and by 15 Macdonald was supporting himself, articling with a Kingston lawyer. He became a prominent lawyer, with an impressive understanding of constitutional law, and won a seat on the town council before moving to provincial politics. Macdonald married his first cousin, Isabella Clark, who was five years his senior. Isabella became an invalid soon after, bedridden with an undiagnosed illness. She became addicted to opium mixed with wine to deal with the pain.

16. John A. Macdonald was devastated by the premature deaths of his wife and first son. (Courtesy of the National Archives of Canada) Despite her illness, Isabella gave birth to their first child, John, in 1847. The baby died 13 months later. Macdonald never got over John's death, and he kept a box of the child's toys until his own death almost 50 year later. (Another son, Hugh, survived.) In 1857, Isabella died. Macdonald was devastated by their deaths but continued to be one of the dominant politicians in Upper Canada. He played the political game through a combination of charisma, will, and shrewd negotiations. "Good or bad, able or unable, weak or strong, he wraps them around his finger as you would a thread," noted Joseph Rymal, a Liberal rival. Macdonald formed a political alliance with a powerful politician from Lower Canada, George-Étienne Cartier. The two men shared a similar, conservative vision that included a vigorous commitment to economic growth and the accommodation of the religious animosities that plagued the United Province of Canada. Their alliance helped break the political stalemates that were a regular part of Canadian politics. Macdonald and Cartier came to depend upon one another to deliver votes from their respective sides of the House. They would also come to depend on one another to build a political movement that would create a nation.

17. George-Etienne Cartier

18. In 1860, George-Étienne Cartier was one of the most powerful politicians in Lower Canada and a fervent protector of French Canadian nationality. But Cartier would work to bridge the gap between English and French Canada and become one of the leading Fathers of Confederation. Prominent politician George-Etienne Cartier was the leading spokesman for French Canada during Confederation negotiations. (Courtesy of the National Archives of Canada) Cartier had the character to undertake this monumental task. He was worldly, urbane, supremely self-confident and utterly at ease with the French and English elite of Montreal. He was a fixture at social events and loved nothing more than to sing songs he had written to the assembled guests. "(Cartier)... was not a man with whom you could talk very much, " wrote financier Hugh Allan. "Because in all interviews with him he generally did most of the talking himself and you could with difficulty say anything." Cartier's oratorical gifts were such that he once spoke for thirteen hours in Parliament delivering a passionate critique of the government. Cartier grew up on a large estate on the Richelieu River and attended the strict Collge de MontrÉal from the age of ten. He began his career as a lawyer and took an interest in politics in his twenties. Although a product of the establishment, Cartier joined the 1837 uprising against British authority. Cartier was a member of the Patriotes - a group of mainly French and Irish Canadians opposed to arbitrary rule by the colonial administration. Cartier had fought in the battle of St. Denis. Cartier was charged with treason for his part in the Rebellion and fled to the United States. There, the rebel had a change of heart and wrote to the colonial governor, swearing his allegiance to the Queen. "Let me express my burning desire to return to my homeland ... to resume my obligations as citizen and British subject and I would be infinitely grateful", wrote Cartier. The charges against him were annulled and Cartier returned to Montreal after six months with a new cause: to make Montreal a great commercial centre of the empire. "This city is inspired by the spirit of progress. Nothing can stop it from becoming, eventually, a rival for the great American cities," said Cartier. In his personal life, Cartier made an advantageous marriage to Hortense Fabre - uniting two families with deep roots in French society. It was a loveless and lonely marriage. Hortense was an austere, religious women who was uncomfortable in social settings. Cartier soon began a lifelong affair with his wife's cousin Luce Cuvillier. Luce loved politics and often advised Cartier. She wore pants, smoked cigars and read Byron and the novels of George Sand. Cartier ran for office in 1848 at the age of 34 and was elected as a member of the Legislative Assembly of United Canada. It would mark the beginning of a long, illustrious career in politics. Cartier worked tirelessly for his constituents and French Canada; rewriting property laws; creating a modern civil code; setting up primary schools for Catholics and Protestants and modernizing the institutions of his province. But Cartier would make his biggest mark when he teamed up with a prominent Upper Canadian politician named John A. Macdonald. Together, the two men would help form a country.

