[ 
 
 w 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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 II 
 
THE 
 
 COJVSTITUTIl^lV 
 
 OF THE 
 
 CANADAS, 
 
 VDOPTED BY THE IMPERIAL PARLUMENT IN THE 
 THIRTY-FIRST YEAR OF THE REIGN OF HIS 
 MAJESTY, GEORGE THE HI. 
 
 AND 
 
 IN THE YEAR OF OUR IiORD ONB THOUSAND SEVEN 
 
 HUNDRED And ninety-one,* 
 
 TOGETHER WITH THE DEBATES THEREON- 
 
 Printed by Joseph Wilson^ 
 
 HALLOWELL, U. C. 
 
 1833. 
 

 PASSED IN THE THIRTY-FIRST YEAR OF 
 GEORGE III. 
 
 ^1/? act to repeal certain parts of an act, passed in the 
 fourteenth year of his Majcstifs reign, entitled, An act 
 for making more effectual provision for the government 
 of the province of Quebec, in North America; and to 
 make further provision for the government of the said 
 Province, 
 k 
 
 Whereas an act was passed in the fourteenth year of 
 - the reign of his present Majesty, entitled, An act for making 
 more etfectual provision for the government of the province 
 of Quebec, in North America : and whereas the said act is 
 in many respects inapplicable to the present condition and 
 circumstances of the said province : and whereas it is expedi- 
 ent and necessary that further provision should now be made 
 for the good government and prosperity thereof : may it 
 therefore please your most^icceHcnt Maj«&ty-thft4- it may 
 be enacted ; and be it enacted by the King’s most excellent 
 Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the lords 
 spiritual and temporal and commons, in this present parlia- 
 ment assembled, and by the authority of the same, That so 
 much of the said act as in any manner relates to the appoint- 
 ment of a council for the affairs of the said province of Que- 
 bec, or to the power given by the said act to the said coun- 
 cil, or to the major part of them, to make ordinances for the 
 peace, 'svelfare, and good government of the said province, 
 with the consent of his Majesty’s governor, lieutenant gov- 
 ernor, or commander in chief for the time being, shall be, 
 and the same is hereby repealed. 
 
 II. And whereas his Majesty has been pleased to signi- 
 fy, by his message to both houses of parliament, his royal 
 intention to divide his province of Quebec into two separate 
 provinces, to be called the province of Upper Canada, and 
 the province of Lower Canada ; be it enacted by the au- 
 thority aforesaid. That there shall be within each of the 
 said provinces respectively a legislative council, ajid an as- 
 
sembly, to be severally composed auJ constituted 
 manner hereinafter describea ; and that in each o 
 provinces respectively, his Majesty, his and 
 
 shall have power, during the continuance of this act, by an 
 with the advice and consent of the legislative council ana 
 
 assembly of such provinces respectively, to make laws tort 
 
 peace, welfare, and good government thereof, such la 
 not being repugnant to this act ; and that all aws 
 
 being passed by the legislative council and assembly oi ei- 
 ther of the said provinces respectively, and assented to b} 
 his Majesty, his heirs or successors, or assented to in 
 his Majesty’s name, by such person as his Majesty, nis? 
 heirs or successors, shall from time to time appoint to be le 
 governor, or lieutenant governor of such province, or b} 
 such person as hii Majesty, his heirs or successors, sha 
 from time to time appoint to administer the governmen 
 within the same, shall be, and the same arc hereby dec ai- 
 ed to be, by virtue of and under the authority of this ac , 
 valid and binding to all intents and purposes whatever, wil i 
 in the province in which the same shall have been so passed 
 III. And he it further enacted hy the authority afore- 
 saidy That for the purpose of constituting such legislative 
 council as aforesaid, in each of the said provinces respect- 
 ively, it shall and may bejawlul for his Majesty, his heirs 
 or successors, by an instrument under his or their sign man- 
 uel,to authorize and direct the governor or lieutenant 
 ernor, or persons administering the government in each ot 
 the said provinces respectively, within the time hereinafter 
 mentioned, in his Majesty’s name, and by an instrument 
 under the great seal of such province, to summon to th«j 
 said legislative council, to be established in each of the said 
 provinces respectively, a sufficient number of discreet ami 
 proper persons, being not fewer than seven, to the legisla- 
 tive council for the province of Upper Canada, and not 
 few’er than fifteen to the legislative council for the province 
 of Lower Canada ; and that it shall also be lawful for his 
 Majesty, his heirs or successors, from time to lime, by an 
 instrument under his or their sign manual, to authorize and 
 direct the governor or lieutenant governor, or^ person ad- 
 ministering the government in each of the said provinces 
 
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 respectively, to summoa to the legislative council of such 
 province, in like manner, such other person or persons as 
 his Majesty, his heirs or successors, shall think fit ; and that 
 every person who shall be so summoned to the legislative 
 council of either of the said provinces respectively, shall 
 thereby become a member of such legislative council to 
 which he shall have been summoned. 
 
 IV. Prodded always^ and be it enacted by the author- 
 ity aforesaid^ That no person shall be summoned to the 
 said legislative council, in either of the said provinces, who 
 shall not be of the full age of twenty ^one years, and a nat- 
 ural born subject of his Majesty, or a subject of his Majes- 
 ty, naturalized by an act of the British parliament, or a 
 subject of his Majesty, having become such by the conquest 
 and session of the province of Canada. 
 
 V. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid. 
 That every member of each of the said legislative coun- 
 cils shall hold his seat therein for the term of his life, but 
 subject, nevertheless, to the provisions hereinafter contained 
 for vacating the same, in the cases hereinafter specified. 
 
 VI. And be it farther enacted by the authority aforesaid, 
 That whenever his Majesty, his heirs or successors, shall 
 think proper to confer upon any subject of the crown of 
 Gieat Britain, by letters patent under the great seal of ei- 
 ther of the said provinces, any hereditary title ofhonor, rank 
 or dignity of such province, descendible according to any 
 course of descent limited in such letters patent, it shall and 
 may be lawful for his Majesty, his heirs or successors, to 
 annex thereto, by the said letters patent, it his Majesty, his 
 heirs or successors, shall so think fit, and hereditary right 
 of being summoned to the legislative council of such pro- 
 vince, descendible according to the course of descent so 
 limited with respect to such title, rank, or dignity ; and that 
 every person on whom such right shall be so conferred, or 
 to whom such right shall severally so descend, shall there- 
 upon be entitled to demand from the governor, lieuteant 
 governor, or person administering the government of such 
 province, his writ of summons to such legislative council, at 
 any time after he shall have attained the age of twenty-one 
 
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 years, subject, nevertlicless, to the provisions hereinafter 
 contained. . 
 
 VII. Promded always, and he il further enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid, That when and so often as any person 
 to whom such hereditary right shall have descended, shall, 
 without the permission of his Majesty, his heirs or succes- 
 sors, signified to the Legislative Council of the province by 
 the governor, lieuicnant-governor, or person administering 
 the government there, have been absent from the said prov- 
 ince tor the space of lour years continually, at any time be- 
 tween the date of his succeeding to such right, and the time 
 ol his applying for such writ of summons, if he shall have 
 been of the age of twenty-one years or upwards at the time 
 of his so succeeding, or at any time between the date of his 
 attainincr the said age and the time oi his so applying, if he 
 shall not hate been of the said age at the time of his so suc- 
 ceeding; and also when and so often as any such person 
 shall at any time, before his applying for such writ of sum- 
 mons, have taken any oath of allegiance or obedience to any 
 foreign prince or pow’er, in every such ca.se such person 
 shairnot be entitled to receive any writ of summons to the 
 Legislative Council by virtue of such hereditary liglit un- 
 less his Majesty, his heirs or successors, shall at any lime 
 think fit, by instrument under his or their sign manual, to 
 direct that such person shall be summoned to the said coun 
 cil; and the governor, lieutenant-governor, or person ad- 
 ministering the. government in the said provinces respect- 
 ively, is herehy authorized and requirctl, previous to grant- 
 \n(r such writ of summons to any person so apjdying for the 
 same, to interrogate such person upon oath, touching the 
 said several particulars, before such Executive Council as 
 shall have been appointed by his Majesty, Ins heirs or suc- 
 cessors, within such province, for the affairs thereof. 
 
 VI II. Provided also, and be it turiher enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid. That if any member of the Legislative 
 Councils of either of the said provinces respectively, shall 
 leave such province, and shall reside out of the same for the 
 space offour years continually, without the permission of his 
 Majesty, his heirs or successors, signified to such Legislative 
 
7 
 
 
 Council by the governor or lieutenant-governor, or person 
 administering Ids Majesty ’’s government there, or for the 
 space of two years continually, without the like permission, 
 ‘tso: or the perojission of the governor, lieutenant-goyernor, or 
 
 M person administering the government of such province, sig- 
 lece- nified to such Legislative Council in the manner aforesaid; 
 
 cel: or if any such member shall take any oath of allegiance or 
 
 ten»; obedience to any foreign prince or power, his seat in such 
 ipw Council thereby become vacant. 
 
 nek IX. Promdetl aho^ and be it fii/thcr enacted by the 
 elia authority a/oresaid, 'I'hat in every case where a wiit of 
 
 lb summons to such Legislative Council shall have been law- 
 
 etift. fully withheld froni an> person to wliom suCh hereditarv 
 ofb right as aforesaid, shall have desce nded, by reason of such 
 ifi,; absence from the province as aforesaid, or of his having 
 )sic- taken an oath of allegiance or obeilieiice to any foreign 
 
 erm prince, or power, and also in every case where the seat in 
 
 sm such Council of any me:;. her thereof, having such hereditary 
 oanv right ns aforesaid, shall have been vacated by reason of any 
 pme of the causes herein before specified, such hereditary right 
 }tbc shall remain suspemleu during the life of inch person, unless 
 UD- his Majesty, his heirs or successors, shall afterwards think 
 
 lime fit to direct that he be summoned to such council; but that 
 
 il, tc on the death of such person, such right, subject to the pro- 
 coiin visions herein contained, shall descend to the person who 
 
 I ad- shall next be entitled thereto, according to the course of 
 
 sped- descent limited in the letters patent by which the same shall 
 rrant* bovc been onginally conferred. 
 
 oTtbe X Provided also tnid be it further enacted by the au- 
 .c ^ thority afmesaid. That it any men. her either of the said 
 
 Legislative Councils shall be attained for treason in any 
 Qfjnc. court of law within any ' his Majesty’s dominions, liis seat 
 in such Council shall thv.eby become vacant, and any such 
 jy ijn hereditaTy right as afor esaid then vested in such person, or 
 Ishtia to be derived to any other persons through him, shall be 
 gjjji] utterly forfeited and ^ x'inguished. 
 
 XI. Provided also^ and be it further enacted by the 
 Qlliii authority aforesaid, That whenever any question shall 
 arise respecting the right of any person to be summoned 
 
8 
 
 to either of the said Legislative Councils respectively, o 
 respecting the vacancy of the seat in such Legislative coun- 
 cil, of any person having been summoned thereto, every 
 i^uch question shall, by the governor, or lieutenant-governor 
 of the province, or by the person adniinistenng the govern- 
 ment there, be referred to such Legislative Council, to be 
 by the said Council heard and determined; and that it shall 
 and may be lawful either for the person desiring such writ 
 of summons, or respecting whose seat such question shall 
 have arisen, or for his Majesty’s attorney-general of such 
 province in his Majesty’s name, to appeal from the deter- 
 mination of the said Council, in such case, to his Majesty 
 in his parliament of Great Britain; and that the judgment 
 thereon of his Majesty in his said parliament shall be final 
 and conclusive to all intents and purposes whatever. 
 
 XII. And he it further enacted by the authority afore- 
 said, That the governor or lieutenant-governor of the said 
 provinces respectively, or the person administering his Ma- 
 jesty’s government therein respectively, shall have power 
 and authority from time to time, by an instrument under the 
 o-reat seal of such province, to constitute, appoint and re- 
 move the speakers of the Legislative Councils, of such prov- 
 inces respectively. 
 
 XIII. And be it farther enacted by the authority afore- 
 said, That for the purpose of constituting such Assembly 
 as aforesaid, in eath of the said provinces respectively, it 
 shall and may be lawful for his Majesty, his heirs or succes- 
 sors, by an instrument under his or their sign manual to au- 
 thorize and direct the governor or lieutenant-governor, or 
 person administering the government in each of the said ^ 
 provinces respectively, within the time hereinafter mention- ^ 
 ed, and thereafter from time to time, as occasion shall re- 
 quire, in his Majesty’s name, and by am instrument under 
 the great seal of such province, to summon and call together 
 an Assembly in and for such province. 
 
 XIV. And be it farther enacted by the authority afore- 
 said, That, for the purpose of electing the members of such 
 Assemblies respectively, it shall and rnay be lawful for his 
 Majesty, his heirs or successors, by an instrument under his 
 
 
9 
 
 > (f- or their sign manual, to authorize the governor or lieuten- 
 ant-governor of each of the said provinces respectively, or 
 ivr the person administering the government therein, within the 
 time hereinafter mentioned, to issue a proclamation dividing 
 such province into districts, counties, or circles, and towms 
 ilOi or townships, and appointing the limits thereof, and dcclar- 
 ing and appointing the number of representatives to be 
 ‘ chosen by each of such distrets, or counties, or circles, and 
 
 D tk towns or townhips respectively ; and that it shall also be 
 
 )f lawful for his Majesty, his heirs or successors, to authorize 
 such governor or lieutenant-guvernor, or person administer- 
 ing the government, from time to time to nominate and ap- 
 point proper persons to execute the ofiice of returning ofli- 
 I fi*:. cer in each of the said districts, or counties, or circles, and 
 towns or townships respectively ; and that such division ot 
 ^fm- the said provinces into districts, or counties, or circles, and 
 towns or townships, and such declaration or appointment of 
 the number of representatives to be chosen by each of th<* 
 pe: said districts, or counties, or circles, an(fj', or townships, 
 
 !crf;‘ respectively, and also such nomination ancf"*appointment of 
 ,nd^ returning ofTicers in the same, shall be valid and effectual 
 iproT- to all the purposes of this Act, unless it shall at any tiriiC 
 be otherwise provided by any Act of the Legislative Coun- 
 fok ciland Assembly of the province, assented to by his Majes- 
 sfii) ty, his heirs or successors. 
 
 ely, XV. Provided nevertheless, and he it further enacted bij 
 saccfi the authority aforesaid. That the provision herein before 
 Itoa: contained, for empowering the governor, lieutenant-govern- 
 rooi, or, or person administering the government of the sai*: 
 theft provinces respectively, under such authority as aforesaid 
 necK from his Majesty, Ids heirs or successors, from time to time, 
 yii to nominate and appoint proper persons to execute the office 
 luid: of returning officer in the said districts, counties, circles, 
 
 ogeli:; and towns or townships, shall remain and continue in force 
 in each of the said provinces respectively, for the term of 
 ajon two years, from and after the commencement of this Act. 
 >/5UC within such province, and no longer ; but subject neverthe- 
 brbt less to be sooner repealed or varied by an Act of the Legis- 
 [erte lative Council and Assembly of the province, assented to 
 by his Majestv, his heirs cr succcssi rs. 
 
10 
 
 XVI. Provided always, and be it further enacted by 
 the authority aforesaid. That no person shall be obliged to 
 execute the said office of returning officer for any longer 
 time than one year, or oftener than once, unless it sliall at 
 any other time be otherwise provided by an Act of the 
 Legislative Council and Assembly of the province, assented 
 to by his Majesty, his heirs or successors. 
 
 XVII. Provided also, and be it further enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid. That the whole number of members 
 to be chosen in the province of Upper Canada shall not 
 
 be less than sixteen, and the whole number ef members to V 
 be chosen in the province of Lower Canada shall not be F 
 less than fifty. ^ I 
 
 XVII I. And be it further enacted by the authority afoi'e- 
 said, That writs for the election of members to serve in the 
 said assemblies respectively, shall be issued by the govern- 
 or, lieutenant governor, or person administering his Majes- 
 ty’s government within the said provinces respective!}", 
 w’ithin alter the sealing of such instrument as 
 
 aforesaid, for summoning and calling together such assem- 
 bly, and that sucl^vrils shall be directed to the respective 
 returning officers of the said districts, or counties, or circles 
 and towns or townships, and that such writs shall be made 
 returnable within fifty days at farthest from the day on 
 which they shall bear date, unless it shall at any time be 
 otherwise provided by any act of the Legislative Council 
 and Assembly of the province, assented toby his Majesty, ‘ 
 his heirs or successors ; and that writs shall in like manner 
 and form be issued for the election of members in the case 
 of any vacancy which shall happen by the death of the ^ 
 person chosen, or bv bis being summoned to the Legisla- J 
 tive Council of either province, and that such writs shall be 
 made returnable within fifty days at farthest from the day on 
 which they shall bear date, unless it sha'l at any time be 
 otherwise provided by any act of the legislative council 
 and assembly of the province, assented to by his Majesty, 
 his heirs or successors; and that in the case of any such 
 vacancy which shall happen by the death of the person 
 chosen, or by reason of his being so summoned as afore- 
 
11 
 
 k . , 
 
 1 1 said, the writ for the election of anew member shall be 
 issued within six days alter the same shall be made known 
 f j to the proper office for issuing such writs of election. 
 
 . ^ XIX. And be it further enacted by the authority afore- 
 saidy That all and every the returning officers so appoint- 
 ed as aforesaid, to whom any such writs as aforesaid shall 
 be directed, shall and they are hereby authorized and requir- 
 od duly to execute such writs. 
 
 II jj. XX. And be it further enacted by the authority afore- 
 ^ said. That the members for the several districts, or coun- 
 ties, or circles, of the said provinces respectively, shall be 
 chosen by the majority of votes of such persons as shall sev- 
 crall)^ be possessed, for their cwn use and benefit, of lands 
 [jIjj or tenements wdthin such district, or ‘county, or circle, as 
 ern. shall be, such lands being by them held in free- 
 
 . hold, or in fief, or in roture, or by certificate derived under 
 the authority of the governor and council of the province of 
 Quebec, and being of the yearlv value of forty shillings 
 sterling, or upwards, over and above all rents and charges 
 payable out of or in respect of the same ; and that the mem- 
 irclK several towns or townships within the said pro- 
 
 vinces respectively shall be chosen by the majority of votes 
 , of such persons as either shall severally be possessed, for 
 their own use and benefit, of a dwelling house and lot of 
 I”’ ground in such town or township, such dwelling house and 
 *! . lot of ground being by them held in like manner as afore- 
 said, and being of the yearly value of five pounds sterling or 
 upwards, or, as having been resident within the said town or 
 township for the space of twelve calender months next be- 
 ‘V, fore the date of the writ of summons for the election, shall 
 bona fide have paid one yearns' rent for the dwelling house 
 in which they shall have so resided, at the rate often pounds 
 sterling per annum, or upwards. 
 
 XXI. Provided always y and be it further enacted by 
 the authority aforesaid,, That no person shall be capable 
 of being elected a member to serve in either of the said 
 Assemblies, or of sitting or voting therein, who shall be a 
 member of either of the said Legislative Councils to be es- 
 ^ tablished as aforesaid in the said two provinces, or who 
 
12 
 
 
 shall be a minister of the church of England, or a minister, 
 priest, ecclesiastic, or teacher, either according to the rites 
 of the church of Rome, or under any other form or profes- 
 sion of religious faith or worship. 
 
 XXII. Provided also, and be it further enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid, That no person shall be capable of vo- 
 ting at any election of a member to serve in such Assem- 
 bly, in either of the said provinces, or of being elected at 
 ^ny such election, who shall not be of the full age of twen- 
 ty-one years, and a natural born subject of his Majesty, or 
 a subject of his Majesty naturalized by act of the British 
 parliament, or a subject of his Majesty, having become such 
 by the conquest and cession of the province of Canada. 
 
 XXIII. And be it also enacted by the authority afore- 
 said That no person shall be capable of voting at any elec- 
 tion of a member to serve in such A'Ssembly, in either of 
 the said provinces, or of being elected at any such election, 
 who shall have been attained for treason or felony in any 
 court oflaw within any of his Majesty’s dominions, or who 
 shall be within any description of persons disqualified by 
 any act of the Legislative Council and Assembly of the 
 province, assented to by his Majesty, his heirs or succes- 
 sors. 
 
 XXIV. Provided also, and be it further enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid, That every voter, before he is admit- 
 ted to give his vote at any such election, shall, if required 
 by any of the candidates, or by the returning officer, take 
 the following oath, which shall be administered in the En- 
 glish or French language, as the case may require : 
 
 I A. B. do declare and testify, in the presence of AU 
 mighty God, that lam, to the best of my knowledge and 
 belief, of the full age of twenty-one years, and that 1 have 
 not voted before at this election- 
 
 And that every such person also, if so required as afore- 
 said, make oath, previous to his being admitted to vote, 
 that he is, to the best of his knowledge and belief, duly 
 possessed of such lands and tenements, or of such a dwell- 
 ing-house and lot of ground, or that ht has bona fide been 
 so resident, and paid such rent for bis dwelling-house, as 
 
13 
 
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 entitles him, according to the provisions of this Act, to give 
 his vote at such election for the county er district, or circle 
 or for the town or township for which he shall offer the 
 same. 
 
 XXV. A firi be it further enacted by the authority afor- 
 said, 1 hat it shall and may be lawfuLfor his Majesty, his 
 heirs or successors, to authorize the governor or lieutenant 
 governor, or person administering the government within 
 each of the said provinces rogp<»rtitr^lj7, to fix th« time 
 and place of holding such elections, giving not less than 
 eight days notice of such time, subject, nevertheless, to 
 such provisions as may hereafter be made in these respects 
 by any act of the legislative council and assembly of the 
 province, assented to by his Majesty, his heirs or succes- 
 sors. 
 
 XXVI. And be it further enacted by the authority afore- 
 •saiJ, That it shall and may he lawful for his Majesty, his 
 heirs or successors, to authorize the governor, or lieutenant 
 governor of each of the said provinces respetively, or the 
 person administering the government therein, to fix the 
 places and times of holding the first and every other ses- 
 sion of the Legislative Council andassembly of such pro- 
 vince, giving^ due and sufficient notice thereof ana to 
 prorogue the bme from time to time, and to dissolve the. 
 same, by proclamation or otherwise, whenever he shall 
 judge it necessary or expedient. 
 
 XXVII. Promded always, and be it enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid, That the said legislative council and 
 assembly, in each of the said provinces, shall be called 
 together once at the least in every twelve calendar months, 
 and that every assembly shall continue for four years 
 from the day of the return of the writs for choosing the 
 same, and no longer, sul^ect nevertheless to be sooner 
 prorogued and dissolved by the governor or lieutenantgo - 
 yernor of the province, or person administering his Ma- 
 jesty’s government therein. 
 