19. George Brown • George Brown founded Upper Canada's most influential newspaper, The Globe, and by 1860 seemed an unlikely Father of Confederation. George Brown founded Upper Canada's most influential newspaper, The Globe, and overcame political differences with John A. Macdonald and George-Etienne Cartier to become a prominent Father of Confederation. (Courtesy of the Metro Toronto Reference Library) • The mountainous six-foot-four man embodied Upper Canadian Protestant virtue and he expressed his ideas and attitudes through his newspaper. The Globe's journalism was aggressive and uncompromising. It saluted progress and was suspicious of the French Catholics. Brown accused French Canadians of imposing their will on the rest of Canada. • "What has French Canadianism been denied? Nothing. It bars all it dislikes. It extorts all it demands... and grows insolent over its victories. • He described he political foes as "A body of men whose policy is despotism, whose faith is darkness, whom all freemen dread and all tyrants caress." • On another occasion, Brown wrote: "Let them pass more nunnery and Monkery Bills, squander the public money on every Popish scheme the Priest present - destroy the public school system." • Brown was enraged that Upper Canada with its larger population had the same number of seats in the legislature as Lower Canada. He argued for representation by population, an issue he had avoided when Lower Canada had larger numbers.

21. Brown was born in Scotland into a literate Liberal family. He absorbed talk of parliamentary reform around the dinner table. He came to Upper Canada at 25 and won office in 1851, running in the southwestern county of Kent as a Reform candidate, representing a movement with a rural, defiantly Protestant base. By 1862, George Brown was a cheerless, upright, 43-year-old bachelor who had lost his seat in Parliament after 10 years as a member. He was facing severe financial problems, and his health had deteriorated. He had been bedridden with depression, and traveled to Britain to recuperate. In Scotland, Brown met Anne Nelson, the daughter of a prominent publisher and was smitten by her sophistication. He proposed to her within weeks. They were married in November 1862. While in London, Brown also changed his attitudes about Canada's future. He learned how weary some British politicians had grown of their colonial burdens: as one Member of Parliament declared, "I want the Canadians clearly to understand that England would not be sorry to see them depart from her tomorrow." Brown came back to Toronto with his new bride and a new commitment. He declared he had returned "with a better knowledge of public affairs and with a more ardent desire to serve." Brown was now prepared to consider the unthinkable, joining forces with Macdonald and George-Étienne Cartier to work toward the union of British North America. The three formed the base of a new coalition government whose singular cause was to promote the union of the colonies.

22. Thomas D'Arcy McGee • Thomas D'Arcy McGee was an Irish Catholic editor, journalist and ex-revolutionary. He had a vast energy that was channeled into poetry, literature and politics. The five-foot-three McGee was the most eloquent of the Fathers of Confederation but was also perpetually indebted, and a sporadically heavy drinker. As a young Irishman, Thomas D'Arcy McGee advocated rebellion against British rule. He later immigrated to Montreal and became a Father of Confederation. (Courtesy of the National Archives of Canada) • McGee described himself as having "with impudence, volubility and combativeness, the life and soul and fortune of ten thousand lawyers" • He listed his good qualities as "a bold face, a fluent tongue and a love for argument." • He was praised by the first archbishop of New York, Archbishop Hughes, as having "the biggest mind" and being "unquestionably the cleverest man and the greatest orator that Ireland has sent forth in our time." • McGee first came to America in 1842 when he was 17. He was one of an estimated 93,000 Irish who emigrated that year. Two years later he was the editor of the Boston Pilot. • In 1845, he returned to Ireland, where he continued to work as a journalist and became involved with Young Ireland, a group of nationalists who advocated rebellion against England. Eventually, he became a wanted man; the police offered 1,500 pounds for his capture. • He married Mary Theresa Caffrey in 1847 and they moved to Boston after the Irish rebellion of 1848. Their first child, Dorcas, died at the age of three, and another baby, Rose, died of scarlet fever. Of six children, only two survived their father.

23. After ten years in the United States, McGee was impoverished and still felt like an exile. He decided to move to Canada, a country whose "character is in the crucible." He moved to Montreal in 1857 and started an Irish nationalist newspaper, New Era. He was elected to the Legislative Assembly the same year. "The one thing needed for Canada is to rub down all the sharp angles, and to remove these asperities which divide our people on questions of origin and religion," he wrote. "The man who says this cannot be done is a blockhead."