 XXVIII. And he it further enacted by the authority 
 aforesaid. That all questions which shall arise in the said 
 legislative councils or assemblies respectively, shall be dici- 
 
 2 
 
14 
 
 (led by the majority of voices of such members • 
 be present ; and that in all cases where the Toic 
 be equal, the Speaker of such council or assembly, as tn 
 case shall be, shall have a casting voice. 
 
 XXIX. Provided always, and be it enacted by the ciu 
 thorily aforesaid, That no member either of the legislativ 
 
 councfl/r assembly, in either ^“'trJTall I ave 
 
 be permitted to sit or to vote therein, ,! 
 
 takL and subscribed the following oath, vither before the 
 g oveniui u r lieuVeuaut-guv B m or of such province, or per- 
 
 |)n administering the government therein, or before some 
 
 person or persons authorized by the said governor or lieut- 
 enant-governor, or other person as aforesaid, to adminis- 
 ter such oath, and that the same shall be administered in 
 the English or French language, as the case may require '• 
 
 I A. B. do sincerely promise and swear, 1 hat 1 wiu tie 
 faithful, and bear true allegiance to his Majesty, King 
 George, as lawful Sovereign of the Kingdom Great 
 Britain, and of these provinces dependant on and be ong- 
 ing to the said kingdom ; and that I will defend him to the 
 utmost of mv power against all traitorous conspiracies and 
 attempts whatever which shall be made against his person, 
 crown and dignity ; and that I will do my utmost endea- 
 vour to disclose and make known to his Majesty , his hens 
 or successors, all treasons and traitorous conspiracies and 
 attempts which I shall know to be against him, or any ol 
 them and all this Ido swear without any equivocation, 
 mental evasion, or secret reservation, and renouncing all 
 pardons and dispensations from any person or power what- 
 ever to the contrary. — So help me God. _ 
 
 XXX. And be it further enacted by the authority Vore- 
 said. That whenever any bill which has been passed by 
 the legislative council, and by the house of assembly, m 
 either of the said provinces respectively, shall be present- 
 ed lor his Majesty’s assent, to the governor or lieutenant 
 
 ’ < 1 ! ranrerm nrlminisf ArinoT 
 
 (Tovernor ol such province, or to the person administering 
 his Maiesty’s Government therein, such governor or lieut- 
 
 enant-governor, or person administering the government, 
 shall, and he his hereby authorized and required to declare, 
 
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 accoriling to his discretion, but subject nevertheless to the 
 provisions contained in th’s act, and to such instructions 
 as may from time to time be given in that behalf by bis 
 IVIajesty, his heirs or successors, that he assents to such 
 bill in his Majesty’s name, or tliat he withholds his IMajes- 
 ty’s assent from such bill, or that he reserves such bill for 
 the signification of his Majesty’s' pleasure thereon. 
 
 XXXI. Provided always, and be it farther enacted by 
 the authority aforesaid, That whenever any bill, which 
 shall have been so presented for his Majesty’s assent to 
 such governor, lieutenant-governor, or person administer- 
 ing the government, shall by such governor, lieutenant- 
 governor or person administering the government, have 
 been assented to in his Majesty’s name, such governor, 
 lieutenant-governor or person as aforesaid, shall, and he 
 is hereby required, by the first convenient opportunity, 
 to transmit to one of his Majesty’s principal Secretaries of 
 State, an authentic copy of such bill so assented to ; and 
 that it shall and may be lawful, at any time within two 
 years after such bill shall have been so received by such 
 Secretary of State, for his Majesty, his heirs or succes- 
 sors, by his or theli Uidcr in Council, to dpr.lare his or 
 their disallowance of such bill, and tint such disallow- 
 ance, together with a certificate, under the ham* and 
 seal of sucii Secretary of State, testifying the day on 
 which such bill was received as aforesaid, being signified 
 by such governor, lieutenant-governor or perron admi- 
 iHstcrino*.the government, to the legislative council and 
 assembly of such province, or by proclamation, shall 
 make void and annul the same, from and after the date of 
 such signification. 
 
 * XXXII. And be it further enacted by the authority 
 aforesaid. That no such bill, which shall be so reserved for 
 the signification of his Majesty pleasure thereon, shall 
 iiave any force or authority w’ithin either of the said prov- 
 inces respectively, until the Governor, or Lieutenant Gov- 
 ernor, or person administering the government, shall signi- 
 fy, either by speech or message, to the Legislative Coun- 
 cil and Assembly of such province, or by proclamation, that 
 
16 
 
 such bill has been laid before his Majesty in Council, and 
 that his Majesty has been pleased to assent to the same; 
 and that an entry shall be made in the Journals of the said 
 Legislative Council, of every such speech, message, or 
 proclamation; and a duplicate thereof, duly attested, shall 
 be delivered to the proper officer, to be kept amongst the 
 public records of the province; and that no such bill, which 
 shall be so reserved as aforesaid, shall have any force or 
 authority within either of the said provinces respectively, 
 unless his Majesty’s assent thereto shall have been so sig- 
 nified as aforesaid, within the space of twm years from the 
 day on which such bill shall have been presented for his 
 Majesty’s assent to the Governor, ’ Lieutenant Governor, 
 or person administering the government of such province. 
 
 XXXIII. And he it further cnactedy by the authority 
 aforesaid, That all laws, statutes, and ordinances, which 
 shall be in force on the day to be fixed in the manner 
 hereinafter directed for the commencement of this Act, 
 within the said provinces, or either of them, or in any part 
 thereof respectively, shall remain and continue to be of the 
 same force, authority, and effect, in each of the said prov- 
 inces respectively, as iLthis_act lia.d not ba<m made, and as 
 if the said'^pr^'vih^^ Quebec had not been divided; ex- 
 cept in so far as the same are expressly repealed or varied 
 by this act, or in so far as the same shajl or may hereafter, 
 by virtue of and under the authority of this act, be repeal- 
 ed or varied by his Majesty, his heirs or successors, by 
 and with the advice and consent of the legislative councils 
 and assemblies of the said provinces respectively, or in so 
 far as the same may be repealed or varied by such tempo- 
 rary laws or ordinances as may be made in the manner 
 hereinafter specified. 
 
 XXXIV. And whereas by an ordinance pasiseJ in the 
 province of Quebec, the governor and council of the said 
 province were constituted a court of civil jurisdiction, for 
 hearing and determining appeals in certain cases therein 
 specified, be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, 
 That the governor, or lieutenant governor, or person ad- 
 ministering the government of each of the said provinces 
 
^17 
 
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 lli* 
 
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 vesiDCclively, together with such executive council as 
 shall be appointed by his Majesty for the affairs of such 
 jwovince, shall be ccourt of civil jurisdiction within each 
 of the said provinces respectively, for hearing and de- 
 termining appeals within the same, in the like cases, and 
 in the like manner and form, and subject to such appeal 
 therefrom, as such appeals might before the passing of 
 this act have been heard and determined by the governor 
 and council of the province of Quebec; but subject ne- 
 vertheless to such further or other, provisions as may be 
 made in this behalf, by any act of the legislative council 
 and assembly of either of- the said provinces respectively, 
 assented to by his Majesty, his heirs or successors. 
 
 XXXV And whereas, by the above mentioned act, 
 passed ill the fourteenth year of the reign of his present Ma- 
 jesty, it was declared, Tliat the clergy of the church of 
 Rome, in the province of Quebec, might hold, receive, and 
 enjoy, their accustomed dues and rights, with respect to 
 such persons only as bliould profess the said religion; pro- 
 vided nevertheless, that it should be lawful for his Majesty, 
 his heirs or successors, to make such provision out of the 
 rest of the said accustomed dues and rights, for the encour- 
 agement of the protestant religion, and for the maintenance 
 and support of a protestant clergy within the said province, 
 us he or they should from time to time think necessary and 
 expedient, and whereas by his Majesty’s royal instructions, 
 given under his Majesty’s royal sign manual on the third 
 day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven 
 hundred and seventy-five, to Guy Carleton, Esq. now 
 lord Dorchester, at that time his Majesty’s captain gene- 
 ral and governor in chief in and over his Majesty’s province 
 of Quebec, his Majesty was pleased, amongst other things, 
 to direct, “ That no incumbent professing the religion of the 
 church of Rome, appointed to any parish in the said prov- 
 ince, should be entitled to receive any tythes for lands or 
 possessions occupied by a protestant, but that such tythes 
 should be received by such persons as the said Guy Carle- 
 ton, esquire, his Majesty’s captain general and governor 
 in chief in and over his Majesty ,s said province of Quebec, 
 2 * 
 
18 
 
 sliouW apnuiiit, ami sliould be reserved in the hands ol his 
 Majesty’s receiver general of the said province, 
 supporUf a protestant clergy in his Majesty’s said province, 
 to be actually resident within the same, and not otherwise, 
 according to such directions as the said Guy Larleton, 
 esquire, his Majesty’s^ ^captain general ® ^ ^ 
 
 chief in and over his Majesty’s said province, 
 
 . r» I • nr ^ iliflt \t 
 
 ICl III aiiu j - ‘ • 1-1 ^ 
 
 oeive from his Majesty in thatbedvalt *, and that in like man- 
 ner all oTowing rents and profits of a vacant benefice should, 
 durinn-?uch vacancy, be reserved !or and applied to the 
 like uses;” and wlien-eas his Majesty’s pleasure has in:e- 
 wise been signified to the same eifect in his Majc sly’s ro} al 
 instructions, given in like manner to sir Ih'edenck llaldi- 
 mand, knio-ht of the most honorable order of the bath, 
 late his Majesty’s captain general and governor in clnef^in 
 and over his Majesty’s said province of Quebec ; and aiso 
 in his Majesty‘o royal instiuctions, given in like manner to 
 the said rierht honorable Guy, lord Dorchester, now his Ma- 
 jesty’s captain general and governor in chief in and over 
 his Majesty’s said province of Quebec, be it enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid, That the said declaration and provision 
 contained in the sai l above n.*entloned act, and also the 
 said provision so made by his iNfajcsty in consequence 
 th^^reof, by his instructions above recited, shall remain and 
 continue to be of full force and eib et in each of tlie said two 
 
 continue lu uc VI ‘wij j *• 
 
 provinces of Upper Canada and Lower (.anada respcctive- 
 V, or any part, thereof, shall be expressly varied or repeal- 
 
 , I 1 K-.r iUn lorMcIa- 
 
 cd’ by any act or acts wliich may be passed by the legisla- 
 tive council and assembly of the said provinces rcs[>ective- 
 ly, and assented to by his Majesty, his heirs or successors, 
 nmier the restriction hereinafter provided. 
 
 XXXVI. And whereas his Majesty has been gracious- 
 /» p/easerf, by message to both houses of parliament, to 
 express his royal desire to be enabled to make a permanenv 
 appropriation of lands in the said provinces, for the support 
 and maintenance of a protestant clergy within the same, in 
 proportion to such lands as have been already granted with- 
 in the same by bis Majesty ; and whereas his Majesty has 
 been oracir.usiv idoascd, by his said message, iurther to 
 
 

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 10 
 
 signify Ills royal drsirc that such provision may be made, 
 ^^ itll respect to all future grants of land within the said 
 provinces respectively, as may best conduce to the due and 
 sutTicient support and maintenance of a protestant clergy* 
 v.’ithin the said provinces, in proportion to such increase as 
 may happen in the population and cultivation thereof; there- 
 fore, for the purpose of more effectually fulfilling his Majesty’s 
 gracious intentions as aforesaid, and of providing forthedue 
 execution of the same in all time to come, be it enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid, That it shall and may be lawful for his 
 Majesty, his heirs or successors, to authorize the governor 
 or lieutenant governor of each of the said provinces respec- 
 tively, or the person administering the government therein, 
 to make, from and out of the lands ol the crown within such 
 jjrovinces, such allotment and appropriation of lands, for the 
 support and maintenance of a protestant clergy within the 
 same, as may bear a due proportion to the amount of such 
 lands within the same as have at any time been granted by 
 or under the authority of his Majesty ; and that whenever 
 any grant of lands wdthin either of the said provinces shall 
 hereafter be fhadc, by or under the authority of his Majesty, 
 his heirs or successors, there shall at the same time be made 
 in respect of the same, a proportionable allotment and ap- 
 propriation of lands ior the above mentfoned purpose, wilh- 
 111 the township or parish to which such lands so to be gran- 
 ted shall appertain or be annexed, or as nearly adjacent 
 thereto as circumstances will admit ; and that no such grant 
 sliall be valid or effpctual unless the same shall contain a 
 specification of the lands, so allotted and oppropriated, in 
 respect ot the lands to be thereby granted ; and that 
 such lands, so allotted and appropriated, shall be, as nearlv' 
 as the circumstances and nature of the case will admit, of 
 the like quality as the lands in respect of which the same 
 are so allotted and appropriated, and shall be, as nearly as 
 the same can be estimated at the time of making such grant 
 equal in value to the seventh part of the lands so granted. 
 
 XXXVII. And be it further enacted by the authority a- 
 foresaid, That all and every the rents, profits, or emolu- 
 ment«, which may at any time arise from such lands so al- 
 
^ T 
 
 20 
 
 lotted aiiJ appropriated as aforesaid, shall be applicable sole- 
 ly to the maintenance and support of a protestant cleroj 
 
 within the province in which the same shall be situated, 
 and to no other use or purpose whatever. 
 
 XXXVIII. And he it farther enacted hy the authoritij 
 aforesaid, That it shall and may be lawful for his Majesty, 
 his heirs or successors, to authorize the governor or lieutenant 
 governor of each of the said provinces respectively, or 
 The person administering the government therein, from 
 lime to lime, with the advice of such executive coun- 
 cil as shall have been appointed by his Majesty, his 
 heirs or successors, wi.hin such province, for the affairs 
 thereof, to constitute and erect, within every township 
 or parish which now is or hereafter may be formed, con- 
 stituted, or erected within such province, one or more par- 
 sonage or rectory, or parsonages or rectories, according 
 to the establishment of the church of England ; and from 
 lime to time, by an instrument under the great seal of such 
 province, to endow .every such parsonage or rectory with so 
 much or such part of the lands so allotted ai^i approprii.te] 
 as aforesaid, in respect of any lands within such towr»ship. 
 or parish, which shall have been granted subsequent to the 
 commencement of Jhis act, or of such lands as may have 
 been allotted and appropriated lor the same purpose, by or 
 in virtue of any instruction which may be given by bis Ma- 
 jesty, in respect of any lands granted by his Majesty before 
 the commencement of this act, as such governor, lieuten- 
 ant governor, or person administering the government, shall 
 with the advice of the said executive council, judge to be 
 expedient under the then existing circumstances of such 
 township or parish. 
 
 XX XIX. And he it further enacted hy the authonty 
 aforesaid, That it shall and may be lawful for his Majesty, 
 his heirs or successors, to authorize the governor, lieutenant 
 governor, or person administering the government of each 
 of the said provinces respectively., to present to every such 
 parsonage or rectory an incumbent or minister of the church 
 of England, who shall have been duly ordained according 
 to the rights of the said church, and to supply from time to 
 
 !iID' 
 
21 
 
 such vacancies as rrjay happen therein ; and that every* 
 :leT» presented to any such parsonage or rectory shall 
 
 \nit. ^he same, and all rights, profits, and emolu- 
 
 ments thereunto belonging or granted, as fully and amply, 
 same manner, and on the same terms and con- 
 uitions, and liable to the performance of the same duties, as 
 ' the incumbent of a parsonage or rectory in England. 
 
 XIj. Provided alwmjs^ and be it further enacted by the 
 n ‘ . ^i^^i^otity aforesaid^ That every such presentation of an in- 
 cumbent or minister to any such parsonage or rectory, and 
 <!? enjoyment of any such parsonage or rectory, and of 
 
 e profits, and emoluments thereof, by any such in- 
 
 ojTti: minister, shall be subject and liable to alf rights 
 
 ^ ^ 2 nd all other spiritual and ecclesiastical juris- 
 
 authority, which have been lawfully granted by 
 ^lajesty’s royal letters patent to the Bishop of Nova 
 ^ Scotia, or which may hereafter, by his Majesty’s royal au- 
 jjf be lawfully granted or appointed to be administcr- 
 
 executed w’ithin the said provinces; or either of them 
 bisop of Nova Scatia, or by any 
 , Dther person or persons, according to the laws and canons 
 church of England, which are lawfully made and re- 
 ^^eived in England. 
 
 ALT. Provided always y and he it further enacted by 
 bs y/*^ aw//tor//y aforesaidy That the several provisions here- 
 y contained, respecting the allotment and appropria- 
 
 Liitf ^ protestant clergy within 
 
 '^uW^ provinces, and also respecting the constituting, crec- 
 tre'loi parsonages or rectories within the said 
 
 respecting the presentation of incumbents 
 * r ministers to the same, and also respecting the manner 
 mUt/ incumbents or ministers shall hold and en- 
 
 same, shall be subject to be varied or repealed by 
 ■ ipbV express provisrons for that purpose, contained in any 
 ^-1 or acts which may be passed by the legislative council 
 ^^^..r)d assembly of the said provinces respectively, and 
 v^^sented to by his Majesty, his heirs or successors, under 
 f ^ restriction hereinafter provided. 
 
 fme Pf added nevertheless, and be it further enact- 
 
22 
 
 in 
 
 ]3 C3S 
 
 ifib 
 
 :iio 
 
 cd ill the authority aforesaid, lhat whenev ^ y 
 acts shall he passed hy the legislative council . • 
 
 of either of the said provinces, containing any provisi 
 to vary or repeal the above recited declaration and pr^ 
 visions contained in the said act passed in the fourteen i 
 year of the reign of his present Majesty ; or to vani 
 or repeal the above recited provision contained i 
 Maieky’s royal instructions, given on the third day 
 January, in the year ol our Lord one thousand ser^ 
 e.i hundred and seveaty-five, to the said Guy Car,e^ 
 ton, Esquire, now I-crJ Dorchester ; or to vary o 
 r peal the provisions herein-bddre contained for contimi 
 i i!r the f-rce and effect of the said declaration an 
 pr'’.vishj!is •, or to vary or repeal any of the several pt; , 
 visions hereinbefore contained respecting the allotmei ; 
 and appropriation of lands for the support of a Protestai ,,, 
 clergy within the said provinces; or respecting the cons 
 tilting, erecting, or endowing parsonages or rectories will , 
 in the said provinces ; or respecting the presentation^ . 
 incumbents or ministers to the same; or respecting t! 
 inannpr in whlclj such incumbents or ministers shall ho v v 
 n'ul enjoy the same! anJ also, that whenever any act 
 acts shall be so passed, containing any provisions whi, 
 
 lU 
 
 sliall in any manner relate to or alfi'Ct the enjoyment 
 exercise of any religious form or mode of woiship orsu 
 impose or create any penalties, burthens, disaoihtics, 
 disqualifications in respect of (lie same ; or shall in m 
 
 manner relate to or affect the payment, recovery, or ei 
 
 joyment of any of the accustomed dues or rights hereW.Kj) 
 before mentioned ; or shall in any manner relate to tu,‘ -• 
 
 ! - ! ^ nnv nfli 
 
 vincf 
 
 clant 
 
 ]aij^ 
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 ie!m 
 
 nths 
 
 iificp, 
 
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 frranlin;T, imposinj:, or recovering any other dues, uij-cec 
 oends, 'or emoluments whatever, to be paid to or fort :,i,;£s 
 ISC of any minister, priest, ecclesiastic, or teacher, » ij(_( 
 ording to any religious form or mode of w-orship, in n taio 
 
 ;ce c 
 
 rorujng lo .>0 , n . 
 
 pect of his sai*d oflice or function ; or shall in any mauD ; 
 elate to or affect the establishment or discipline of ti 
 hurch of England,, amongst the ministers and meinbt ; 
 
 1 r . enifi nrovioces ; or shall in anv mano r;/.* 
 
 rhurch ot h^nglanu,. amongbi me auu incutvA 
 
 thereof wdtliin the said provinces ; or shall in any manii 
 relate to or affect the King’s prerogative touching 
 

 23 
 
 granting of waste lands of the crown within the said pro- 
 vinces ; every such act or acts shall, previous to any dc- 
 ^Vlaration or signification of the King’s assent thereto, be 
 ^''^aid before l)oth houses of parliament in Great Britain ; and 
 ''^that it shall not be lawful ior his Majesty, his heirs orsuc- 
 ’J^Vssors, to signify his or their assent to any such act or 
 Vets, until thirty days after the same shall have been laid 
 '^3cfore the said houses, or to assent to any such act or acts, 
 
 ^ V case either bouse of parliament shall, within the said 
 hirty days, address his Majesty, his heirs or successors, 
 “JV withhold his or their assent from such act or acts; and 
 ""^hat nosuch'act shall be valid or clfectual to any ol the 
 ^%iJ purposes, within either of the said provinces, unless 
 *^ he legislative council and assembly of such province shall, 
 the session in which the same shall have been passed by 
 have presented to' the governor, lieutenant-govern- 
 toVo(r, or person administering the government of such pro- 
 ^^^*ince, an address or addresses, specifying that such act 
 ^‘«5*ontains provisions for some of the said purposes hercin- 
 !D|J‘J^efore specially described, and desiring that, in order to 
 iclbjive effect to the same, such act should be transmitted to 
 s’w^dngland without delay, for the purpose cf being laid* bc- 
 a^yve parliament previous to the signification of his Majes- 
 iOMV’s assent thereto. 
 
 )joy» XLIII. And he it farther enacted by the authority 
 fores aid j That all lands winch shall be hereafter granted 
 ibilit^ithin the said province of Upper-Canada shall be granted 
 ia!l ii free and common soccage, in like manner as lands are 
 holden in free and confimon soccage, in that part of 
 'iA< dreat Britain called England ; and that in every case 
 •late ’’bore lands shall be hereafter granted within the said prb- 
 (kfijince of Lower- (’anada, and where the grantee thereof 
 (oo: rail desire the same to be granted in free and common soc- 
 (rjii-ige, the same shall be so granted ; but subject neverlhe- 
 ;!jp, ss to such alterations, with respect to the nature and con- 
 inj Kquences of suck tenure of free and common soccage, as 
 ilice lay be established by any law or laws which may be made 
 I nieL" his Majesty, his heirs or successors, by and with the 
 nj’iidvice and consent »f the legislative council and assembly 
 ebinf the province. 
 
XLIV. And he it further enacted by the authority 
 aforesaid, That if any person or persons holding any lands 
 in the said province of Upper-Canada, by virtu® of any 
 certificate of occupation derived under the authority of the 
 governor and council of the province of Quebec, and hav- 
 ing power and authority to alienate the^same, shall at any 
 time, from and alter the commencement of this act, sur- 
 render the same into the hands of his Majesty, his heirs 
 or successors, by petition to the governor or lieutenant- 
 governor, or person administering the gv)vernment of the 
 said province, setting forth that he, she or they, is or are j 
 desirous of holding the same in free and common soccage, j 
 such governor or lieutenant-governor, or person adminis- f 
 tering the government, shall thereupon cause a fresh grant 
 to be made to such pt^rson or pei-sons of such land, to be 
 holden in free and common soccage. 
 
 XLV. Prodded nevertheless and he it further enacted 
 hy the authority aforesaid. That such surrender and grant 
 shall not avoid or bar any right oi title to any such lands 
 so surrendered, or any interest in the same, to which any 
 person or persons, other tb.an the person or persons surren- 
 dering the same, shall have been entitled, either in pos- 
 session, remainder, or reversion, or otherwise, at the time 
 of such surrender ; but that every such surrender and grant 
 shall be mode sul»ject to every such right, title and inte* 
 ^st, and that every such right, title or interest, shall be 
 as valid and efTectual as if such surrender and grant had 
 never been made. 
 
 XLVl. And whereas, by an act passed in the eigh- | 
 leenth year of the reign of his present Majesty, intitled, , 
 “ An Act for removing all doubts and apprehensions con- / 
 cerning taxation by the parliament of Great Britain, in 
 any of the colonies, provinces and plantations in North , 
 America and the West Indies; and for repealing so much ; 
 of an act, made in the seventh year of the reign of his . 
 present Majesty, as imposes a duty on tea imported from ; 
 great Britain into any colony or plantation in America, 
 or relates thereto,” it has been declared, “That the King , 
 and Parliament of Great Britain will not impose any duty, 
 
 1 
 
25 
 
 
 tax or assessment whatever, payable in any of his Majes- 
 ty s colonies, provinces and plantations in North America 
 orthe West Indies, except only such duties as it may be 
 expedient to impose for the regulation of commerce, the 
 net produce of such duties to be always paid and applied 
 
 *°if "u ^ province or plantation in 
 
 which the same shall be respectively levied in such man- 
 ner as otlier diUies collected by the authority of the respec- 
 tive General Courts or General Assemblies of such colo- 
 iiies provinces or plantations, are ordinarily paid and ap- 
 
 n»fit for the general be- 
 
 nefit ot the British Empire, that such power of regulation 
 01 commerce should continue to be exercised by his Majes- 
 ty, his heirs or successors, and the Parliament of Great 
 Britain, subject nevertheless to the condition herein-before 
 recited, with respect to the application of any duties which 
 may be imposed for that purpose : Be it therefore enacted 
 by the authority aforesaid. That nothing in this act con- 
 tained shall extend, or be construed to extend, to pre- 
 vent or affect the execution of any law which hath 
 been or shall at any time be made by his Majesty, his 
 heirs or successors, and the Parliament of Great Bri- 
 tain, tor establishing- regulations or prohibitions, or for 
 imposing,- levying or collecting duties for the regula- 
 tion of navigation, or for the regulation ot the com- 
 
 bet\^en either of the said provinces and any other part of 
 Ins Majesty s dominions, or between cither of the saidprov- 
 inces and any foreign country or state, or for appointing 
 and directing the payment of drawbacks of such duties sf 
 imposed, or to give to his Majesty, his heirs or successors-, 
 or authonty, by and with the advice and consent 
 ofsuch Legislative Councils and Assemblies respectivelv, 
 to vary or repeal any such law or laws, or any part there- 
 tliereof* prevent or obstruct the execution 
 
 always, and be it enacted bu the 
 authonty aforesaid. That the net produce of all duties 
 which shall be so imposed, shall at all times hereafter be ap- 
 
 3 ^ 
 
26 
 
 plied to and for the use of each of the said 
 tively, and in such manner only shall be direc e , Y 
 law or laws which may be made by his Majesty, his heirs 
 or successors, by and with the advice and consent of the 
 Legislative Council and Assembly of such province. 
 
 XLVIII. And whereas, by reason of the-distance of the 
 said provinces from this country, and of the change to s 
 made by this act in the government thereof, it may be ne- 
 cessary that there should be some interval of time between 
 the notification of this Act to the said provinces respective- 
 ly, and the day of its commencement within the said pro- \ 
 vinces respectively ; Be it therefore enacted, by the authority j 
 aforesaid. That it shall and may be lawful for his Majesty, with J 
 the advice of his Privy Council, to fix and declare, or to autho- 1 
 rize the Governor or Lieutenant-Governor of the province 
 of Quebec, or the person administering the government 
 there, to fix and declare the day of the commencement of 
 this Act within the said provinces respectively, provided 
 that such day shall not be later than the thirty-first day of 
 December, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven 
 hundred and ninety-one. 
 
 XLIX. And he it further enacted by the authority a- 
 foresaid, That the time to be fixed by his Majesty, his 
 heirs or successors, or under his or their authority, by the 
 governor, lieutenant governor, or person administering the 
 Government in each of the said previnces respectively, for 
 issuing the writs ofsummons and election, and calling to- 
 gether the legislative councils and assemblies of each of the 
 said provinces respectively, shall not be later than the thir-| 
 ty-first day of December, in the yean of our Lord one thou- 
 sand seven hundred and ninety-two. ' 
 
 L. Provided always, and be it further enacted by the 
 authority aforesaid. That during such interval as may hap- 
 pen between the commencement of this act, within the said^ 
 provinces respectively, and' the first meeting of the legisla-1 
 five council and assembly of each of the said provinces re-* 
 spectively, i» shall and may be lawful for the governor, ot 
 li^tenant governor of such province, or for the person ad- 
 ministering the government therein, with the consent of the . 
 
 m 
 
 
27 
 
 V 
 
 major part of such executive council as shall be'appointed by 
 his Majesty for the affairs of such province, to make tem- 
 porary laws and ordinances for the good government, peace, 
 and welfare of such province, in the same manner, and un- 
 der the same restrictions, as such laws or ordinances might 
 have been made by the council for the affairs of the Province 
 ot Quebec, constituted by virtue of the above mentioned 
 act of the fourteenth year of the reign of his present Majes- 
 ty ; and that such temporary laws or ordinances shall be 
 valid and binding within such province, until the expiration 
 of six months after the legislative council and assembly of 
 such province shall have been first assembled by virtue of 
 and under the authority of this act ; subject nevertheless to 
 be sooner repealed or varied by any law or laws which may 
 be made by his Majesty, his heirs or successors, by and 
 with the advice and consent of the said legislative council 
 and assembly. 
 

 CONSTITUTION 
 
 OF 
 
 UPPER CANA DA, 
 
 V 
 
 INTRODUCED, DEBATED AND SETTLED, IN THE BRITISH 
 HOUSE OF COMMONS, IN 1791. 
 
 Fridatj, 4th March, j 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt moved, “ That His Majesty’s ^ 
 Message concerning the !New Constitution for Quebec 
 might be read.” It was read accordingly. 
 
 ‘‘ George R. 
 
 “ His Majesty thinks it proper to acquaint the House 
 of Commons, that it appears to his Majesty that it icould 
 be for the benefit of his Majesty^s subjects in the Province 
 of Quebec, that the same should be divided into two sepa- 
 rate provinces, to be called the Province of Upper Cana- 
 da and the Province of Lower Canada; and that it is 
 accordingly his Majestifs intention to divide the same, 
 whenever his Majesty shall be enabled by act of parlia- 
 ment to establish the necessary regulations for the govern- 
 ment of the said provinces. His Majesty therefore recom- 
 mends this object to the consideration of this Ilouse. 
 
 “ His Majesty also recommends it to this House to con- 
 sider of such provisions as may be necessary to enable his 
 Majesty to make a permanent appropriation of lands in ^ 
 the said provinces, for the support and maintenance of 
 a Protestant clergy within the same, in proportion to such 
 lands as have been already granted within the same by his 
 Majesty; and it is his Majesty'^s desire that such provis- 
 ion may be made, with respect to all future grants of land 
 within the said provinces respectively, as may best conduce 
 to the same objects in nroportion to such increase as man 
 
20 
 
 
 W 
 
 
 WK 
 
 d 
 
 W 
 
 ill 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 ic« 
 
 idi I 
 !«< 
 
 jflt 
 
 ijik 
 
 <r^ 
 
 f'lffl 
 
 ik/k 
 
 fjss 
 
 nr(f' 
 
 inccs; and for this purpose his Majesty consents that such 
 jyrovisions or regulations may be made by this Hcmse^ res- 
 pecting all future grants of land to be made by his Majes- 
 ty ivithin the said provinces y as this House shall think fitd^ 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt then moved, “ That the act of the 
 14th of his Majesty, respecting the said province, be read;” 
 and the title being read,;;ro forma, he observed that the 
 purport of his motion was to repeal part of the above act, 
 and to introduce new regulations tor the future government 
 of the province. Feeling the importance of the subject, 
 he should have been desirous of stating fully to the House 
 the grounds and.the principles on which he meant to pro- 
 ceed in forming a constitutoin for a valuable appendage to 
 the British dominion, which he trusted would contribute to 
 its future prosperity ; but as it was not likely that any op- * 
 position would arise against bringing in a bill lor this pur- 
 pose, and as explanation would come with more propriety 
 when the bill was before the House, he should state only 
 in a few words the outlines of a plan, unless questions 
 were asked, or explanations demanded, in the first instance. 
 The bill which he meant to propose was founded, in the 
 first place, on the recommendation contained in his Majes- 
 ty’s message to divide the province into two governments. 
 This division, it was hoped, would put an end to the com- 
 petition between the old French inhabitants and the new 
 settlers from Britain or British colonies, which had occa- 
 sioned the disputes and uncertainty respecting law*, and 
 other disputes of less importance, by which the province 
 had been so long distracted. This division, it w^as hoped, 
 could be mode in such a manner as to give each a great 
 majority in their own particular part, although it could not 
 be expected to draw a line of complete separation. Any 
 inconveniences to be apprehended from ancient Canadians^ 
 being included in the one, or British settlers in the other, 
 would be cured by the establishment of a local legislator in 
 each. 
 
 It was for this purpose that he should first propose, in 
 imitation uf the constitution of the mother-country, a Coun- 
 cil and House of Assembly for , each; the Assembly to be 
 3^ 
 
30 
 
 constituted in the usual manner, and the members of the 
 Council to be members for life, reserving power to his 
 jesty to annex to certain honours an hereditary right ol 
 sittino* in the Council. All laws and ordinances of the 
 province were to remain in force Jill altered by this new 
 legislature. They would consequently retain as much ol 
 the law of Kn^land as they now had, and chose to keep; 
 and they would possess the means of introducing as much 
 more as they might think convenient. The habeus cok- 
 PUS ACT WAS already A LAW, BY AN ORDINANCE OF 
 THE PROVINCE, AND THIS INVALUABLE RIGHT WAS TO 
 BE CONTINUED AS A FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE OF THE 
 CONSTITUTION. 
 
 These were the most important points ; but there were 
 others to which the attention of the House was called by 
 his Majesty’s Message. It was meant to make provision 
 for a Protestant clergy in both divisions, by an allotment 
 of lands in proportion to those already granted ; and as in 
 one of thorn the inajority^of ihe inhabitanls would be Cath- 
 olics, it was meant to provide that it shall not be lawful for 
 his Majesty in future to assent to grants of lands for this 
 purpose, under the sanction of the Council and Assembly 
 of either division, without first submitting them to the con- 
 sideration ol the British parliament. The tenures which 
 had been the subject of dispute, were to be settled in Low’- 
 er Canada by the local legislature; in Upper Canada the 
 settlers being mostly British, or British colonists, the tenures 
 were to be soccage tenures ; and in order to prevent any 
 such dispute as had^been the cause ol separating the thirteen 
 states from the mother country, it was provided that the 
 British parliament should impose no taxes but such as were 
 necessary for the regulation of trade and commerce ; and 
 
 were to be levied and to be ^ ^ ^ 
 
 of each division As the constitution which he had thus 
 briefly opened could not be in a state of activity for some 
 time, his Majesty was to be empowered to make tempora- 
 ry regulations, to be in force for six months after the e.s- 
 tablishment of the new constitution. 
 
 to guard against the abuse 
 
31 
 
 
 Mr. Fox declared it impossible to exj)ress an entire ap-* 
 [probation or disapprobation of a bill which the House had 
 not yet seen ; but he did not hesitate to say, that if a local 
 ^ legislature was liberally formed, that circumstances would 
 incline him much to overlook defects in the other regula- 
 tions, because he was convinced that the only means of re- 
 taining distant colonies with advantage, was to enable them 
 ' to govern themselves. 
 
 Ordered, that leave be given to bring in a bill to re- 
 peal certain provisions of the act of the 14th of his Majes- 
 ty, respecting the government of Canada; and to make 
 other provisions, &c. 
 
 Friday^ Sth April, 
 
 The order of tlie day for taking the report of the Que- 
 w bee bill into further consideration having been read, 
 
 Mr Hussey begged leave to inform the House that he 
 • » had a petition to present, from a number of very respecta- 
 ilii- ble persons, against the bill in question. They had con- 
 j(c ceived that it was likely to prove prejudicial to their trade. 
 
 Ihe petition was brought up and received. It contained 
 ibh the prayer of several merchants, warehousemen, and manu- 
 cor- facturers of Quebec, that the bill might not pass into a law, 
 iluc inasmuch as after having duly weighed the cbnsequences of 
 Lfli it, they feared fhat it would be attended with great injury, 
 i (k particularly to their trade and commerce 
 lore: ^ The petition was ordered to lie on the table. The 
 m Speaker then put the question, “ That this report be now 
 \eertaken into further consideration.” 
 
 [ tk Mr, Hussey moved, “ That the bill be recommitted.” 
 Mr. Fox remarked, that the bill contained a variety of 
 jiDtclauses of the utmost importance, not only with respect to 
 tactile country to which they immediately related, but to 
 atisGreat Britain. Many of these clauses ap*peared to be ve- 
 tluiry exceptionable, and such as he could by no means sub- 
 soiiScribe to. The bill proposed to- give two Assemblies to 
 jofa-the two provinces, and thus far it met with his approbation ; 
 ei-but the number of persons to whom these Assemblies 
 were to consist deserved particular attention. Although 
 
32 
 
 it might be perfectly true that a representa- 
 
 times as large as Great Lritam ouglit t P 
 
 lives three or four times as numerous, yet it rvas 
 .. , 11 ciwriilfl liavft AsscmbI 
 
 three or four times as numerous, ^ ^ 
 
 say that a small country should have an f ! - 
 
 - llv small.-The great object in the “ 
 
 . ^ . 11* *u«4. 4Uo s-wamtlii shoTilti be fulls aij 
 
 all 
 
 lionally smalt— me greai oujowt ... r u . 
 
 'is t; s: u 
 
 havi al/the virtues and vices incident to ’ 3^ 
 But when they made an assembly to consist ^ ^0 
 
 persons, they seemed to him to give a free constitut on 111 
 
 Lpearancc,^when, in fact, they withheld it. In Grea \ 
 Britain we had a septennial bill ; but the ° ' | 
 
 had been considered doubllui, at least, c\en y y J 
 
 those who took a lead in the present bill. 1 he 
 rrentleman (Mr. Pitt) had himself supported a vote for the 
 ?e'peal of that act. He did not now mean to discuss lU 
 
 merits ; but 
 defensible was 
 
 a main ground on 
 
 which it had been thought 
 
 lUlU gJGUtlU -- — 
 
 that a general election in this country 
 
 was 
 
 deiensioie was. uiul « 
 
 attended with a variety of inconveniences. 1 lut ge^.cml 
 elections in Great Britain w.re attended with several in- 
 
 elections in Vxreai JL>niaui w --ic - 
 
 conveniences could not be doubted ; but when they came 
 to a country so different in circumstances as Canada, and 
 where elections, for many yeais at least, were not liKC y 
 to be attended vvilli the consequences which they arcaded, 
 wliv they should make such assemblies, not annual or 
 triennial, but septennial, was beyond Ins comprehension. 
 A septennial bill <lid not apply to many ot the most res- 
 pectable persons in that country •. they might be peisoiis 
 Ingaged in trade and >f c'oosen _re)ir«enUt.^^^^ 
 
 ) pre 
 
 veiit them from attem.ing the sen ice of their 'country 
 But although it n.ight be inconvenient lor such persons 
 to attend such assembly for tne term of seven years, Uicy 
 mieht be able to give'tlnir attendance for one, or even 
 for three years, without any danger or inconvenience to. 
 their com'mercial concerns. By a septennial bill the coun- 
 try of Canada might be deprived ot many of the few re- 
 
 
33 
 
 prcscntatives that were allowed by the bill. If it should 
 “ be said that this objection applied to Great Britain, he 
 completely denied it ; because, althoujrh there \yere per- 
 sons engaged in trade in the British House of Commons, 
 
 • and many of them very worthy members, yet they were 
 
 * comparatively lew, and ihtrefore he should think that, 
 from the situation of Canada, annual and triennial par- 
 liaments would be much preferable to septennial. Of the 
 
 ‘ qualification of electors lie felt it impossible to approve. 
 
 ^ in England a freehold of forty shillings was sufficient; 
 five pounds were necessary in Canada. Perhaps it miglit 
 be said, that when this was fairly considered, it would 
 : make no material dilference, and this he sus[iected to bo x 
 the case ; but granting that it did not, when we were 
 ^ giving to the world by this bill our notions of the princi- 
 ples of election, we should not hold out that the qualifica- 
 
 ■ tions in Great 13ritain were lower than they o'ught to be. 
 The qualifications on a house were still higher, lie believ- 
 ed ten pounds. He thought that the whole of this consti- 
 
 • tution was an attempt to undermine and contradict the 
 professed purport of the bill, — ihe introduction of a po- 
 pular government into Canada. But although this was the 
 
 ■ case with respect to the two .Assemblies, although they were 
 to consist of so inconsiderable a number of members, the 
 
 ' Legislative Councils in both provinces were unlimited as to 
 numbers. They might consist of any number whatever, at 
 '5*f^the will of the governor, instead ol being hereditary councils, 
 councils chosen by electors, as was the case in some 
 i^^'of the colonies in the West Indies, or chosen by the 
 . ; King, they were compounded of the other two. As to 
 the points of hereditary powers and hereditary honours, 
 
 V ' to say that they were good, or that they were not 
 good, as a general proposition, was not easily maintained ; 
 but he saw nothing so good in hereditary powers and ho- 
 . nours as to incline us to introduce them into a country 
 r: where tliey were unknown, and by such means distin- 
 liec guish Canada from all the colonies in the West Indies, 
 lec ln countrits where they made a part ol the constitution, 
 feifhe fli'l not think it wise to destroy them; but to give birth 
 
1 
 
 
 34 
 
 and life to such principles in countries where they 
 not exist ap'jeared to him to be exceedingly unwise. e 
 could not account for it, unless it was that Canada, hav- 
 ing been formerly a French colony, there might be an 
 opportunity of reviving those titles ot honour, the ex- 
 tinction of which some gentlemen so much deplorea, and 
 t') reviv’e in the west that spirit of chivalry which had 
 fallen into disgrace in a neighbouring country. He 
 thought these powers and honours wholly unnecessary, 
 and tending rather to make a new constitution W’orse than 
 better It tlie Council were wholly hereditary, he should 
 ecjually object to it ; it Would only add to the power of I 
 the king and the governor ; for a council so constituted f 
 would only be the tool of the governor, as the governor 
 hirnsf.lf would only be the too] and engine of the king. 
 11c did not clearly comprehend the provision which the 
 bill made for the Protestant clergy. By the Protestant 
 clergy he supposed to be understood not only the clergy 
 of tiie Churdi of England, but all descriptions of Pro- 
 tesfants. He totally disapproved of the clause which 
 enacts, “ That whenever the King shall make grants ol 
 lands, one seventh part of those lands shall be appropria- 
 ted to the Protestant clergy.” He had two objections 
 to these regulations, both of them in his opinion of great 
 weight. In all grants of land made in that country to 
 Catholics, and a majority of the' inhabitants were of that 
 persuasion, one-seventh part of those grants was to be 
 appropriated to the Protestant clergy, although they might 
 not have any cure of souls, or any congregations to in- 
 struct. One-tenth part of the produce ot this country 
 was assigned, and this, perhaps, was more than one-se-i; 
 venth of the land. He wished to deprive no clergyman ' 
 of liis just rights ; but in settling a new constitution, and 
 laying down new principles, to enact that the clergy should 
 h.ave one-seventh of all grants, lie must confess appeared 
 to him an absurd doctrine. If they were all of the Church 
 of England, this would not reconcile him to the measure, 
 ft might be asked, why should they not have as much 
 as the Church of England ? In this country we had that 
 
35 
 
 which some condcmed, and others praised : we had a kind 
 ol shew, but still a proportion must be observed. The 
 greatest part of these Protestant clergy were not of the 
 Church of England ; they were chiefly what are called 
 Protestant dissenters in this country. They were, there- 
 fore, going to give to dissenters one-seventh part of all 
 the lands in the province. Was this the proportion, ei- 
 ther in Scotland or in Any other country where those reli- 
 gious principles were professed } It was not the propor- 
 tion either in Scotland, or in any other ecclesiastical coun- 
 try in Europe. VV’e were therefore, by this bill, making 
 a sort of provision for the Protestant clergy of Canada, 
 which was unknown to them in every part of Europe ; a 
 provision, m his apprehension, which would lather tend 
 to corrupt than to benefit them. The regulations were 
 likewise in part obscure ; because, alter it had stated that 
 one-seventh of the land should always be set aside for 
 the Protestant clergy, it did not state how it should be 
 applied. The bill was likewise exceptionable, as far as 
 ^ it related to the regulation of appeals. Suitors, were, in 
 the first instance, to carry their complaints belore the 
 ^^^^courtsof common law in Canada: if dissatisfied with the 
 ^decisions of those courts, they might appeal to thegovern- 
 i or and council : if dissatisfied with their judgment, they 
 ^ ^ might then appeal ' ‘ ’ 
 
 and next to 
 of Lords was 
 
 ^ _ . . to the king in council i 
 
 Oil O ^ 
 
 /the House of Lords. Now, if the House 
 a better court, which he believed it to be, than the king 
 ' in council, why compel them to appeal to the king in coun- 
 1 '^'^cil before they could come to the House of I.ords ? 
 