24. September 1864 The Charlottetown Conference

25. In September 1864, the Atlantic provinces - Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick and Newfoundland - organized a conference to discuss a union among themselves. Governor General Monck asked that the province of Canada be invited to their talks, "to ascertain whether the proposed Union might not be made to embrace the whole of British North American Provinces." Canada's most prominent politicians journeyed down the St. Lawrence River on a 191-ton steamer, with $13,000 of champagne in its hold, to attend the conference in Prince Edward Island. Those on board included John A. Macdonald, and George Brown from Upper Canada and George-Étienne Cartier, Thomas D'Arcy McGee and Alexander Galt from Lower Canada. Each journeyed to Charlottetown with a different motive in mind. Cartier felt that if he could persuade the Maritimes to join in a union, together their population would balance that of Upper Canada. In contrast, Brown wanted an end to what he considered French domination of English affairs - the end of a political stalemate. Macdonald was worried about American aggression and felt that the united British colonies, perhaps, could resist their powerful neighbour. In the 1860s, John A. Macdonald was instrumental in creating the Dominion of Canada and became its first prime minister. (Courtesy of the National Archives of Canada) The group of eight cabinet ministers and three secretaries arrived in Charlottetown on the same day as Slaymaker's and Nichol's Olympic Circus, the first circus to visit the island in 20 years. The harbour was deserted with most of the town at the circus. The delegates to the conference soon formed a different, political circus with a marathon of speeches, protests, lobster lunches, resolutions, picnics, alliances, flirtations and champagne balls. On the first official day of the conference, Macdonald spoke at length about the benefits of a union of all of British North America. The next day, Galt - a businessman, finance minister, and railway promoter - presented a well-researched description of the financial workings of such a union. On the third day, George Brown discussed the legal structure. And on the fourth day, McGee praised the nationalist identity, one that he saw bolstered by a vivid Canadian literature. Prominent politician George-Etienne Cartier was the leading spokesman for French Canada during Confederation negotiations. (Courtesy of the National Archives of Canada) The original intent of the conference to discuss a Maritime union was overwhelmed by talk of a larger union. In a matter of days the Maritimers and Canadians had persuaded each other to create a new federation. The delegates were giddy with success and the celebration party continued in Halifax, Saint John and Fredericton. But the terms of the union remained to be worked out - a daunting political task. The delegates agreed to meet again in Quebec City the following month.

26. October 1864 The Quebec Conference

27. Campaign Against Confederation

28. Lower Canada Dissent

29. Maritime Opposition

30. The London Conference November 1866

31. July 1, 1867 On July 1 1867, at noon, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and the Province of Canada were proclaimed the Dominion of Canada, with John A. Macdonald its first prime minister. Now, the area of Upper Canada was called Ontario and Lower Canada was called Quebec. In most parts of the new Dominion, it was a dazzling sunny day. The reverberation of a brass band could be heard in many towns. In Toronto, children were given Union Jacks to wave and an ox was roasted in front of St. Lawrence Hall, with the meat then distributed to the poor. In Ottawa, a military review on Parliament Hill fired a salute. The soldiers forgot to take the ramrods out of their rifles and the iron rods arched over Sparks Street.

34. "There was the dark and then there was the light of a candle... then there was the opening of the great door, and the rush of cool, fresh air, and the deep darkness. 'Oh, Look!' said a voice. The sky was suddenly full of shooting stars. There were fountains of stars, coloured red and green and blue... 'This is the First of July, in the year eighteen hundred and sixty seven,' (my) father said, 'always remember this day, and this night. You are a very lucky little girl, to be a child in Canada, today.'"

35. Political Deadlock in the Canadas • members in the legislature they often couldn’t agree: political deadlock. George Brown and Macdonald were enemies but in 1864 Brown agrees to work with him and form the Great Coalition to continue to pass laws, make improvements. Canada West (John A. Macdonald: Liberal-conservative and George Brown: Reform) and Canada East (George-Etienne Cartier-Le Parti Bleu and Antoine-Aime Dorion-Le Parti Rouge) Due to the mix of English and French-speaking political

36. In the Province of Canada, there was one government problem or crisis after another. A new system of decision making, with one central government and provincial governments to deal with local issues, might help make government more stable in the colonies. • The government of the Province of Canada did not run smoothly because the English-speaking and French-speaking halves had different ideas about how things should be run. Leaders from both parts of the province decided that joining the other colonies might help solve their own political problems.

37. 1861 • American Civil War

38. Conference at Charlottown • September 1 1864