 Why not apply to the House of Lords at once? This 
 "^could answer no possible purpose, but to render lawsuits 
 1;^. exceedingly expensive, and exceedingly vexatious. Those 
 / were the principal objections he had to this bill. There 
 had not yet been a word said in explanation of it, with 
 all its variety of clauses and regulations. It went through 
 the House silently, without one observation; it also went 
 through the Committee only in form, but notin substance, 
 all the points of the bill, that w’hich struck him the 
 forcibly was, the division of the province of Cana- 
 
3G 
 
 <ia. It had been urged, that by such means we could 
 venerate the P^nglish and French inhabitants of the pro- 
 vince ; that we could distinguish who were originally 
 I'rench, from those of English origin. But was this to 
 be desired Was it not rather to be avoided ? Was it 
 agreeable 'to general political expediency The most 
 desirable circumstance was, that the t rench and English 
 inhabitants of Canada should unite tind coalesce, as it were 
 into one body; and that the different distinctions of the 
 people might be extinguished for ever. If this had been 
 the olyect in view, the English laws might soon have pre- \ 
 vailed universally throughout Canada ; not from force, but J 
 from choice, and conviction of their superiority. He had f 
 no doubt that, on a fair trial, they would be found free 
 from all objection. The inhabitants of Canada had not 
 the laws of France. The commercial code was never 
 established there : they stood upon the exceedingly incon- 
 venient custom of Paris. He wished the peopde of that 
 country to adopt the English laws from choice, and not 
 from force ; and he did not think the division of the pro- 
 vince the most likely means to bring about this desirable 
 end. In his opinion, this bill was also objectionable as 
 far as it related to the trial by jury, and the habeas corpus 
 act, which the Canadians were said to enjoy by an ordi. 
 nance of the province. It was stated by one of the coun- 
 sel at the bar, that either the ordinance, which gave the 
 inhabitants the trial by jury, or that which afforded them 
 the benefit of the habeas corjius, would expire before tliis 
 bill could pass into a law. If this were true it was an i 
 objection to the bill, and ought to be remedied. He trust- ] 
 ed that the House would also seriously consider the par- j 
 ticular situation of Canada. It w’as not to be compared 
 to the West Indies: it was a country of a different na- 
 ture: it did not consist of a few white inhabitants and a 
 number of slaves ; but it was a country of great growing 
 population, which had increased very much, and which 
 lie^hopeff would increase much more. It was a country 
 capable of enjoying as much political freedom, in its ut- 
 most extent, as any other country on the face of the 
 
37 
 
 globe. This country was situated near the colonies of 
 North America : all their animosity and bitterness on the 
 quarrel between them and Great Britain was now over 5 
 and he believed that there were very few people among 
 those colonies who would not be ready to admit every per- 
 son belonging to this country into a participation of all tneir 
 privileges, and would receive them with open arms. The 
 governments now established in North America were, in 
 his opinion, the best adapted to the situation of the people 
 who lived under them of any of the governments of the 
 ancient or modern world ; and when we had a colony like 
 this, capable of freedom; and capable of a great increase of 
 people, it was material that the inhabitants should have 
 nothing to look to among their neighbours to excite their 
 envy. Canada must be preserved in its adherence to Great 
 Hiitain by the choice of its inhabitants, and it could not 
 possibly be kept by any other means. But it must be felt 
 by the inhabitants that their situation was not worse than 
 that of their neighbours. ‘ He wished them to be in such a 
 situation as to have nothing to envy in any part of the king’s 
 dominions. But this would never prove the case under a 
 bill which held out to them something like the shadow of 
 the British constitution, but denied them the substance — 
 Where the principles of liberty were gaining ground, which 
 would increase in consequence of the general diffusion of 
 literature and knowledge in the world, they should have 
 a government as agreeable to the genuine prtireipTes of 
 freedom as was consistent with the nature of circumstances. 
 He did not think that the government intended to be es- 
 tablished by the bill would prove such a government ; and 
 this was his principal motive for opposing it. The Legis- 
 lative Councils ought to be totally free, and repeatedly 
 chosen, in a manner as much independent of the governor 
 as the nature of a colony would admit. Those, he con- 
 ceived, would b« the best; but if not, they should have 
 their seats for life; be appointed by the King; consist of a 
 limited number; and possess no hereditary honours. Those 
 honours might be very proper, and of great utility, in coun- 
 tries where they had" existed by long custom; but, in bis 
 . 4 
 
38 
 
 ; 
 
 opinion, they were not fit to be introJuced where they had 
 no original existence; where there was no particular reason 
 for .introducing them, arising from the nature ot the 
 country, its extent, its state of improvement, or its pecu- 
 liar customs; where instead of attracting respect, they 
 might excite envy; and as but few could enjoy them, those 
 who did not might be induced to form an unfavorable com- 
 parison between their own situation and that ot their neigh- 
 bors, among whom no such distinctions were known.— 
 Even whilst he felt himself perfectly desirous of establish- 
 ing a permanent provision for the clergy, he could not think 
 of making for them a provision so considerable as was un- 
 known in any country of Europe, where the species of re- 
 ligion to be provided for prevailed. It was upon these 
 grounds which he had stated, that he felt himself justified 
 in seconding the motion of his honourable friend (Mr. 
 Hussey.) 
 
 Mr> Chancellor Pitt said that, although he did not feel 
 himself inclined to oppose the motion, he could not avoid 
 expressing his regret, that the clauses which were objected 
 against had not attracted the attention of gentlemen on an 
 earlier day : at any rate, it was not owing to any fault oi 
 his that the bill had not been fully discussed in the former 
 stages of it; but considering it, as be did, to be of very 
 great importance to form a s^tem for the government of 
 a colony y which both in lyint of duty and interest they 
 were bounTto do, he professed him^f to be extremely 
 anxious to court all opportunity of receiving every species 
 of observation and information which could be obtained 
 upon the subject; and therefore be acquiesced in the re-1 
 commitment of the bill. As to the first objection of the . 
 right honourable gentleman against the manner of forming 
 the Atjsemblies, he must confess it was certainly his wish, 
 that the Assemblies in both provinces might prove numer- 
 ous enough to answer all the purposes of a popular assem- 
 bly, as far as the circumstances of the two provinces were 
 properly qualified for that situation. But he doubted very 
 much, according to the present state of the colony, and the 
 population in that piovince, whether the assemblies coyU 
 
T 
 
 39 
 
 ; be rendered more numerous than was proposed. The 
 ^ House would however have the goodness to consider, that 
 there was not the smallest idea that the assemblies should 
 '' not be increased, when the population of the province in- 
 ' creased. The assemblies, undoubtedly, ought to be exten- 
 ^ (led with the growing population of Canada. He believed 
 ; that a very numerous representative body was in no respect 
 ^ desirable; and they ought always to bear some proportion to 
 the circumstances of the country. With regard to the dura- 
 : tion of the assemblies, a House of assembly for seven years 
 ^ would surely prove better than for a shorter period. In the 
 “ other colonies, the Council and assembly were constituted 
 ' in such a manner, as to invest the governor with more in- 
 ^ fluence than would be given to him by the present bill. If 
 the assembly was not properly constituted at first, it must 
 ‘ be recollected that it was subject to revision, and that it 
 might easily afterwards be altered. There was nothbig to 
 ; hinder the parliament of Great Britain from correcting any 
 which might hereafter appear to want correction- 
 As to the Legislative Council, he totally and entirely dif* 
 fered from the right honourable gentleman, who thought it 
 ^’^Svould be better if it were to be an elective council, in the 
 .manner which had been lately established in America. He 
 ^'^did not think it was the business of that House to discuss 
 what was the best constitution of government for France, 
 for America, or for any foreign country : and this had been a 
 ^^'®reason why he had always declined making ai^ remarks 
 f^concerning the affairs ot France. Whether France had 
 7chosen well for itself, or whether America had chosen well 
 ‘'*for itself, he had no difficulty in declaring that the English 
 constitution which we had chosen was in its principle the 
 ‘ ®best for us ; better than an}^ of those republican principles. 
 l»Tle said he did not mean to use the word republican as an 
 obnoxious term, but none of those republican principles 
 Jf’*' which the right honourable gentleman had described as 
 ic^'the consequence of a greater extension of learning and 
 light, and which, he said, shone in the constitution of 
 an*' France and America, could improve the constitution of 
 s ^ Britain. They did not appear to be such as, if adopted 
 
’37 
 
 40 
 
 by us or any of our colonies, would be any improvement 
 ot our constitution, but the reverse. An aristocratical 
 principle being one part of our mixed Governrnent, he 
 thought it proper there should be such a council in Cana- 
 da as was provided for by the bill, and which might ans- 
 wer to that part of the British constitution which compo- 
 sed the other House of Parliament. With respect to the 
 Protestant clergy, hd wished to make an adequate pro- 
 vision for them, so that they might be supported in as 
 respectable a situation as possible. The giving them a 
 certain portion of land was the most eligible mode of sup- \ 
 porting the clergy which had occurred to his mind ; and as J 
 to the proportion of one-seventh, whether it was or was j 
 not too much, if it turned out to be too much in fu- 
 ture, the state of the land appropriated to the clergy, 
 like every thing else provided by the hilly was subject 
 to revision. At present he imagined that no man could 
 think that one-seventh part was unreasonable : and it 
 was to be recollected that one-seventh had almost 
 grown into an established custom where land had been 
 
 f iven in commufaHoh TorTTlITesr One-Tenth of (he pro- 
 uce which took place in England must be confessed to 
 be far greater provision than one-seventh of land. As to 
 the division of the province, it was in a great measure 
 the fundamental part of the bill ; and he had no scruple 
 to declare, that he considered it as the most materia] anil 
 essential part of it. He agreed with the right honoura- 
 ble gentleman in thinking it extremely desirable that the 
 inhabitants of Canada should be united, and led univer- v 
 sally to prefer the English constitution and the English ’ 
 laws. Dividing the province he considered to be the most j 
 likely means to effect this purpose, since by so doing, the 
 French subjects would be sensible that the British govern- 
 ment had no intention of forcing the English laws upon 
 them, and therefore they would, with more facility’, 
 look at the operation and effect of those laws, compare 
 them with the operation and effect of their own, and pro- 
 bably in time adopt them from conviction. This he 
 thought was more likely to prove (he case, than if the 
 

 41 
 
 
 - British government were all at once to subject the whole 
 inhabitants to the constitution and laws of this country. 
 Experience would teach them that the English laws were 
 Iff best; and he admitted that they ought to be governed to 
 Qs- their satisfaction. If the province had not been divided, 
 p:- there would have been only one House of Assembly ; and 
 fe there being two parties, if those parties had been equal, 
 or nearly equal, in the Assembly, it would have been the 
 III source of perpetual faction : if one of the parties had been 
 IK much stronger than the other, the other might justly have 
 ;p- complained that they were oppressed. It WoS on that 
 \i' pcrsiiation that the division ot the province was conceiv- 
 in ed to be the most likely way of attaining every desirable 
 f: end. — The bill re-committed. 
 
 Friday, 6 th May, 
 
 The House resolved itself into a Committee on the 
 (iuebec Bill, Mr. Hobart in the chair. 
 
 When the chairman put the question, that the clauses 
 lee of the bill be read paragraph by paragraph. 
 p Mr Burke said, it might be a question whether the 
 it chairman should be directed to leave the chair, or whe- 
 ^5; ther the bill should be debated clause by clause. He 
 15;; should therefore speak to the general principle. The 
 
 House, by the bill, was going to do a high and important, 
 jgj act ; to appoint a legislature lor a distant people, and to 
 affirm a legal authority in itself to exercise this high pow- 
 ((^ er. The first consideration, then, was, the competency 
 or incompetency of the House to do such an act ; for if 
 it was not competent, the beneficence of the intention, 
 UP or the goodness of the constitution they were about to 
 ,, give, would avail nothing. A body of rights, commonly 
 called the rights of man, imported from a neighbouring 
 .. country, was lately set up by some persons in this, as 
 paramount to all other rights. This new code was, “ That 
 all men are. by nature free, equal in respect of rights, and 
 Ip, continue so in society.” If this code were admitted, then 
 the power of the House could extend no further than to 
 f, call together all the inhabitants ©{.Canada, and recom- 
 • 4 ^ 
 
42 
 
 mend to ^liem the free choice of a constitution for them- 
 selves. On what then was the House to found its com- 
 petence ? There was another code, on which men of al] 
 ages had acted, viz. the law ot nations ; and on this code 
 lie thought the competence of the House must rest. This 
 country had acc^uired the power of legislating for Canada, 
 by right of conquest ; ano in virtue of that right, all the 
 rights and duties of the old government had devolved on 
 us. In the second place, came the right by the cession 
 of the old government ; and in the third, the right of 
 possession, which we had held for about thirty years. 
 All these, according to the law of nations, enabled us 
 to legislate for the people of Canada, bound us to afford 
 them an equitable government, and them to allegiance. 
 Setting aside, then, the doctrine of the rights of man, 
 which was never preached any where without mischief, 
 the House was bound to give to the people of Canada the 
 best government that their local situation, and their con- 
 nexion with this country, would admit. How was this to 
 be done ? He could not refer to the experience of old go- 
 vernments, for that was exploded by the acadimies of 
 Paris, and the clubs of London ; who saw too much by 
 the light of their new lantern, to have recourse to any 
 other. The great examples to be considered were the 
 constitutions of America, of France and of Great Britain. 
 To that of America great attention, no doubt, was due, 
 because it was of importance, that the people of Canada 
 should have nothing to envy in the constitution of a coun- 
 try so near to their own. Situation and circumstances 
 were first to be considered ; — non michi res sed rebus me 
 suhmittere conor. They were not to imitate the examples 
 of countries that bad disregarded circumstances, torn asun- 
 der the bonds of society, and even tlie lies of nature. 
 In the local situation, was there any thing to give a pre- 
 ference to the American constitution, or in the habits of 
 the people? Part of the province was inhabited chiefly 
 by persons who had migrated from the United States. 
 These men had fled from the blessings of American go- 
 vernment, and there was no danger of their going back. 
 
43 
 
 
 ■ There might be many causes of emigration not connected 
 
 • with government, such as a more fertile soil, and more 
 
 ■ genial climate ; but they had forsaken all the advantages 
 - of a more fertile soil, and more southern latitude, for the 
 
 ■ bleak and barren regi*>ns of Canada*. There was no 
 " danger of there being so much shocked by the introduc- 
 tion of the British constitution, as to return. The peo- 
 ple of America had, lie believed, formed a constitution 
 as well adapted to their circumstances as they could. But, 
 
 of compared with the French, they had a certain quality of 
 
 • phlegm, of old English good nature, that fitted them bet- 
 ter fbr a republican government. They had also a re- 
 publican education : their former internal government was 
 republican, and the principles and vices of it were res- 
 
 : trained by the beneficence of an over-ruling monarchy in 
 this country. The formation of their constitution was 
 It! preceded by along war ; in the course of which, by mi- 
 ■•litary discipline, they learned order, submission to com- 
 st’.mand, and a regard for great men They learned what, 
 p-if it was allowable in so enlightened an age as the pre- 
 cisent to allude to antiquity, a king of Sparta had said was 
 Vthe great wisdom to be learned in bis couqtry — to com- 
 armand, and to obey They were trained to government 
 
 • by war, not by plot.*?, murders and assassinations. In the 
 tai.next place, they had not the materials of monarchy or 
 karistocracy among them. They did not however set up 
 lacilhc absurdity, that the nation should govern the nation : 
 ^iNthat Prince Preltyman should govern Prince Prettyman ; 
 
 formed their government, as near as they could, ac- 
 wicording to the model of the British constitution. Yet he 
 [jr/lid not say, give this constitution to a British colony 5 
 jjjbecause, if the imitation of the British constitution was so 
 iti'igood, why not give them the thing itself? as he who 
 .^professed to sing like a nightingale was told, by the per- 
 j^json to whom he offered his talents, that he could hear the 
 If^Tnightingale herself. Hence, he thought the greater num** 
 libber of inhabitants of that description would have no ob- 
 
 
 * Here was a very great mistaWa. 
 

 w 
 
 41 
 
 jcclion to the British constitution ; and the British '> 
 Lilants were probably not so much corrupted by the clubs 
 of London, and the academies of Pans, as to think any 
 form of government preferable to an old one. 1 he an- 
 cient Canadians were next to be considered, and being the 
 mostnumerou*, they were entitled to the greatest atten- 
 tion. Were sve to give them the French constitution — a 
 constitution, founded on principles diametrically opposite 
 to cur’s, that couM not assimilate with it in a single point, 
 as ditferent from it as wisdom from folly, as vice from 
 virtue, as the most opposite extremes in nature — a consti- V 
 tution founded on wliat was called the rights of man? I 
 But let this constitution be examined by its practical el- i 
 iects in the French West India colonies. These, not- * 
 withstanding three disastrous wars, were most happy and 
 flourishing till they heard of the rights of men. As soon 
 as this system arrived among them, Pandora’s box, re- 
 plete with every mortal evil, seemed to fly open, hell it- 
 self to yawn, and every demon of mischief to overspread 
 the face of the earth. Blacks rose against whites, whites ■ 
 against blacks, and each against ore another, in murder- c 
 ous hostility ; subordination was destroyed tlie bonds of 'j 
 society torn asunder, and each man seemed to thirst far | 
 the blood of his neighbour. — 
 
 Black spirits ar.d white, , 
 
 - “ Blue spirits ami grey, , 
 
 “ Mingle, mingle, mingle.*’ ‘ 
 
 c 
 
 All was toil and trouble, discord and blood, from tlie ^ 
 moment that this doctrine was promulgated among them; 
 and he varily believed, that wherever the rights of men /| 
 w^ere preachet) up, such ever had been, and ever would i 
 be, the consequences. France, who had generously sent ^ 
 them the precious gift of the rights of men, did not like ■ 
 this image of herself reflected in her child, and sent out 
 a body of troops, well seasoned too with the rights of 
 men, to restore order and obedience. These troops, as 
 soon as they arrived, instructed as they were in the prin- 
 ciple of government, felt themselves bound to become 
 
45 
 
 parlies in the general rebellion, and like most of their 
 . brethren at home, began asserting their rights by cutting 
 t off the head of their general. Mr. Burke read the late 
 )i accounts from St. Domingo, delivered to the National As- 
 sembly, and added, that by way of equivalent for this 
 ij information, M. Barnavc announced the return of the 
 •. members of the late Colonial Assembly, to the true prin- 
 ciples of the constitution. The members of an assembly 
 no longer in existence, had bequeathed their return to tho 
 : principles of the constitution, as their last act and deed as 
 V a body, and this was an equivalent for all the horrors oc- 
 , casioned by troops joining in a rebellion, which they were 
 i]. sent to quell ! Ought this example to induce us to send 
 n to our colonics a cargo of the rights of men ? As soon 
 ; "would he send them a bale of infected cotton from Mar- 
 seilles. If we had so little regard for any of our colo- 
 , P, nies, as to give them that, for the sake of an experimenl, 
 fill which we would not take to ourselves — if we were for 
 l j)eria//wn in corpora vilif let us think how it would opc- 
 , rate at home. Let us consider the effects of the Frencli 
 i:;i;Constilution on France, a constitution on which he looked 
 not with approbation, but with horror, as involving every 
 '• principle to be detested, and pregnant with every conse- 
 quence to be dreaded and abominated, and the use which 
 they proposed to make of it. They had told us them* 
 selves; and their partisans in this country, the Revolu- 
 tion and Unitarian societies, had told us that they had 
 erected a great monument for the instruction of mankind. 
 ^‘This was certainly done not without a view to imitation, 
 [iin fiCt us see what we were called on to imitate; what were 
 duhe last acts of the contrivers of this glorious form ofgo- 
 ^ vernment. There were here no doubts of the facts, tor 
 .;'they w’cre related by the authors; and there were cases in 
 Dili- which the falsest of men might be believed, namely, wherj 
 ei: (hey gave a true - character of themselves. When they 
 had got a constitution moulded according to the newest 
 y pattern of the rights of man ; when they had got a king, 
 ej who was every thing in name, and nothing in reality, over 
 jea whom as a state prisoner the Marquis de la Fayette, the 
 
46 
 
 chief jailor of Paris, mounted guard : lie was desirous of 
 taking a little fresh air, and a little recreation m the coun- 
 try, and they granted him a day rule to go five miles from 
 Paris. But then recollecting, as it is the quality ot the 
 rights of men never to be secure, that this temporary re- 
 lease from imprisonment might afford the means of escape, 
 thev surrounded his carriage, commanded him to stop, and 
 one of the grenadiers of his faithful and loyal body guard 
 presented his bayonet to the breast of the fore-horse. - 
 M Baker here called Mr. Burke to order. He said he 
 had sat many years in parliament, and no man entertained 
 a higher opinion of the integrity and abilities of the right 
 honourable gentleman than he did. His eloquence was 
 great, and his powers on many occasions had been irre- 
 sistable. His abilities might enable him to involve the 
 House in unnecessary altercation t this, perhaps, the right 
 honourable gentleman migVit do unwittingly for others, and 
 not to serve any purpose of his own ; he himself perhaps 
 might be the unwilling instrument, and might involve the 
 country itself in a contest with another nation : he could 
 not, therefore, sit any longer without calling him to order; 
 and he should insist upon every person adhering to the 
 question, and that the chairman state what the question 
 before the Committee was. He said that he had no ob- 
 jection, on any occasion, when questions of this sort came 
 properly before the House, fairly and fully, openly and 
 explicitly, to state his opinion. He had called the right 
 honourable gentleman to order, merely lor the sake of the 
 House, and for the peace of the country, and he had a 
 right to say, that the right honourable gentleman’s conduct 
 W’as inconsistent, with the order of the debate, and the re- j 
 gularity of the proceedings of that House. 
 
 ^ The Chairman stated that the question before the Com- 
 mittee was, whether the clauses of the Quebec bill should 
 be read paragraph by paragraph. 
 
 Mr. Fox aoyf rose and said that he conceived his right 
 honourable friend could hardly be said to be out of order. 
 
 It seemed that this was a day of privilege, when any body 
 might stand up, select his mark, and abuse any government 
 
^ 
 
 47 
 
 he pleased, whether it had any reierence or not to the point 
 i in qnestion. Although nobody had said a word on the 
 
 r subject of the French revolution, his right honourable 
 friend had gotten up and abused that event. He might 
 have treated the Gentoo government, or that of China, or 
 the government of Turkey, or the laws of Confucius, pre- 
 . oisely in the same manner, and with equal appositeness to 
 the question before the House. Every gentleman had a 
 right that day to abuse the government of every country 
 as much as he pleased and in as gross terms as he thought 
 proper, or any government, either ancient or modern, with 
 ^ ids right honourable friend. 
 
 “ ATr. Burke replied, that the honourable gentleman’s con- 
 ^ elusion \vas very ill drawn from his premises. If he was 
 disorderly, he was sorry for it. His right honourable friend 
 had also accused him of abusing governments in very gross 
 terms. ^ He conceived his right honourable friend meant to 
 u., abuse him in unqualified terms. He had called him to an 
 account for the decency and propriety of his expressions. — 
 Mr. Burke said he had been accused of creating dissension 
 among nations. He never thought the National Asseno- 
 ^ ^ imitated so well as in the debate then going on.— 
 
 esi could never utter a single sentence in that as- 
 
 sembly without a roar. 
 
 to: . Taylor spoke to order. He thought the 
 I discussion was carried forward to no good purpose. He 
 ; • Said he revered and respected the character of his friend. 
 They came to argue the question of the Quebec Bill : 
 were not discussing the English constitution, but 
 , \yhether, in fact they ought to give the British constitu- 
 T* tion to Canada ; and if they ought to give it, whether the 
 “ present bill gave it. VVhen he should be permitted to give 
 . his opinion, he should endeavour to shew that the bill did 
 1)4 constitution to that country. He said he 
 
 must insist on the rule of order. They were then dis- 
 . cussing whether it would be right to give Canada our own 
 j'*? constitution ; and, secondly, if it were right to give it, 
 whether that bill had given it. 
 
 J ' Mr, Burke submitted to the Committee whether he was 
 
 rflOK 
 
 1 
 
4S 
 
 or ^vas not in orJer. The question was 
 was then to be read paragraph by paragraph. “ 
 a fair way in reasoning to see what experiments had been 
 made on other countries. Ills right honourable Inend had 
 said that nobody had the least idea of borrowing any thing 
 of the French revolution in the bill. Mr Burke asked 
 how his right honourable friend knew that .> For anj 
 thing he knew, he (Mr. Burke) himself, might mean Ic 
 insert some clause. If he were to be stopped, he askto 
 why was it not in the beginning, and before he had fullj 
 declared the French revolution to be the work of folly and 
 not of wisdom ? It was the work of fice, and not of vir- 
 tue. If the.Committee would permit him to go on, he 
 should endeavour to meet the most captious ideas of order. 
 He declared he would not suffer friend nor foe to come be- 
 
 tween bis assertion and his argument, and thereby to maki 
 him a railer. His honourable friend had said that althougl 
 
 he did not do it himself, he was probably, though unwt 
 tino-ly, the instrument of some other people’s folly. Ht 
 declared he had not brought forward this business from an; 
 views of his own. If they did not suffer the affair to I 
 discussed ; if they shewed a reluctance to it ^ 
 
 Here Mr- St- John called Mr. Burke to order, and sat 
 the discussion could -not be brought forward with any rfr 
 card to order. He really asked it as a favour of his rigin 
 Lnourable friend, that 'he would fix a day on which bi 
 would bring on the discussion of the French constitution 
 He said he knew the English constitution ; he admire; 
 it ; he daily felt the blessings of it. He should be 
 tremely sorry if any person in England should endeavoii 
 
 iremeiY suiij — n 
 
 to persuade any man or body of men to aiter the constitn-y 
 tion of the country. If his right honourable friend kl 
 
 non me -n - " 
 
 made the French revolution the subject of a distinct dis- 
 cussion, that would be bringing it on in a fair way. 1 
 bis friend felt the mischiefs of the French constitution* 
 jipplicable to the English constitution, let him appoint i 
 (lav for that discussion. This he requested of his right ho 
 nourable Iriend as a particular favour. 
 
 Mr. Martin was of opinion that the right honourabl 
 
49 
 
 gentleman (Mr. Burke) was not irregular in speaking of 
 the French constitution. He had formerly heard a right 
 honourable gentleman say that the public had a right to 
 5 the sentiments of public men on public measures, and“ there- 
 
 • fore he hoped the right honourable gentleman would be 
 permitted to go on. 
 
 t Mr. Burke in reply said, he meant to take the sense of 
 : the Committee whether or not he was in order. He de- 
 
 clared, he had not made any reflection, nor did he mean 
 t. any on any one gentleman whatever. He was as fully con- 
 y vinced as he could be that no one gentleman in that House 
 4 wanted to alter the constitution of England. The reason 
 why, on the first regular opportunity that presented itself, 
 
 • he was anxious to make his reflections on the subject was 
 
 : because it was a matter of great public concern, and occa- 
 
 sion called for his observations. As long as they held to 
 the constitution, he should think it his duty to act with 
 . them ; but he would not be the slave of any whim that 
 i.i might arise. On the contrary, he thought it his duty not 
 IM to give any countenance to certain doctrines which were 
 Sir. supposed to exist in this country, and which were intended 
 fundamentally to subvert the constitution. They ought to 
 at. consider well what they were doing. “ 
 
 a; Here there was a loud call of “Order! Order”’ 
 
 kii “ Go on ! — Go on !” 
 
 wt Mr. Burke said, there was such an enthusiasm for order 
 rliK that It was not easy to go on, but he was going to state 
 aiit What the result of the French constitution perfected was 
 ur and to shew that we ought not to adopt the principles of it’ 
 
 u '^hen no man meant to 
 
 . . alter the English constitution ? Why raise animosities 
 Ii*j where none existed > and why endeavour to stir up pas- 
 ,,, sions where all was quiet before ? He confessed a thino 
 mioht be orderly, and yet that it might be very improper 
 . to discuss it. Was there any reason for doing this, or did 
 ,« they think the country was in danger > He declared he 
 rf answer that question. He was perfectly con- 
 
 Vinced that there was no immediate danger. He believed 
 the body of the country was perfectly sound, although at- 
 
 5 
 
50 
 
 temots were made to take the constitution Worn their hea s 
 by ^surd theories. He firmly believed the English con- 
 stitution was enthroned in the affections of their bosoms ; 
 that they cherished it as part of their nature ; and that it 
 was as inseparable from Englishmen as their souls and 
 their bodies. Some ministers and others had, at times, ap- 
 prehended danger even from a minority ; and history had 
 shewn that in this way a constitution had been overturned. 
 The question, he said, would be, what had they to do 
 with the French constitution ? They had no right to have 
 recourse to the proceedings of the National Assembly, be- 
 cause the Government of this country had not yet recog- 
 nised it. If they had, they would silence him. If the 
 French revolutionists were to mind their own affairs, and 
 had shewn no inclination to go abroad and to make prosel- 
 ytes in other countries, Mr. Burke declared, that neithei 
 he lor one should have thought, nor any other member of 
 the House had any right to meddle with them. 11 they 
 were not as much disposed to gain proselytes as 
 XIV. had been to make conquests, he should have thought 
 it very improper and indiscreet to have touched on the sub- 
 ject. He would quote the National Assembly itself, and a 
 correspondent of his at Paris, who declared that he appear- 
 ed as the ambassador of the whole human race-— 
 
 Mr- Anstruther, interrupting Mr. Burke, here spoke to 
 order. He said his right honourable friend had transgress- 
 ed something of what he looked upon to be the bounds ot 
 order in that House. It was a rule of order lor rnembers 
 to confine themselves to the question in debate. When hof 
 stated this, he begged it to be understood, that if any mi^ 
 nority in the country had any intentions to alter the con- 
 stitution, there was no man more ready to take strong and 
 decided measures to check that minority, and to crush that 
 spirit than he should be — 
 
 Here Colonel called Mr. Anstrutber to order, and 
 
 said that a declaration of his attachment to the constitution, 
 or of his gallantry in defence of it, was as much out of or- 
 der as the right honourable gentleman, whom he was calH 
 ing to order. 
 
 
51 
 
 d 
 
 L 
 
 il' 
 
 'j 
 
 E». 
 
 *• 
 
 b 
 
 5c.- 
 
 \a 
 
 oi 
 
 'e; 
 
 sji:- 
 
 b: 
 
 rre* 
 Is i 
 jk 
 
 &Cff 
 
 61." 
 
 fi-tr 
 
 of ■ 
 
 J//-. yi725frM//ecr replied, that if the honourable gentle- 
 man had condescended to hear him out, before he had call- 
 ed him to order, he would have saved himsehf some troub- 
 le. The honourable gentleman would recollect that he 
 had said he had heard of a design in this country to over- 
 turn the constitution. If such a design really existed, it was 
 the duty of the right honourable gentle man, who had stated 
 it, to bring forward some specific measure on the subject. It 
 was disorderly in the right honourable gentleman to thrust 
 that into a debate on the Quebec bill. If such a design 
 really existed, it could not be debated on that day consis- 
 tently with regularity. The question before the Commit- 
 tee was, whether the bill should be read, paragraph by 
 paragraph. The right honourable gentleman had said, how 
 did gentlemen know but that somebody, perhaps that right 
 honourable gentleman himself, meant to propose something 
 
 of the French- rev fdiitlojv in th a laill thcnr'^top then 
 
 till a clause or clauses of that sort were proposed ; let them 
 be silent till something like the principles of the French 
 constitution appeared in the bill ; and then any gentleman 
 would have a right to argue the subject ; but till then all 
 the debate was foreign to the question. He should say 
 nothing to the danger, how far it was proper, how far it 
 was decent, how far it was prudent, and how far it was 
 wise. Gentlemen were discussing the French constitution, 
 without any question before them- The question was the 
 (iuebec constitution. The p|inciple of the Quebec bill, if 
 it had any principle, was something like the English con- 
 stitution. The French constitution, for any thing we 
 knew, might be good for them, and might be bad for us. 
 it was neither fit nor prudent that that should be made a 
 question of discussion in parliament. If any intention ex- 
 isted in any part of the country, to introduce the constitu- 
 tion of France, it should not be considered under the Que- 
 bec bill, but they should appoint a day for taking the sub- 
 ject into consideration, to stop, crush, and quell any ma- 
 chination of that sort, if any such existed in any minority . 
 
 Mr. Burke said, an objection had been taken against 
 arguing the business, on the ground, that although it might 
 
] 
 
 be in order, yet the discussion might be attended with mis- 
 chievous consequences. If some good were not to be ob- 
 tained by it, he admitted, that it might be censurable to 
 argue it, and prudence, he owned, was a very useful qual- 
 ity, and a part of every man’s duty to his country. He 
 said he had formerly observed, in the course of this most ir- 
 regular debate, that the body of the country was yet untain- 
 ted with this French malady. The House smiled at the 
 expression, and Mr. Burke observed, that there might be 
 some allusion, which might not be so proper. He hoped 
 there was a very little minority indeed out of doors, who \ 
 were disaffected with the English constitution, and who j 
 wished to put the country out of love with it, by endeav- i 
 curing to fill them with admiration for another. He was 
 asked why he did not come forward with this business as a 
 distinct subject } He said before he did that it would be 
 propftr first to know what support he was likely to have. 
 
 He must know how Government stood affected to the bu- 
 siness, and also how the other side of the House liked it. • 
 
 He had sat ^ix-and-twenty years in that House, and had 
 never called any man to order in his life. This being a 
 question of prudence, he thought it was the part of a wise 
 man, and good citizen, rather to discountenance the mea- 
 sure, and to admonish those who might entertain those de- 
 signs, of their danger, than to come immediately to the 
 knife. He knew there was a levity natural to mankind ; 
 but when they were alarmed, they might recollect them- 
 selves, and correct those things which he should be sorry if 
 the law were to correct for them. 
 
 (Here there was a loud cry of Chair ! chair!” and of ^ 
 Hear ! hear !”) 
 
 Mr. Anstruther interrupted Mr. Burke, and spoke a- 
 gain to order. 
 
 Colonel Phipps immediately called Mr. Anstruther to 
 order, conceiving that the right horourable gentleman was 
 not out of order, inasmuch as he had a right to introduce 
 into the debate every topic that was at all applicable to the 
 question. 
 
 Mr. 'Fox said, he still entertained the opinion that he 
 
53 
 
 
 j had stated originally, and he had before spoken seriously, 
 
 V. and not irronically. He thought his right honourable friend 
 bad a right to enter into the constitution of France, because 
 p. he had a right to enter into the constitution of Turkey, or 
 I that of the Gentoo government, upon just the same princi- 
 i! pie. But it had been usual, when persons had gone into a 
 5: question, to state which side of a question they meant to 
 
 maintain. He confessed he did not know to what side of 
 t; the question to apply what had been said. He did not 
 ^ know whether his tight honourable friend was for or a- 
 jy gainst reading the clauses, paragraph by paragraph. He 
 wished he would favour the Committee with the reasons 
 a: which induced him to think the bill should be read para- 
 
 graph by paragraph, or not. 
 
 5 Mr, Grey said it was perfectly true that when a go- 
 ^ vernment was to be provided, strictly speaking, he under- 
 
 stood that any member had a right to support any form of 
 government, or to shew the evil tendency of another sys- 
 I j- tern which had been recommended by others. Yet he 
 (jj thought his right honourable friend had precluded himself 
 g, from that by staling the view and purpose for which he 
 ^ brought forward that measure. He had said that he did 
 jjj. not believe there was a man in that House who wished to 
 I alter the constitution ; and Mr. Grey believed his right 
 ^ ^ honourable friend was perfectly sincere in that idea : upon 
 what ground then, and upon what principles, was it neces- 
 ieir go into the French constitution.^ Because the 
 
 right honourable gentelman knew a design existed some- 
 where to overturn the fundamental principles of our consti- 
 , tution. The right honouiable gentleman had repeatedly 
 declared that he knew such a design existed. Now if this 
 was his ground, Mr. Grey wished to appeal to the right 
 honourable gentleman himself, and to the Committee, 
 whether that busines ought to be dh cussed on tht Canada 
 bill ; and whether that was a fit moment for such a discus- 
 ' " sion ? It was a duty which that right honourable genlle- 
 man owed to his country to discover that design ; and if any 
 person was more called upon than another to wish that the 
 discussion should be seriously taken up, it was the right 
 t h 5* 
 
honourable gentleman opposite to him (^Mr. Pitt,) >vho was 
 bound to watch over the interests of the country, and to 
 take care that no such design should be carried into etFect, 
 and therefore Mr. Grey hoped that the right honourable 
 gentlemen would unite with him in requesting his right 
 honourable friend to drop this business on the Canada bill, 
 and to make a direct charge with all that gravity which 
 the most serious mode ofform would allow, for bringing it 
 with due solemnity before the House. 
 
 Mr, Chancellor Pitt hoped the honourable gentleman 
 would not call on him to give liim an answer, till he could , 
 do it consistently with order. He doubted whether what ] 
 had just been delivered Tjy the honourable gentleman was J 
 a speech in order ; and unless some question had been mo- 
 ved, or order made to slop the right honourable gentleman, 
 he said he could give no answer without being guilty of an 
 irregularity. 
 
 Mr. Grey said, it was not his custom to call for an an- 
 swer from the right honourable gentleman, when he was 
 precluded from giving that answer. He repeated it, that 
 if any member knew of a design existing to overturn the 
 constitution of the country, it was the duty of that member 
 to bring it forward ; and he requested the right honourable 
 gentleman to unite with him in entreating his right honour- 
 able friend to put an end to a discussion which could not 
 then, with propriety, come before the House. He there- 
 fore again called on the right honourable gentleman to 
 adopt the mode of naming a day when he might bring for- 
 ward the subject properly, and have it regularly discussed. 
 
 Mr. Sheridan made the same application to the right 
 honourable gentleman opposite to him (Mr. Pitt.) He 
 was extremely giad, he said, to find that light honourable 
 gentleman had professed himself an advocate for order. 
 
 Mr, Chancellor Pill called Mr. Sheridan to order. 
 He submitted it to the Committee, whether, when the 
 question was with respect to the order or disorder of the 
 light honourable gentleman, the honourable gentlman 
 (Mr. Sheridan) had a right to digre.^s from that question 
 
 Mr. Sheridan said, the right honourable gentleman who 
 
55 
 
 
 was out of order, spoke to order, lie said, if there were 
 “ any design to overturn the constitution, it was the duty ot 
 
 * that House, and particularly of that right honourable gen- 
 
 - tlenDan, to endeavour to follow up the idea, and to prepare, 
 ) in a fair manly way, for the discussion. (Mr. Sheridan 
 
 • was going on, when he was called to order by Mr. Orde.) 
 
 ' Mr. Sheridan thought it his duty to interrupt the right 
 
 honourable gentleman whenever he spoke on that ques- 
 tion. He had been stating matters which he thought re- 
 
 - quired a seperate discussion. 
 
 Colonel Phipps called Mr. Sheridan to order. 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt said, whenever any body conceived 
 I ■ the right honourable gentleman was out of order, they got 
 up and interrupted him. The only way to bring this to a 
 point would be to move, that it was disorderly for him to 
 ^ advert to the French constitution in the present debate. 
 
 lie said he himself could not interrupt him, unless he was 
 [ijj convinced he was out of order. 
 
 M Mr. Burke again submitted to the committee whether 
 til he was orderly or not. He desired to proceed no further 
 r. without taking the sense of the House upon it. When he 
 rolii spoke of a design thot was formed in this country against 
 iu\i the constitution, he said, he spoke with all the simplicity of 
 m a member of parliament. He did not imagine there were 
 lhany plots, but he had a knowledge or conviction of them. 
 (iiB Mr. Burke complained that his friends had not used him 
 m with candour. He said, if they reluctantly forced him to 
 ^Hake a regular day, he should certainly do it, provided 
 they gave him a regular parliameiitary call to do it. 
 j li Mr. Grey said, Jie certainly did not mean to shrink from 
 ,) i any thing he had before stated. He did not know he 
 m could call upon the right honourable gentleman to bring 
 ler. forward the measure, but if the right honourable gentleman 
 uH knew of any design, it certainly was his duty to mention it. 
 i Mr. Burke asserted that there was such a design, so far 
 as could be collected from the conduct of certain persons in 
 pjv the country, to put us oqt of love with our constitution. If 
 ^ he was called on regularly, he should certainly make good 
 3 1 his charge. 
 
56 
 
 Mr. Si. Johx called Mr. Burke to order a second time. 
 He should think it necessary to take the opinion of the 
 House on his conduct. 
 
 Mr. Burke said an attempt was now made, by one who 
 had been formerly his friend, to bring down upon him the 
 censure ot the House-: it was unfortunate, he said, lor him 
 sometimes to be hunted by one party, and sometimes by 
 another. He considered himsell to be unfairly treated by 
 those gentlemen with whom he had been accustomed to ; 
 act, but from whom he now received extreme violence. ^ 
 He should, he said, if the tumult of order abated, proceed V 
 in the account he was going to give of the horrible and ne« j 
 farious consequences flowing from the French idea of the ) 
 
 rights of men. . , ^ i ‘ 
 
 Lord Sheffield spoke to order. Whatever might be 
 said by gentlemen on the other side of the House to the 
 
 contrary, his lordship declared he was convinced that the 
 
 right honourable gentleman was disorderly, and would 
 move, “ That dissertations on the French constitution, and 
 to read a narrative of the transactions in France, are not re- 
 <rulai or orderly on the question, that the clauses ot tU 
 Quebec Bill be read a second time, paragraph by para- 
 graph.” 
 
 Mr. Fox seconded the motion. 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt was glad of the motion, as it 
 duced the debate to something like order. lie said he 
 considered the introduction of a discussion on the 1? rencii 
 constitution to rest on discretion and order, which were tw 
 distinct things : he explained their ditference, and said, foi 
 his own part, he would use no vehement language, no: ' 
 any word that might give umbrage ; not conceiving, how- 
 ever, that the right honourable gentleman was disorderly, 
 he should certainly give his negative to the motion. 
 
 Mr. Fox .said, he was sincerely sorry to feel that he 
 must support the motion, and the more so, as his righi 
 honourable friend had made it necessary by bringing on, 
 in so irregular a manner, a discussion of a matter by w 
 means connected with the Quebec Bill, in a manner whid 
 he could not help, thinking extremely unfair, but which h.i 
 
 I 
 
57 
 
 
 must consider as a direct injustice to him. If tlic ijtrht 
 honourable gentlenr.an’s argument over the way with re- 
 gard to order was to obtain order, it w^as a mode of order 
 that would go to stop every proceeding of that House, es- 
 pecially in committees. It w^as proper to debate the prin- 
 ciple of a bill in the second reading of it ; and referring to 
 matter that might be analogous, much lattitudc would be 
 ^‘required. Ihe Ciuebec Bill had been read a second time, 
 and was decided. Il gentlemen, therefore, when a bill 
 \vas in a committee, would come dowm and state in long 
 •• speeches, general answers to all possible objections, to 
 -clauses that might be proposed, but were never meant to 
 • be proposed, debates might be drawn to any imaginable 
 length, and the business of the House suspended at the 
 '^•pleasure of any one of its members. The argument which 
 > '5ome gentlenaen might possibly move, that the chairman 
 ‘' leave the chair, was applicable to every clause, and to every 
 '^•>tage of the bill in the Committee ; and if on that account 
 Mvvry species of volunteer argument was to be held in or- 
 “|!er, it would be impossible fur business to proceed. His 
 ® ight honourable friend instead of debating the principle of 
 jhe bill, in any stage, which was usual, had come down, 
 ot to debate the clauses, but to fortily misrepresentations 
 f what he had said in a former debate, which his right 
 ^ onourable friend did not even hear. Order and discretion 
 sJ'i debate had been said to be distinct ; with him, Mr. Fox 
 J''cclared, they never should be sepevatc. Where the di.s- 
 '^.^^nction lay he could not see, for he always conceived 
 ^Aat order was founded on discretion. He was not in the 
 >^g'ubit ol interrupting any gentleman on the point of order, 
 because, unless the deviation from it was strong indeed. 
 iMore time was often lost by calling to order, than by sul- 
 y jring gentlemen to proceed : but if he saw any discussion 
 el Uempted to be introduced in a way not merely irregular, 
 tout unfair, he felt himself obliged to endeavour to slop if. 
 of'Iuch had been said on the present occasion, of the dan- 
 erer of theory and the safety of practice. Now, what had 
 oer’een the conduct of the gentleman who looked on theory 
 abhorance ? Not to enter into a practical discussion 
 

 .t.b. liu, ci..« 1., 
 
 gave, what it professed to give, the Bn i ^ 
 
 Canada ; but, having neglected to have done h y, ■ 
 attended the proper stage gf debating the pnncip , . 
 
 ter into a theoretical inquiry of what the princq 
 and a discussion of the constitution of another conn r} 
 pectincT which it was possible that he might difler Irom Ins 
 If this were not manilcst eagerness to seek a ditlercnce, ^ ^ 
 opinion, and anxiety to discover a cause of oispute, 
 knew not what was ; since, if they came to the clauses 
 the bill, he (lid* not think there would be any ditference 
 opinion, or almost but a very trifling one. If the riglif 
 honourable gentleman’s object had been to debate the Uu( 
 bee Bill, he would have debated it clause by clause,! 
 cording to the established practice of the House. If hn i . 
 icet had been to prevent danger apprehended to the Bn 
 constitution, from the opinions cf any man, or any set 
 men, he would have given notice of a particular purjx 
 
 1 _il_ rotVlPT*thrir\ tllSt 
 
 ret 
 
 iiet 
 
 mer 
 
 the 
 
 lDH 
 
 im 
 
 liili s- 
 
 cat 
 
 Lh 
 
 a 
 
 r \1 
 
 or taken any other cccasion of doing it, rather than 
 
 
 'iosi 
 
 ui luivcii auj V. , .mo 
 
 which his nearest and dearest friend had been grossly i 
 represented and traduced. That at least would ^ “ untf 
 the course which he himself should have taken, and tw 
 fore what he naturally expected from another. The coi 
 
 which his right honourable friend had chosen to laKC i 
 that which seemed to confirm the insinuation urgeu a<ra , ^ 
 him, that of having ‘maintained republican princif 
 as applicable to the British constitution, in a former drf 
 on tiie Bill. No such argument had ever been 
 him, or any from which such inference was fairly dead ^g^ 
 On the French revolution he did indeed differ 
 1 ight honourable friend. There opinions, lie had no n 
 pie to say, were wide as the poles asunder; but i 
 had a difference of opinion on that, which, to the Hoi 
 was only matter of theoretical contemplation, to dot - ^ 
 the discussion of a practical point, on which no dfe 
 existed ^ On that revolution he adhered to his opii 
 and never would retract one syllable of what he hads 
 He repealed, that he thought it on the whole, one of 
 most glorious events in the history of mankind. Butv 
 
 
 L\pe'. 
 

 5D 
 
 je had on a former occasion mentioned France, he had 
 ^Qitit^c^tioned the revolution only, and not the constitution- 
 hw ® ia^ter remained to be improved by experience, and ac- 
 circumstances. The arbitrary system of 
 was done away ; the new one had the good of 
 r coiiDtr^® P®^P, object, and this was the point on which 
 
 diflerfs^ opinion, Mr. Fox said, he wished the 
 
 kadife^^ ought come to debate, if opinions of his were again to 
 of diifi^ oiade the subject of Parliamentary discussion. He had 
 otbeda^ concealment of his opinions, but if any thing could make 
 ly of such a discussion, it would be the fixing a day 
 
 . liiii ^^^echize him respecting his political creed, and respec- 
 which the House was neither going to act, 
 k had been thus catechized 
 
 ise. Ji ^ honourable gentleman (Mr. Dun- 
 
 to the stage of the then administration, had said, 
 
 1 r adrninistration to be bad, where are you 
 
 \ic\iWm admit men into power who 
 
 erthanY ' the representation of the people is inadequate, and 
 m principles would oyerturn the constitution ?’’ On 
 
 found an able defender in a right hon- 
 Un ^^’^tlcman, whom he could not expect to be his 
 
 ' that day ; but who had, in 17S2, demanded in 
 
 ^^nly and energetic tones, “If the House would bear to 
 told that the country was incapable of furnishing an ad- 
 JD «^^g^^ni3tratipn more worthy ol trust than that whose' miscon- 
 lic^ ht was admitted even by its advocates He might 
 ilormt^ have, looked for a defender to another quarter, to the 
 W|ich on which he sat, and been as much disappoifited. 
 ila\iW^4t the catechizer on that occasion had soon after joined 
 i diffcrbther ministry, and supported that very reform of the 
 ,lie woresentation which he had depreciated as more danger- 
 under; Js to the constitution. Were he to differ from his rTght 
 I, to l^nourable friend on points of history, on the constitutions 
 tioD, I* Athens and ol Rome, was it necessary that the differ- 
 ich DO ^ce should be discussed in that House ? Were he to 
 d to tiJvise the conduct of the elder Brutus^ and to say that the I 
 
 ^Ijat li* pulsion of the Tarquins was a noble and patriotic act, j 
 
 ( 7 bole,*>uld it thence be fair te argue that he meditated the es- 
 kind- ' 
 
)uld 
 >\ect I 
 
 dif. j 
 
 GO 
 
 lablishment of a consular government in this country r 
 Were he to repeat the eloquent eulogium of Cicero on the 
 taking olf of Ciesar, would it thence be deducible that he 
 went with a knife adout him, for the purpose of killing 
 some orreat man or orator ? Let those who said, that to 
 admire was to wish to imitate, shew that there was some 
 similarity of circumstances. It lay on his right honourable 
 friend to shew that this country was in the precise situation 
 of France at the time of the French revolution, before he 
 had a right'^o meet his argument ; and then with all the 
 obloquy that might be heaped on the declaration, he should 
 be ready to say, that the French revolution was an object 
 of imitation for this country. Instead of seeking for 
 Terences of opinion on topics, happily for the country, entire- 
 ly topics of speculation, let them come to the matter of fact, 
 and of practical application : let them come to the discussion 
 of the bill before them, and see whether his objections to 
 it were republican, and on what he should ditfer with his 
 right honourable friend ? He had been warned by high 
 and most respectable authorities, that minute discussion of 
 great events, without information, did no honour to the 
 pen that wrote, or the tongue that spoke the words. If 
 the Committee should decide that his right honourable 
 friend should pursue his argument on the French constitu- 
 tion, he would leave the House : and if some friend would 
 send him word when the clauses of the Quebec Bill were 
 to be discussed, he would return and debate them. And 
 when he said this, he said it from no unwillingness to listen 
 to his right honourable friend : he always had heard him 
 with pleasure, but not where no practical use could result 
 from his argument. When the proper period for discussion j 
 came, feeble as his powers were, compared with those ol ' 
 his right honourable friend, whom he must call his master, 
 for he had taught him every thing he knew in politics (as 
 he had declared on a former occasion, and he meant no 
 compliment when he said so,) yet feeble as his powers 
 comparatively were, he should be ready to maintain the 
 principles he had asserted, even against his right honoura- 
 ble Iriend’s superior eloquence, and maintain that the 
 
8 COK 
 
 iceto K 
 iblc tk 
 e ofE 
 said.tii 
 
 irewjji 
 itboaod 
 :ciw rh 
 n, befoTi 
 
 witlij: 
 
 as ai 
 
 i(rj, cb: 
 tteroli 
 
 ‘T \?ltl 
 
 td bj ; 
 
 wor(/s. 
 
 bOTiOHI! 
 
 coni 
 friend i; 
 
 hew. . 
 isstoli 
 
 [or disco 
 
 lliisB 
 I politio 
 le 
 
 his p 
 [naiobs 
 ht iKi 
 in U 
 
 61 
 
 r"’ f>0“0“raWe friend had ridi- 
 
 uled as chimerical and visionary, were, in fact, the basis 
 
 RrV^r^'°" '■“‘‘onal constitution, and even of 
 
 he British constitution itself, as our statute book proved • 
 
 '=o'»Pa<=t be- 
 
 in England and its government, as stated 
 
 ^nt riihVjT.l’ recognition of the original inher- 
 
 ciinAr^ A P^^ple as men, which no prescription could 
 
 nrfnp obliterate. If such were 
 
 principles dangerous to the constitution, they were the prin- 
 ciples of his i^ht honourable friend, from whom he had learn- 
 ed them. During the American war they had together 
 rejoiced at the success of Washington, and sympathiMd al- 
 mos o tears for the fall of a Montgomery. From his 
 right honourable friend he had learned, that the revolt of a 
 whole people could never Le countenanced and encouraged 
 but must have been provoked. Such bad at that time been 
 the doctrine of his right honourable friend, who had said, 
 with equal energy and emphasis, that he could not draw a 
 biJl of indictment against a whole people. Mr. Fox de- 
 clared he was sorry to find that his right honourable friend 
 had since learned to draw such a bill of indictment, and to 
 crowd It with all the technical epithets which disgraced our 
 statute book, of false, malicious, wick ed, by the instigation 
 ^ the devil, not having the fear of Goiha/ore our eyes, &c. 
 Having been taught by his right honourable friend that no 
 revolt of a nation was caused without provocation, he could 
 not help feeling a joy ever since the constitution of France 
 became founded on the rights of man, on which the British 
 constitution itself was founded. To deny it, was neither 
 more or less than to libel the British constitution; and no book 
 his right honourable friend could cite, no words he might de- 
 liver in debate, however ingenious, eloquent, and able,' as 
 all his writings and all his speeches undoubtedly were, could 
 induce him to change or abandon that opinion; he differed 
 upon that subiect from his honourable friend toto oeIo. Hav* 
 ing proceeded thus far, M. Fox declared he had said more 
 than he intended, possibly much more than was either wise 
 or proper ; but it was a common error, arising from his 
 
 6 
 
earnestness to be clearly understood ; but if Ins sentimenU 
 could serve tbe other side of the House, which had coun- 
 tenanced the discussion of that day, apparently in order to 
 get at them, they had acted unnecessarily. They might be 
 sure of him and his sentiments on every subject without 
 forcing on any thinglike a difference between him and his 
 right honourable friend, and having once heard them, they 
 might act upon them as they thought proper. 
 
 Mr, Burke said, that though he had been called to order 
 so many times, he had sat with perfect composure, and had 
 heard the most disorderly speeche that was perhaps ever 
 delivered in that House. He had not pursued the conduct 
 of which an example had been set to him, but had heard, 
 without the least interruption, that speech out to the end, 
 irregular and disorderly as it had been : his words and his 
 conduct throughout had been mis-represented, and a per- 
 sonal attack had been made upon him from a quarter he ne- 
 ver could have expected after a friendship and an intimacy 
 of more than twenty-two years ; and not only his public 
 conduct, words, and writings, had been alluded to in the 
 severest terms, but confidential conversation and private 
 opinions had been brought forward with a view of proving 
 that he acted inconsistently ; and now a motion was intro- 
 duced which hindered him in a great measure from having 
 an opportunity to ascertain by facks what he had stated as 
 opinions. He could not help thinking that on the subject 
 of the French revolution he had met with great unfairness 
 from the right honourable gentleman, who had said as 
 much as that he had acted and spoken rashly, without tu- 
 formation, and unsupported by facts to bear out his deduc- 
 tions, and this had been treated in a manner that did little 
 justice to his feelings, and had little appearance of decen- 
 cy on the part of the right honourable gentleman. How- 
 ever, when and as often as this subject came to be discus- 
 sed fairly, and facts that he was possessed of allowed to be 
 brought forward, he was ready to meet the right honoura- 
 ble gentleman hand to hand and foot to foot upon it. Mueb 
 
 was 
 
 said against proceeding without good' infortnation. 
 He was ready to state his prools for all the facts he had ai- 
 
 repi 
 
 saic 
 
 and 
 
 (ien. 
 
 bn- 
 
 oat 
 
 can 
 
 sal 
 
 Qi 
 
 fr 
 
 m 
 
 lion 
 ill’s . 
 
 righi 
 (lid I 
 
 casjc 
 
 tbe. 
 
63 
 
 sentiii^ 
 
 ha^Cd 
 n oni/: 
 
 ect «iii 
 
 miii 
 
 lied tea; 
 
 Tb|» e? 
 tiiew' 
 had k 
 ) ttee 
 
 d a ^ 
 .er \icj 
 1 \ntio 
 bis pdi 
 to in: 
 id pm 
 f proT 
 nas io! 
 m ban 
 i stated 
 be sell 
 uflfain 
 
 bis dt 
 at did : 
 e of lie 
 lan. S 
 be (is 
 llowedl 
 
 >Dit. 
 
 leged (0 which public proof was at all applicable : that iu- 
 cleed there were a few particulars on which he did not 
 
 ‘l>® present state of things 
 
 tors to the*T r**” U ^ ranee, he might subject his rela* 
 tX! ^ fashionable summary justice of the lanteme. 
 enX reserves of that kind he was ready to 
 
 »t!.I ° ^*S'=“sfion concerning the facts in that book 
 
 -m/f • "'■gl't possibly fall into minute 
 
 and trivial mistakes, but lie was sure he was substantially 
 right in every substantial matter of fact. To the few mat- 
 
 ters on which he declined offering proof, he pledged him- 
 self, upon his honour, that he had sufficient to saLfy a so- 
 ber and considerate judgment. But this it seemed was not 
 the cause of quarrel : it was not because this’ authoritv, or 
 uiat example were mentioned, but he was accused of mis- 
 representating what the right honourable gentleman had 
 said on a former day, when he owned he was not present, 
 ‘^n which he disavowed in the most positive terms. He 
 oenied any allusion to that, or any other speech of the riffht 
 
 Iiononrahle gonlUmon, and oontondej ll.at lie had nljfued 
 
 on this, as he wished to do on every other occasion, in a 
 candid, plain, and simple manner. With regard to the 
 ^bject which he meant to introduce in the Committee of the 
 Quebec Bill, the right honourable gentleman was no stran- 
 pr to the grounds he meant to go upon. He opened to 
 him very particularly the plan of his speech : how far he 
 meant to go, and what limits he proposed to put upon him- 
 self. His reasons for forming those opinions he had men- 
 tioned in the fullest and most particular manner to him, at 
 ids own house, and walked from thence to that House with 
 him, conversing all the time on that subject. The right 
 honourable gentleman had then entirely disagreed with him 
 upon it, but they bad no quarrel upon it, and what the 
 right honourable gentleman had said upon the subject he 
 did not now wish to state. He would not, however, be per- 
 suaded, from what the right honourable gentleman said, to 
 give up his purpose of stating to the House, upon this oc- 
 casion, his mind with regard to the French constitution and 
 • he facts which led him to think as he did ; and certainly in 
 
64 
 
 this he thought there could be nothing disorderly, especial- 
 ly when so much had already been introduced, not about 
 the constitution of Quebec, but about the American consti- 
 tution. He had asserted that dangerous doctrines were en- 
 couraged in this country, and that dreadful consequences 
 miffht ensue from them, which it was his sole wish and 
 ambition to avert, by strenuously supporting the constitution 
 of Great Britain as it is, which, in his mind, could better be 
 done by preventing impending danger than by any remedy 
 that could afterwards be applied ; and he thought himselt 
 justified in saying this, because he did know that there 
 were people in this country avowedly endeavouring to dis- 
 order its constitution and government, and that in a verv 
 bold rnanner. The practice now was, upon all occasions*, 
 to praise, in the highest strain, the French constitution : 
 some indeed quallified their argument so far by praising 
 only the French revolution ; but in that he could see no 
 difference, as the French constitution, if they had anj”, was 
 the consequence and effect of that revolution. So fond 
 were gentlemen of this favourite topic, that whoever dis- 
 
 appTOV cd oi tljv mic^i niiO — 
 
 in bVance, or could not foresee the benefits that were to 
 arrise out of it, were stigmatized as enemies to liberty and 
 to the Biitish constitution ; charges that were false, unfound- 
 ed, misapplied, and every way unfair. Doctrines of this 
 kind, he thought, were extremely dangerous at all times, 
 and much more so, if they were to be sanctioned by so 
 great a name as that of the right honourable gentleman, 
 who always put whatever he said in the strongest and 
 most forcible view that it could appear. Thus it had be- 
 come common to set the French constitution up against the 
 English constitution upon all occasions, when the compari- 
 son could be introduced ; and then he insisted if the former 
 was praised the latter must be proportionally depreciated. 
 Here again he reverted to what he had been told had pass- 
 ed on a former day, when he said the right honourable 
 gentleman bad taken fire when the French constitution was 
 mentioned, anc had termed it the most glorious and stupen- 
 
 uons fabric that ever was reared by human wisdom. Ho 
 
,espea 
 not iliii 
 tan coir. 
 Jswerer 
 
 nswjtieK 
 
 wblu; 
 
 iDyrew: 
 
 kh 
 
 ;iDg^jj5* 
 
 in a Tf 
 
 occasic: 
 
 15/i/l/lic; 
 
 pniisii 
 1 see I 
 anj,ij 
 So f« 
 ever ^ 
 
 fwf 
 
 were l 
 eily it 
 ,\info5t; 
 esof t 
 ill lime 
 j bj i 
 lotleoa; 
 igfsl a: 
 
 it y I 
 igaiast: 
 
 IC COBfi 
 
 tl)6 foil 
 epretii:; 
 
 iy;2 
 
 *10002:1 
 
 ad staff 
 offi. ; 
 
 sllll insisted, that the discussion of the Quebec Bill was a 
 proper opportunity, efter what had been said, for enterincr 
 upon a true and minute comparison of the French constitu- 
 tion with that of England, though the disorderly rage for 
 order that prevailed that day seemed to be adop*ted for the 
 purpose of precluding every fair and proper discussion. 
 He had that day been accused, among other breaches of 
 friendship towards the right honourable gentleman, of hav- 
 ing provoked this discussion, to give an advantage to the 
 right honourable gentleman’s enemies, a principle that he 
 utterly disclaimed, and never thought that any fair or can- 
 did man could have brought ; however, if any could have 
 said so before, what they had heard from the opposite side 
 of the House this day must convince them of the contrary. 
 In what he had repeatedly said and written concerning the 
 French revolution, he had been accused of stating hit 
 opinions rashly and without foundation ; a charge which he 
 was certainly anxious and able to refute, if he had been al- 
 lowed ; and at the very time when he was going to pro- 
 duce facts in support of what he asserted, blended partly 
 with private information and respectable authorities, though 
 he perhaps might have gone greater lengths than he wish- 
 ed, by disclosing communications which he ought to con- 
 ceal, yet being so particularly called upon, he would have 
 done it ; at this very moment he was stopped in the most 
 unfair, and, notwithstanding, as he had already said, the 
 rage for order, the most disorderly manner ; and but for 
 this extraordinary conduct, he would have proved that the 
 issue of the French constitution, or revolution, which they 
 liked to call it, was not intended for, and never jcould be, 
 for the cause of liberty ; but on the contrary, 'and ever 
 was and ever would be, for the cause of tyranny, oppres- 
 sion, injustice, anarchy, and confusion. 
 
 After what had been said, nobody could impute to him 
 interested and personal motives for his conduct ; those with 
 whom he had been constantly in habits of friendship and 
 agreement, were all against him ; and from the other - side 
 of the House he was not likely to have much support ; yet 
 all he did was no more than his duty. It was a struggle. 
 
66 
 
 not to support any man, or set of men, Lut a struggle U>- 
 support the British constitution, in doing which he had in- 
 curred the displeasure of all about him, and those opposite 
 to him ; and what was worst of all, he had induced the 
 right honourable gentleman to rip up the whole course and 
 tenure of his life, public and private, and that not without 
 a considerable degree of asperity. His failings and imper- 
 fections had been keenly exposed, and in short, without 
 the chance of gaining one new friend, he had made ene- 
 mies, it appeared malignant enemies of his old friends. But 
 after all he esteemed his duty far beyond' any friendship, 
 any fame, or any other consideration^ whatever. He haiL,. 
 stated the danger which the British constitution was daily 
 in from the doctrines and conduct of particular persons ; 
 however, as neither side of the House supported him in this,, 
 but as both sides thought otherwise, he would not press 
 that point upon them now in any stonger way than he had ' 
 done ; but he would still aver, that no assistance which 
 could either be given or refused to him, would ever bias 
 him against the excellence of the British constitution ; nor 
 lead him to think well of the French revolution, or the 
 constitution, as it was named, that was formed in its place. 
 The right honourable gentleman, in the speech he had 
 made, treated him in every sentence with uncommon harsh- 
 ness. In the first place, after being fatigued with skir- 
 mishes, of order, which were wonderfully managed by his 
 light troops, he then brought down the whole strength and 
 heavy artillery ofhis own judgment, eloquence, and abili- . 
 ties upon him, to crush him at once, by declaring a cen^ 
 sure upon his whole life, conduct, and opinions Notwith- 
 standing this great and serious, thought, on, his part, un- 
 merited attack and attempt to crush him, he would not be 
 dismayed ; he w^as not yet afraid to slate his Sentiments in 
 that House, or any where else, and he would tell all the 
 world that the constitution was in danger. And here he 
 must in the most solemn manner express his disapprobation 
 of what was notorious in the country and to the world. 
 Are there not clubs in every quarter,’ who meet and vole 
 resolutions, the contents of which was it necessary for him 
 
G7 
 
 S-. 1“ “ts,' •" »>- .1. «... 
 
 1 ,, — J '-a i.»uiju uu over uie eomi- 
 
 try, ami with other countries? Do they not u • 
 their milnifs -loM..;.,., .i„. ... not preach iii 
 
 
 •». iV“..*ST,i Th^r,’ p'-A. 
 
 wfe ^ 1 * V ‘ 1 constitution ? Adrnittino- 
 
 iliK he believed nobody would say his observations 
 
 ¥ were ill-founded, would they hesitate a moment to pro- 
 niiiOL n ounce such transant Inna rl^nn-Ar^Mo av. ,• ^ . 
 
 ttiilvr 1 . - . — j a inuujcni 10 nro- 
 
 »tenounce such transactions dangerous to the constitution, and 
 
 -hen added to 
 
 d P L- • r *' Ail lucii nature; wne 
 
 “»■ K this, infamous libels against the constitution were circulated 
 every where. The malignity with which the right ho- 
 ne nourable gentleman had spoken his sentiments, with renard 
 is ill to government, and the charge of inconsistency in his no- 
 persoB htical life and opinions, were neither fair nor true • tor ^ho 
 imlliedemed that he ever had any different idea of government 
 ( preffrom what he now entertained, and had upon many occa- 
 tie ksions stated : he laid it down as a maxim, that monarchy 
 mwas the basis of all good government, and that the nearer 
 er bsi.o monarchy that any government approached, the more 
 in; Kperfect it was, and cice versa; and he certainly, in his 
 or fe.videst moments, never had so far forgotten the nature of 
 ! place;ovepment, as to argue that we ought to wish for a con- 
 lie lactitution, that we could alter at pleasure, and chance like 
 abadi du ty shirt. He was by no means anxious for a monar- 
 ilh skinny, with a dash of a republicanism to correct it But the 
 I by b.^>ench constitution was the exact opposite of the English 
 ffth ain every thing, and nothing could be so dangerous as to 
 i aW etit up to the view of the English, to mislead and de- 
 ^ t^wch their minds. In carrying on this attack against him 
 Solwi(:li« right honourable gentleman had been supported bv a 
 
 »it, iiorpsof well disciplined troops, expert in their manoeuvres 
 
 obedient to the word of their commander. 
 
 imeits: [iWr. Grey here called Mr Burke to order, conceiving, 
 11 alliihat it was disorderly to mention gentlemen in that way 
 1 herei^^^^ to ascribe improper motives to them.] * 
 
 )proto ^Ir. Burke explaimed, and went on. He said he had 
 e prod^rmerly stated that he b^slieved those who fomented what 
 and Ttf® dreaded as dangerous to the constitution, to be a very 
 , far tmall number indeed : it was not from their numbers now : 
 
m 
 
 
 
 
 t,ul if ll>c suirit was sulTered to ferment %vlio 
 what might happen ? Let it be reinmbereo there were 300,- 
 000 men in arms in France, wl.o at the proper moment 
 miMit assist that spirit ; and though there might be no im- - 
 mediate danger threatening tlie British constitution, yet a 
 time of scarcity' or tumult miglit come, and in such a case 
 it was certainly safer and wiser to prevent the consequen- 
 ces, tlian to remedy the evil. lie recurred to 1780, am! 
 meiitioned the dreadful consequences of the riots occasion- 
 ed bv Lord George Gordon. Had he at that time caution- 
 
 IJU uy XiUlU 
 
 ed the House to beware of the Protestant association, 
 
 ieii 
 
 inti 
 
 ime 
 
 ffJ! 
 
 MO 
 
 desj 
 
 XJlUMoC Vv' - — j 
 
 other caballing meetings, he supposed his cautions would 
 have been treated in the same way as those he oflercd 
 now ; but he trusted no person would wish again to see 
 such destruction and disorder : the houses of some of tho 
 best men that ever adorned tho country, the ^[a^quis of 
 Rockingham, and Sir George Saville, beset by the mob, 
 and obhged to be defended by armed forces ; they surely 
 could not desire again to behold camps in all our squares, 
 and garrisons in our palaces. As to the present state of 
 this country, he described the king as in fjll power in all 
 liis functions, that his ministers were responsible for all 
 their conduct ; that the country was blessed with an oppo- 
 sition of strong force, and that the common people ^^ere 
 united with the gentlemen in a column of prudence. From 
 all. which he argued that the present was the moment for 
 crushing this diabolical spirit, and every trivial attempt to 
 subverf the principles of the constitution ought to be 
 watched with the greatest jealousy and circumspection; 
 when he spoke of our constitution as valuable, he spoke of 
 the whole complete, and not of any particular or predomin- 
 ant part ; and therefore thought it wiser to be prepared for 
 any attack that might be made upon it, than to trust Ibat 
 we could preserve it, even after the attack was made. 
 Having dwelt for some time on this point, he next began 
 to recapitulate the political questions upon which he bad 
 differea with the right honourable gentleman upon former 
 occasions, particularly the several attempts that had been 
 made for a parliamentary reform, the Dissenter’s Bill, 
 
 liain), 
 
 I Me 
 
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 le^. but in all these in the course of their acquaintance and in- 
 m timacy, no one difference of political opinion had ever for a 
 «Mi moment inlerrnptcd or affected their friendship. It certain- 
 Mit; 7 was indiscretion, at any period, but much greater at his 
 Ilia time ot life, to provoke enemies, or give his friends cause 
 » to desert him; yet if that was to be the case, by adherinn- 
 i80,i to the British constitution, he would risk all, and, as public 
 ocas duty and public prudence taught him, in his last words ex- 
 eae claim, “bly Itom the French constitution.’' (It was 
 In s whispered by Mr. Fox, there was no loss of friends. ) Mr . 
 IS r. Burke said yes, there was a loss of fiiends, he knew tl.e 
 • ik price of his conduct : he had done his duty at the price of 
 (o ; his friend ; their friendship was at an end. He had been 
 ! ol: told, that it was much better to defend the English consti- 
 ■(|iiis fution, by praising its own excellence, than bylbusin^ oth- 
 le a,;er constitution, and certainly the task of praising was'muci, 
 f SKinore pleasant than that of abusing; but he contended that 
 spthe only fair way of arguing the merits of any constitution, 
 stale was by comparing it with others; and he could not speak 
 •nniwith propriety of the e.\cellence of the English constitution, 
 Cif iWithout comparing it with the deformity and injustice of the 
 Mi which was tlic shade that brought its colours fur- 
 
 ile niward in the briglitest point of view; and omitting to do it. 
 
 . be lihe presenting a picture without a shade. He 
 
 ^eut vrould warn tlie right honourable gentlemen, who were the 
 e/i)|)t?*’^3t rivals in that House, that wlielher they should in fu- 
 [ (0 ‘.ure move in the political hemisphere, as two flaming me- 
 or walk together as brethren, that they should pre- 
 spob>^rve and cherish the British constitution; that they should 
 against innovation, and save it from the danger of 
 pareii^bese new theories. In a rapturous apostrophe to the in- 
 finite and unspeakable power of the Deity, who with his 
 hurled a comet like a projectile out of its course, wdio 
 jjl [^enabled it to endure the sun’s heat, and the pitchy dark- 
 ,jj jijUess of the chilly night ; he said that to the Deity must be 
 
 fjeft the task ofinfinite perfection, while to us poor, weak, 
 If n capable mortals, there was no rule of conduct so safe 
 
 as 
 
 UJfj ; ^ ^ ...... J ........ .... . W... ... ............. .....w .... 
 
 5 jryxp^'rience. He concluded, with moving an amendment. 
 
70 
 
 that all the worJs of ti.e motion, after “ DissevUtion on the 
 -French constitution,” should be omitted, and the lollowing 
 be inserted in tlieii room, ‘‘ tending to shew that exam- 
 ples may be drawn therefrom ; and to prove that they arc 
 insufficient for any good purposes, and that they lead to 
 onA rnnfncirjn. nnd nre ronsCGUentlv Unfit to bc in- 
 
 anarchy and confusion, and are consequently unfit 
 troduced into schemes of government, are improper to be 
 referred to on a motion for reading the Quebec Bill para- 
 graph by paragraph.” 
 
 In the course of the preceding speech, Mr. Burke having 
 said that Mr. Fox had of late years forborne that friendly 
 intercourse with him by visits, &c. which he had formerly 
 ].reserveJ, the latter in reply, said, that the omission com- 
 plained of was purely accidental ; that men at dilfercnt pe- 
 riods fell iiito dillerent habits ; and without any intentional 
 
 k 
 
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 «(fe 
 
 ail 
 
 -jjoi: 
 
 :re) 
 
 :etbe 
 
 Mi 
 
 I aii}ft 
 , iffli/jf 
 
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 neglect, it frequently happened that they did not see their 
 fi lends so often as they might have done in preceding years ; 
 
 Sjf 
 
 bat at the same time, that their friendship was as warm 
 and as sincere as ever. 
 
 ^Ir. Burke likewise, while in one of the parts of it, 
 where he was reasoning with great warmth, checked him- 
 self, and addressing hims' lf to the Chair, said, ‘‘ I am not 
 mad, most noble Festus, but speak the words of truth and 
 soberness.” 
 
 Mr, Fox rose to reply, but his mind was so much agita- 
 le<J, and his heart so much afiected, by wl at had fallen 
 from Mr. Burke, that it was some minutes before he could 
 ])rocccd. Tears trickled down his cheeks, and he strove 
 in vain to give utterance to feelings that dignified and e.x- 
 alled his nature. Injustice to the House it must be said, 
 that the sensibility of every one present seemed to be un- 
 commonly excited upon the occasion. Being at length 
 recovered from the clepression under which he had risen, 
 Mr. Fox proceeded to answer the assertions which bad 
 caused it. He said, however events might have altered 
 the mind of his riglit honourable friend, for so he must call 
 him, notwithstanding what had passed, because, grating as 
 it was to any naan to be unkindly treated by those who 
 were under obligations to him, it was still more orratingand 
 
 sQbje 
 
 loruii 
 
 fk. 
 
 5een 
 
 mlar, 
 
 :|;bl£ 
 
 :iffere 
 
 ^boi 
 
 iiooV 
 
 'Ifinej 
 
 ’loinji 
 
 iiierij 
 
 
 '.all 
 
by tbosc tu whwn tli6y ielt 
 
 lJr/n« obligalfr.ns and wl.otn, notwithstanding ^heiJ 
 isleim TT seventy, they found they must still lofe ami 
 esteem. He could not forget, that when a boy almost he 
 had been in the habit of receiving favours from his right 
 honourable friend ; that their friendship had grown wdl 
 their years, and that it had continued for upwards of twentv 
 five years, for the last twenty of which they had acted to- 
 gether, and ived on terms of the nr.ost familiar intimacy. 
 He hoped, therefore, that notwithstanding what had han- 
 pened that daj', the right honourable gentleman would think 
 on past limes, and, however any im)>rudent words or in- 
 temperance ot his might have him, it would show 
 
 I that it had not been, at least intenticnaliy, his fault. The 
 right honourable gentleman had said, and'' said truly, that 
 ^ they had differed foimerly on many subjects, and yet it 
 ^ did not interrupt their friendship. Let the rlglit honoura- 
 ble gentleman speak fairly, and say, whether they could 
 not ditter, without an interruption of their friendship, on the 
 subject of the PTench revolution, as well as any of their 
 former subjects of difference, lie enumerated severally 
 i what those differences of opinions had been, and appealed 
 to his right honourable friend, wnether their friendship had 
 ^ been interrupted on anyone of those occasions. In parti- 
 cular, he said, on the subject of the French revolution, the 
 
 • Iionourable gentleman well knew that his sentiments 
 differed widely fronri his own ; he knew also, that as soon as 
 
 0‘ his book on the subject was published, he condemned that 
 ittbook both in public and private, and every one of the doc- 
 li trines it contained. Mr. Fox again explained, that Mr. 
 s Burke’s conduct appeared as if it sprung from an intention 
 to injure him, at least it produced the same effect, because 
 
 * the right honourable gentleman opposite to him had chosen 
 [j to talk of republican principles, as principles which he wish- 
 I ed to be introduced into the new constitution of Canada, 
 j whereas his principles were very far from republican in 
 : any degree. If, therefore, his right honourable friend had 
 s thought it necessary to state to the House his sentiments 
 i.on the French revolution, he might have done it on any 
 
72 
 
 Aher occasion, with less injury to him, than on the Que- 
 bec bill, because his doing it then confirmed and gave 
 weight to the misrepresentations of the right honourable 
 ♦rentleman opposite to him, and not only that, but put it 
 out of his power to answer him properly. Besides, 1« 
 had, as every other man must have, a natural antipathy and 
 dislike to being catechized as to his political principles. It 
 was, he said, the first time that ever he heard a philosopher 
 state, that the way to do justice to the excellence of the 
 British constitution, was never to mention it without, at the 
 same time, abusing every other constitution in the world. 
 For his part, he had ever thought that the British constitu- 
 tion, in theory, was imperfect and defective, but that in 
 practice it was excellently adapted to this country. He 
 had ofteri publicly said this ; but because he admired the 
 British constitution, was it to be concluded that there was 
 no part of the constitution of other countries worth praising, 
 or that the British constitution was not still capable of im- 
 provement ? He therefore could neither consent to abuse 
 every other constitution, nor to extol our own so extrava- 
 gantly as the right honourable gentleman seemed to think it 
 merited. As a proof that it had not been thought quite per- 
 fect, let the tw’o only reformers of it be recollected that 
 had been attempted of late years ; the reform relative to the 
 representation in parliament of the right honourable gen* 
 tleman opposite to him ; and the reform of the civil list bj, 
 his right honourable friend. Was it expected that he should 
 declare the constitution would have been more perfect, or 
 better, without either of these two reforms ? To both 
 had he given his support, because he approved both ; and 
 yet they were both tests, one to retrench the influence of . 
 the crown, the other to enlarge the representation of that 
 House ; and would the right honourable gentleman say he 
 was a bad man for having voted for both ? He was, Mr. 
 Fox said, an enemy to all tests whatever, as he had hith- 
 erto thought the right hormurable gentleman was, and there- 
 fore he objected to every man’s being expected to have 
 his ^litical principles put to the test, by his being obliged 
 to abjurt every other constitution but our own. Such a 
 
 c:: 
 
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 iiis 
 
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 him 
 
 • ^ " thirty-nine articles, and said he 
 
 wshed there were a hundred and thirty-nine more, that he 
 
 prove his orthodoxy. 
 .Nothing blit the Ignominious terms which his right hon- 
 ourable friend ha-1 licaped on him fMr. Burke said, loud 
 enough to be heard, that he did, not recollect he had used 
 any.^ My right honourable friend, said Mr> Fox, does 
 not reccollect the epithets : they are out of his mind ; then 
 they are completely and for erer out of mine. I cannot 
 cherish a recollection so painful, and from this moment 
 they are obliterated and forgotten. Mr. Fox then pursu- 
 ed his argument, and expressed his surprise that his rio-ht 
 honourable friend had talked of the friends who sat near 
 
 him as phalanx, and as disciplined troops ; it by that he. 
 
 meant that any improper influence had been exercised, or 
 attempted to be exercised, on their miods, he disclaimed 
 the idea ; and indeed his right honourable friend best knew, 
 so long as he had acted with them, when any such influ- 
 ence had been exercised over his own mind. 'He declared 
 lie could not but bo sorry that such a character of a partv 
 linked together on the most honourable principles should 
 come from one of their own corps. He had imagined that 
 Ids right honourable friend knew more of them than to im- 
 pute such conduct to men of thejr^ description. The fact 
 was, Mr. Fox paid, that upon hV honour no one of the 
 honourable §;entlt 5 men n^^r^m, w^o h^d^ risen %t day, 
 and ^lled his honourable ' friend to order, had been desired 
 by him to 3To so ; bn the contrary, wherever he was likely 
 to have his application complied with, he had earnestly en- 
 treated his friends not to interrupt the right Iionoumie 
 gentleman. He admitted that no friendship should exist 
 in the way of public duty ; and if his right honourable 
 friend thought he did service to the country by blasting the 
 French revolution, he must do so, but at the same time he 
 must allow others, who thought differently, to act in a dif- 
 ferent manner, Mr. Fox alluded to what Mr Burke had 
 quoted from Montesquieu, and declared he agreed with 
 Montesquieu in his observation on the British constitution ; 
 
 7 
 
 
74 
 
 but could not admit that Montesquieu meant to say that it 
 was a model for all other countries- If he referred to what 
 had passed in 1780, the right honourable gentleman would 
 sav that he raked into all the transactions of his life. Mr. 
 Fox declared he would not, unless it redounded to his ho- 
 nourable friend’s honour, and to the glory of his character, 
 and where oauld he find the incident that did not . In the 
 year 1780, it had been the opinion ot that House, “ that 
 the influence of the crown had increased, was increasing, 
 and ought to be diminished. His right honourable friend 
 had agreed to that resolution, and thereby declared that the 
 constitution was not perfect without such reduction. Would 
 he not grant to the French the same right that he had him- 
 self exercised ? If the influence of the British crown, 
 which consisted in the civil list, in the army, navy, and the 
 power of giving places and honours, was so great as to be 
 thought dangerous, what, in the eyes of reflecting French- 
 men, must have been the extravagant influence of the 
 crown ot France ? With a civil list ten times as large as 
 our’s ; with a navy almost as large ; an army tenfold *, a 
 church more than tenfold ; must they not, as we^ had done, 
 pursue the course of diminishing its power ? When, in ad- 
 ditidn to this, they had to deplore the degree of corruption 
 and despotism into which the whole of their government 
 had fallen, was it not right that they should endeavour to 
 better their condition, and to extricate themselves from 
 their misery and slavery ? His right honourable friend 
 had said that they must not hear of the French constitu- 
 tion, because it was diametrically opposite to our’s : how 
 that could be he could not easily comprehend. His right 
 honourable friend had also asserted, that evil must not be 
 done, that good might come out of it : that must be left 
 to God alone ; what, Mr- Fox asked, did his right honoura- 
 ble friend think of the occasion of the war ? War, in it- 
 self, was certainly an evil ; civil war a moral evil ; and 
 yet war was often commenced that good might come out of 
 it. If original rights were totally to be disregarded, Mr- 
 Fox said, he should contend that the resistance of the par- 
 liament to Charles the first, and the resistance of 1688, 
 
m 
 
 75 
 
 rights of men 
 
 1 ] ^ opinion, the foundation of all governments and 
 
 all constitutions, which were a compact between the go- 
 
 f binding on both sides. He 
 
 vou . not say that the government of France was good ; 
 It was undoubtedly capable of improvement, and would be 
 amended by degrees. How, he asked, did we make 
 our own government ? By sending to Greece or Rome 
 fora pattern for our constitution ? No ; but by gradually 
 improving our government, which was bad at first, and 
 which grew better in proportion as experience suggested 
 alteration. Ihe French would in time experience the de- 
 fects of their government, and would have the same op- 
 portunities ol correcting it. 
 
 ith regard to his honourable friend’s enthusiastic at- 
 tachment to our constitution, in preference to all others, 
 did he remember, when his Majesty’s speech was made in 
 ^ / S3, on the loss of America, in which his Majesty la- 
 mented the loss the provinces had sustained in being de* 
 prived of the advantages resulting from a monarchy ; how 
 he had ridiculed it, and compared it to a man’s opening 
 the door, after he had left a room, and saying, “At our 
 parting pray let me recommend a monarchy to you.” In 
 that ridicule, Mr. F'ox said, he had joined heartily at the 
 time. The French, he observed, had made their new go- 
 vernment on the best of all principles of a government, 
 viz. the happiness of the people who were to live under it. 
 
 I he J rench, it should be considered, were a great nation ; 
 they were inferior to England only in arts, arnis, the pow- 
 ers of reasoning, &c. Was it not joyful, then, that she 
 should have cast off the tyranny of the most horrid despo- 
 tism, and become free ? Surely w^e did not wish that 
 liberty should be engrossed by ourselves. If his right 
 honourable friend talked of light and shade, Mr. Fox said, 
 there was no shade so proper for the people of this country 
 as the departed despotism of France ; of which, though no 
 more in existance,we seemed still to be afraid ; and the 
 French themselves, from a dread of the return of the spec- 
 tre, did many things which appeared extravagant and ab- 
 
76 
 
 surd to us, who were cool observers of the scene m 
 
 P'rance. A ludicrous image of this was given by the first 
 of our dramatic poets, who makes Fa'sta^ say, I fe^ this 
 o-unpowder Percy, though he be dead. The ngj^ ho- 
 nourable gentleman has said that he shall lose my 
 ship, continued Mr. Fox, but this I assure him he shall not 
 lose. He has also said, he should lose that of the friends 
 about him, because he stands up for the constitution of this 
 country. I, however, hope that my friends are as fond ol 
 that constitution as the right honourable gentleman is, and 
 that the example of France will make them cautious not to 
 run into the same errors, and give the same provocation to 
 the people. With regard to tests, Ur. Fox said he would 
 not believe bis honourable friend had altered his sentiments 
 on that head, till he saw him voting for one. France had 
 established a complete unequivocal toleration, and he hear- 
 tily wished that a complete toleration was also established 
 in England. Because troubles had happened at the time 
 the French were changing their constitution, should we 
 say that they would also happen in England, were any al- 
 teration maJe in our constitution ? He must contend for 
 the contrary ; and as he thought that the British constitu- 
 tion was capable of improvements, so did he think the 
 greatest improvements might be engrafted on it by degrees, 
 with success, and without any violation of the public tran- 
 quility.. ,,11 
 
 Mr. Fox said, he lamented the difference that had hap- 
 pened, but he hoped, that when his right honourable friend 
 came to turn in his mind all the circumstances that had oc- 
 casioned it, he would forget what was past. His right ho- 
 nourable friend had said, that if he were to quote some of 
 his expressions on particular occasions, he could prove his 
 inconsistency. Mr. Fox acknowledged that no member of 
 that House was more apt to let expressions fall which, per- 
 haps, were rash and imprudent, than he was. He knew 
 he had done so : but his right honourable friend never let 
 any thing tall but what did him honour, and might be re- 
 membered to his credit. Mr. Fox now proceeded to speak 
 ol the reasons which had induced the right honourable 
 
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 DOC.'’-' 
 
 77 
 
 gentleman and himself to enter into a systematic opposi- 
 tion to the present administration : this was not, he said, 
 for the purpose of obtaining power and emolument by the 
 means of a faction ; but he had ever understood they and 
 their friends had formed a party for supporting the true 
 principles of the British constitution, and watching the pre- 
 rogative. Alter expatiating on this, Mr. Fox said, “ let 
 the right honourable gentleman maintain his opinions, but 
 let him not blame me for having mine.” He then noticed 
 the cruel and hard manner in which his right honourable 
 friend had used him, and spoke feelingly of the pain he had 
 given him. The course lie should pursue, he said, would 
 be to keep out of his right honourable friend’s way till 
 time and reflection had fitted him (Mr. Burke) to think 
 diflerently upon the subject, and then, if their friends did 
 not contrive to unite them, he should think their friends did 
 not act as they had a right to expect at their hands. If his 
 right honourable friend wished to bring forward the ques- 
 tion of the French revolution on a future day, in that case 
 he would discuss it with him as temperately as he could. 
 At present he had said all that he thought necessary, and 
 let'his right honourable friend say what he would more up- 
 on the subject, he would make him no further reply. 
 
 Mr. Burke said, that the tenderness which had been dis- 
 played in the beginning and conclusion of the speech had 
 oeen completely done away by what had occurred in the 
 middle part. Under the mask of kindness for him, an at- 
 tempt had been made to injure his character, and attack 
 the whole of his public conduct. The event of this night’s 
 debate, in which he had been interrupted, without being 
 suflered to explain, in which he had been accused and had 
 not been heard, made him at a loss now to understand 
 what was party or friendship. He had indeed, as had been 
 alleged, proposed a reduction of the power of the «^rown : 
 butlie had proposed it only so far as he considered it ne- 
 cessary ; and though his views had not been complied with, 
 no bad consequence had followed. In 1784 an attack had 
 been made, not upon the form, but upon the spirit of the 
 constitution. His opposition to this attack had not been 
 
78 
 
 single and unsupported. He had not, indeed, succeeded 
 in procuring a remedy. He knew not, indeed, where the 
 remedy was to be found. The evil arose from the people j 
 and till they should be made sensible of the disease, how 
 was it possible to apply the means of cure ? He did not 
 expect that his jests, that hasty or careless expressions, 
 should have been recorded against him, and mustered up in 
 the form of accusations : and yet all this was done under 
 the mask of friendship ! He had been charged with incon- 
 sistency, but he desired that there should be shewn one 
 word, one expression, one act or occasion, in which he 
 had discovered the smallest inconsistency. It had been 
 said that the British constitution might in some points be 
 amended. But had he ever affirmed that it or any other 
 human constitution might not ? It had been charged up- 
 on him, that he thought it necessary to abuse every other 
 constitution in order to praise the British ; but had he ever 
 displayed any such spirit ? On the contrary, he should 
 never have thought it necessary to bring forward the 
 French constitution as the subject of animadversion, had 
 not attempts been made to introduce the monster into this 
 country. He had heard the right honourable gentleman, 
 who now appeared as so violent an advocate of the French 
 constitution, say, that the King of France was the best in- 
 tentioned sovereign in Europe. This king might now be 
 said to be in jail. In consequence of his good nature, in- 
 deed, he had been ruined. He had gone on from conces- 
 sion to concession, from the grant of one indulgence to an- 
 other, till at last he found himself deprived by his subjects 
 of his own rights, thus holding out a memorable lesson to 
 all monarchs, to be watchful in preserving their privileges, 
 and cautious in guarding against the encroachments of their 
 subjects. Political truth, it had been said, gains by dis- 
 cussion ; but it was surely not that sort of discussion which 
 had taken place that evening, in which his facts had not 
 been allowed to be produced, and his arguments had not been 
 heard. A serious danger, as he had s.tated before, and 
 would now repeat, was to be apprehended from the intro- 
 duction of the principles of the new constitution into Uiii 
 
70 
 
 m country. If there should be formed in this country a party-, 
 
 m however small, who might join with those abroad, wlwt 
 
 evils might not ensue ? However small might be the par- 
 mimical to the constitution in this country’, \-et they 
 were not less to be dreaded ; they would not want the sup- 
 port of numbers. The constitution of this country leans to 
 monarchy : it was necessary that all parts of it should be 
 w B defended together. All the parts of the constitution had 
 
 wJBs now been attacked- Libels were circulated against the 
 
 constitution by societies who assumed the name of constitu- 
 wb tional. Nay, libels were circulated through the country 
 bo* in the name of the crown, and under the pretended sanc- 
 poiim tion of his Majesty’s ministers, and from that authority re- 
 iDj a commended to the perusal and attention of the people. 
 
 Such libels, issued in the name of the crown, and eagerly 
 cryefc devoured by the ignorant and hot-headed multitude, had 
 Ikei been in a great measure the source of the evils in France, 
 ;e k and their progress was to be guarded against in this coun- 
 pfaidi try. The new constitution in France had been called a 
 ioD.li stupendous fabric of wisdom. He had thought that the 
 otv i right honourable gentleman had possessed a better taste in 
 ikm - architecture than to bestow this magnificent epithet on a 
 YtciK building composed of untempered mortar. For his own 
 Iftesti part, when he saw the new temple, he wept. He consid* 
 ,D0f ' ered it as the work of Goths and Vandals, where every 
 iluR,! thing was out of place, disjointed, and inverted. It had 
 I (wc been said, that he did not love tests ; yet if his intimacy 
 iXfOi should be renewed with the right honourable gentleman, 
 
 5 sit: he might explain to him that it was necessary that some 
 
 evil should be suffered, in order to obtain a greater good. 
 
 In France, it had been asserted by the right honourable 
 tsflii gentleman, prevailed the largest religious toleration It 
 . ^ would be judged of what nature was that toleration, when 
 it was understood that there the most cruel tests were im- 
 i|jj posed. Nay, tests were imposed for the most inhuman of 
 jpoii all purposes, in order to deprive those, of wdiom they were 
 exacted, of their bread. The treatment of the nuns was 
 jjg{ almost too shocking to be mentioned. These wretched 
 iiilj who could only be animated by the most exalted 
 
80 
 
 ?!^ 0 ' 
 
 n 1 
 
 BOQ 
 
 lim 
 
 '.the 
 
 ]i<rious enthusiasm, were engaged in the most painful ollicc 
 orhumanity, in the most sacred fluty of piety, visiting and 
 attending the hospitals. Yet these had been dragged into 
 the streets : these had been scourged by the sovereigns of 
 the French nation, because the priest, from whom they 
 had received the sacrament, had not submitted to the test. 
 
 This proceeding had passed not only unpunished but un- 
 censured. Yet in the country in which such proceedings 
 had happened, had been said to subsist the largest religious 
 toleration. The present state oT France was ten times 
 worse than tyranny. The n^w constitution was said to be 
 an experiment ; but it was not true. It had already been 
 tried and been found to be only productive of evils. They 
 would go on from tyranny to tyranny, from oppression to 
 oppression, till at last the whole system would terminate in 
 the ruin and destruction of that miserable and deluded people. 
 
 He stated that his opinion ot the revolution in America did 
 not at all militate with his opinion of the revolution of France. 
 
 In that instance he conceived that the people had had some ^ 
 reason for the conduct w’hich they had purs«ied There^/j^ 
 was an expression of his which had been taken exception 
 at, “ well disciplined troops.” He only meant that every 
 body of men wdio acte>J upon a method and in concert were 
 well disciplined. He was sorry for the present occasion. 
 Sufficient to the day was the evil thereof. Yet, let the 
 evifbe tb him if the good* was to many. H#* hoped that 
 they would not barter the constitution of this country, the 
 eternal jewel of their souls, for a wnld and visionary system, 
 which could only lead to confusion and disorder. With p 
 
 regard to pretences of friendship, he must own that he did 
 not like them, where his character and public conduct, aa 
 in that instance, had been so materially attacked ancJ in- 
 jured. The French principles in this country, he h )U been 
 told, would come to some head It would then be per- 
 ceived what were their consequences. Several of the 
 gentlemen were young enough to see a change. They 
 would be enterprising enough to act a part It would then 
 be seen whether they would be borne on the top, or en- 
 cumbered in the gravel. In going along with the current. 
 
 iilate 
 
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 they W’ould most ccitainly be forced to execute and approve 
 many things very contrary to their own nature and character. 
 
 CyhcincclloT Pill said he rose to take notice of the 
 very extraordinary situation in which the House stood, but 
 would say only a very few words : and indeed the only 
 subject to v.’hich, as the question then stood, he couM 
 speak, was one which excluded him from going into any 
 debate upon it. They had been engaged for some houis 
 in an unfinished debate on a question of order moved in the 
 middle of the right honourable gentleman’s speech on the 
 question of reading the clauses in the Quebec bill, para- 
 graph by paragraph j and the question of order w’as, whe- 
 ther the right honourable gentleman should be permitted 
 to go on in an argument on the subject of the French revo- 
 lution which he had begun, but had, been frequently intor- 
 : rupted by having been called to order by dilferent gentle- 
 men on the other side of the House. The right honoura- 
 ble gentleman opposite to him (Mr. Fox,) had spoken early 
 in the debate on the question of order, and had given it as 
 liis opinion that it was disorderly for the other rigiit ho- 
 nourable gentleman to enter into a discussion respecting 
 the lute revolution in France ; and yet the right honoura- 
 ble gentleman himself had, in his own speech, gone di- 
 rectly to that discussion, and the Comriiittee had since heard 
 two speeches from each of the right honourable gentlemen 
 immediately upon the subject of the French revolution. 
 For his own part he had ail along been of opinion that the 
 right honourable gentleman who opened the first debate 
 had been strictly in order in introducing his opinions on 
 the French revolution, when speaking on a subject of a 
 constitution to be provided for Quebec, although he couM 
 not but think that every asperity and censure on that event 
 had, for various reasons, better be avoided ; circumstanced 
 as the Committee then stood, he said he fe It a considerable 
 degree of embarrassment : he did not think it consistent 
 with decorum to move any amendment to the question of 
 order, nor that any advantage was likely to result from 
 taking the sense of the House upon it. The only advisa- 
 ble thinor to be done was to withdraw it ; but to that there 
 
I 
 
 
 S2 
 
 was clearly an obstacle, though he hoped not altogether 
 an insuperable one. It was usual, he believed, to obtain 
 the consent of the mover ot any question previous to its be- 
 ing withdrawn, but in the present case the noble lord who 
 had proposed the question had withdrawn himself. His 
 
 havino- left tiie House, however, might be presumed to be; 
 
 10 
 
 ifiiu 
 
 IOC 
 
 r^i 
 
 a pretty strong implied consent on the part of the noble 
 mover to its being withdrawn, and therefore he should sug- 
 gest that measure. 
 
 Mr. Pitt then recurred to the first debate,' and said 
 upon the question w'hether the clauses of the bill be 
 paragraph by paragraph, any gentleman who thought the l£«|^ 
 general principle of the bill and the principles of the clauses 
 
 il, tliat 
 I read ^ Cisc 
 
 ;i2ics 
 
 'mk 
 liial n 
 ! was 
 ienan' 
 k 
 
 xni'.Da 
 
 so objectionable that they could not be so modelled and ma- 
 tured by correction in a Committee as to be made fit to 
 pass, \vas undoubtedly entitled to state bis objections to the 
 bill ; and therefore he had thought the right honourable 
 gentleman perfectly in order in the mode he had adopted ; 
 hut it had been supposed that he had given an opinion that] 
 the right honourable gentleman’s arguments and doctrines 
 were not to be supported either by him or any of those ho- 
 nourable friends who generally voted for him. Now, if 
 was to be recollected that he had declined giving ahj 
 opinion whatever on the subject, and had carefully avoided 
 doing so, declaring that he did not think it proper for hii% Jwno 
 in the situation in which he stood, to enter into discussiol »seli 
 of an opinion on the constitution then forming in a neiglh dkat 
 bouring country. With regard to what the honourable »Qor 
 gentleman hUd said of a misrepresentation by him of thalj'ijedv 
 right honourable gentleman’s words in a former debate on ^en, « 
 the Quebec Bill, if he had given any misrepresentation of iassc 
 the right honourable gentleman’s speech, he had given it inyve fa 
 the right honourable gentleman’s own words, and in hvih 
 
 presence ; if, therefore, he had mistaken or mis-stated any 
 thing the right honourable gentleman had said, it had been 
 in his own power to set him right at the instant, and not let 
 a wrong impression of his words go abroad, the fact was. 
 that in discussing the subject of the new constitution fori 
 f^anada, he had suggested his intention to propose, as the 
 
 It fC’ 
 
 »con 
 
 4kc(! 
 
 kn 
 
63 
 
 % 
 
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 sto'i 
 
 lefe'r 
 
 siiiK;', 
 
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 h i’nr Hn. hereditary council, in imitation 
 
 of our House of Lords ; whereas the right honourable (gen- 
 tleman had suggested that, in his opinion, an elective coun- 
 cil would be preferable i and as the right honourable sen- 
 lleman had just been talking of the governments of the 
 Independent and United States of America, which were 
 Jsk; republics, he (Mr. Pitt) had conceived that the ri^ht ho- 
 nourable gentleman was inclined to think that a greater 
 indsa infusion of republican principles into the new government 
 )ill b ol‘ Canada would be better adapted to that province than a 
 tkr constitution more exactly similar to our own, and therefore, 
 iftk -in his reply, he had given his sentiments against any great- 
 led IE* or infusion of republicanism into the new constitution of 
 mjiit Canada, than at present subsisted in the I3ritish c<?nstitutioii. 
 cte: That was precisely what he had said, and that he conceiv- 
 ; ed was no misrepresentation of the right honourable gen- 
 id ± tleman’s speech. As to the publications which the other 
 op. right honourable gentleman had stated to have been dis- 
 i(j inseminating throughout this country, with a view to extol 
 the French revolution and its consequences, and to induce 
 Atf-i Ihc people to look into the principles of their own constitu- 
 pg tion, he did not venture to think that there might be no 
 illy av: danger arising from them ; but when he had saFd that he 
 ^rfofisaw no cause for immediate alarm from them, it was be- 
 (Jjjci cause he was of opinion that they were the less dangerous 
 Dj at that time, since he could not think the French revolu- 
 bonof any of the new constitutions could be deemed an 
 
 B Qijobjection fit for imitation in this country by any set of 
 j^^jlj^men, or that such an attempt should ever be made. There 
 senlat/'^as such a fund of good sense in that House, and such a 
 jgjyf love for the constitution implanted in the minds of the peo- 
 pie in general, that he saw no reason to apprehend any 
 revolution in this country. But although he was not 
 desirous of going with the right honourable gentleman in 
 I his comments on the French revolution, and little appre- 
 (jjjfc hensive as he was of a similar revolution taking place in 
 jjtilir country, yet he agreed with that right honourable 
 genileman that our own constitution was inestimabl#^ ; and 
 that not only no other constitution was preferable, but that 
 
I 
 
 
 S4 
 
 people 
 a mo- 
 
 
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 iiine 
 
 'hi 
 
 atli£ 
 
 ieon 
 
 iiiase 
 
 fliefe 
 
 mi 
 
 atthi 
 
 no other %xhatcver, as aJaptcd to the genius of the 
 and the security ol popular freedom, would bear 
 
 ment’s comparison with it. The right honourable gentle- 
 man, he observed, had intimated that he was to receive no 
 support from him, nor from any near him, in his arguments 
 that day. The fact was, he said, that .they had not got so 
 far into” the debate that it was possible for the right honoura- 
 ble gentleman to have heard from him, or from any of his 
 friends, whether they meant to support him or not. He 
 had already declared’ that, for various reasons, he did not 
 wish to enter into any discussion on the subject of the 
 French revolution ; and if, hereafter, there should appear 
 more serious ground of apprehension that there was any de- 
 si^rn to subvert our constitution, and that ground should be 
 stated by the right honourable gentleman, he should not 
 only receive his warmest and most effectual support, but nol 
 gentleman, who thought as he did, he was persuaded, ^ 
 would refuse his support to the right honourable gentleman 
 He thought the right honourable gentleman entitled to the 
 oratitude of his country, for having that day in so able and 
 eloquent a manner stated his sense of the degree of danger 
 to the constitution that already existed, and did assure’ 
 him, that although he was of opinion that our constitution 
 w*as capable of gradual and temperate melioration and a- 
 mendment in some few of its principles, yet so fully and 
 perfectly was he persuaded of its being preferable to that of; 
 anFofher cdhstitutibn in the worlT, that he would cordial' 
 ly CO operate w'itb the right honourable gentleman' in tak- 
 ino- every possible means to preserve it, and deliver it down 'bate 
 to^posterity, as the best security for the prosperity, free- prefe 
 dom, and happiness of the British people. In the course of , ad li 
 
 oftbe 
 
 fonni 
 
 pliedi 
 ade 
 lore t 
 kcaiL 
 
 
 his speech, Mr. Pitt hinted that it would be impossible for 
 them, at that late hour, to go into the discussion of the 
 clauses of the bill. 
 
 Mr. Fox immediately rising, acknowledged that the 
 right honourable gentleman had given a pretty fair 
 account of what had passed the other day upon the Que- 
 bec bill, and he \vas obbged to him for having explained 
 
 his meaning. 
 
 In the proposition of having the Council 
 
 It 
 
 diiir, 
 
 Jlr 
 
 itigti 
 
 Th 
 
4 
 
 85 
 
 elective, rather than hereditary, he declared he did not 
 think there was any thing like instilling republican princi- 
 ples into the new constitution for Canada f of which, he 
 was satisfied, he should be able to convince the right ho- 
 nourablc gentleman who had just sat down, as well as the 
 right honourable gentleman near him, when they went into 
 the debate on the clauses of the bill. When that day 
 came, Mr. Fox said, he hoped the right honourable gen- 
 tleman near him would come down to the House and join 
 in the debate, as he was anxious to get to practice from 
 theory ; and whatever the right honourable gentleman 
 himself might think, all his arguments that day had been 
 mere theories, and nothing else. Mr. Fox declared he 
 was not to be imposed on by sounds, so as to be startled 
 at the name of republican principles : there was in our con- 
 stitution something of those principles, inasmuch as that 
 House was elective ; but it was on account of the bad use 
 of the word ‘‘ republican,” and the purpose to which it 
 might be converted, that he had been anxious to have his 
 former arguments explained. They all knew that the 
 word “ republican” was a watch-word, always unfairly ap- 
 plied to any man, when the object was to run him down, 
 and exasperate the country against him. He should there- 
 fore be glad when they came into the clauses of the bill ; 
 because professions of principles were at all times odious to 
 him ; and indeed every body might know his principles 
 from his political life, having never attempted or wished to 
 disguise them. When, however, they came into the de- . 
 bate on the clauses, he should state his reasons why he 
 preferred an elective to an hereditary Council for Canada, 
 and he flattered himself not altogether without success. 
 
 It was then moved, “ That the Chairman leave the 
 chair, and ask leave to sit again.” 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt wished to know what day would 
 be agreeable for the Committee to be resumed, and at 
 length Wednesday next was agreed on. 
 
 The House adjourned. 
 
86 
 
 m 
 
 Wednesday f 11 th May- 
 
 The House having resolved itself into a Conimittee ou 
 the Quebec Bill, Mr. Hobart in the Chair, 
 
 Mr, Chancellor Pitt moved, That the Bill be read 
 clause by clause.” He said, that he trusted it was not 
 now necessary to read over the whole clauses, and that 
 any gentleman would state his objections to any particular 
 clause. 
 
 Mr. Hussey objected to the division of the provinces, 
 stated in the bill, a measure which he considered as not 
 suited to the purposes of legislation. He thought they all 
 would become British subjects sooner if this division did 
 not take place. He considered it, instead of tending to 
 heal their differences, as calculated to preserve and inflame 
 their animosities. Commerce was the chief point of view 
 in which Quebec was of importance to this country. It 
 behoved the House, therefore, to provide for that most es- 
 sential object, the security of property. We ought to in- 
 troduce the English commercial law, and leave the House 
 of Assembly to make such alterations as they should find 
 rendered expedient by their own peculiar circumstauces. 
 
 Mr. Powys said that the reason of this division was sta- 
 ted to be to prevent feuds and divisions. But he very 
 much doubted that the method of division, whether or not 
 it came in the form of a declaration of his Majesty’s inten- 
 tion, would be but ill calculated for this purpose. 
 
 Mr. Fox wished to be informed of one point, which had 
 never been explained, and that was, whether his Majesty 
 had a power to divide the province as was then proposed. 
 
 Upon consulting the 14th George III., it appeared that 
 the king had that authority. 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt said, the point being settled that 
 his Majesty had an authority to divide the province, the 
 question would be whether it was fit for parliament to agree 
 with his Majesty to establish -two legislatures ; and if they 
 did not agree, they might negative.the whole of the clauses, 
 and might dispose of the whole of the' bill ; because it pro- 
 ceeded all through its various clauses on the fundamental 
 supposition of two legislatures. It appeared to his Majes- 
 
 . ;iiir 
 ' ires 
 
 m' 
 
 ‘ s^tao 
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 .tillie 
 
 rasa 
 iliicl] 
 fjence 
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 d'k: 
 
 ma, 
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 ieEr 
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 lunuc. 
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 Upper 
 
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 87 
 
 tf s ministers, first, that the only way' of consulting the 
 interest of the internal situation of Quebec, and of render- 
 ing it profitable to this country, was to give it a legislature 
 as near as circumstances would admit, according^ to the 
 principles of the British constitution. In the next place it 
 appeared to them that there was no probability of recon- 
 ciling the jarring interests and oppositive views of the in- 
 habitants, but by giving them two legislatures. It was 
 conceived this form of government was best adapted to 
 put an end to all the difi^iculties of a legal sort, and to ren- 
 der the regulations more useful to the subjects of that coun- 
 try’’. He believed that there was such a rooted opposition 
 of interests of the one description and the other, that if there 
 was a constitution consisting of a House of Assembly, in 
 which the parties might be nearly balanced, the conse- 
 quence, at least for a long series of years, would be a 
 great degree of animosity, and a great degree of confusion. 
 If one of the parties had a great ascendancy over the other, 
 the party having the superiority was very unlikely to give 
 satisfaction to the other party. It seemed to his Majesty’s 
 servants the most desirable thing if they could not give 
 satisfaction to all descriptions of men, to divide the pro- 
 vince, and to contrive that one division should consist, as 
 much as possible, of those who were well inclined towards 
 the English laws, and that the other party should consist 
 of a decided preponderancy of the ancient inhabitants, who 
 were attached to the French laws. It was perfectly true, 
 Mr. Pitt said, that in Lower Canada there still remained 
 a certain number of English subjects, but these would hold 
 a much smaller proportion than if there was one form of 
 government for every part of the province. It was in 
 Upper Canada particularly that they were to expect a 
 great addition of English inhabitants. The consequence 
 was that if it was not divided from the rest, the Canadians 
 forming a majority of five to one, the grievance would be 
 every year increasing in proportion as the population in- 
 creasea. He was ready to admit, on the other hand, that 
 it was impossible to adopt any measure that was perfectly 
 free from inconvenience* The division of the province 
 
u 
 
 8S 
 
 might be liable to some objections, but, on the whole, it 
 was subject to fewer objections than any other measure, 
 and would tend more to promote their connexion with this 
 country, or to produce good effects. ^ 
 
 ilir. Powys owned that he was not convinced by (he 
 right honourable gentleman’s reasoning. He had allowed 
 that in this instance the interests of one part of the inhabit- 
 ants of Canada were sacrificed to those of the other. He 
 could not give up his Majesty’s declaration, of which he 
 read some part, promising to the inhabitants of Canada the 
 British constitution. 
 
 Mr, Burke said it was evidently the intention of his 
 Majesty’s declaration, that the laws adopted in Canada 
 should be as nearly as possible similar to those of England. 
 Indeed it was usual in every colony to form the govern- 
 ment as nearly upon the model of the mother country as 
 consistent with the difference of local circumstances. It 
 was proper that every corporation should adopt for its own 
 use tne regulations of the community from which it held. 
 To ascertain the propriety of dividing the provinces requir- 
 ed a degree of local knowledge, which he did not possess j 
 but he should take it that the measure was convenient. 
 An attempt to join people dissimilar in law, language, and 
 manners, appeared to him highly absurd ; to join too the 
 conquerors and the conquered must give rise to much un- 
 pleasant feeling, and many inviduous distinctions. Such a 
 measure would appear to him to sow %vhat must be most 
 fatal to the establishment of a new government, the seeds 
 of discord. This geographical distribution then was in his 
 opinion highly convenient. The upper colony was chiefly 
 inhabited by emigrants from America : these then were 
 desirous of the English constitution. Let the Canadians 
 have a constitution formed upon the piinciples of Canadi- 
 ans, and Englishmen upon the principles of Englishmen. 
 Let them be governed upon the nature of men, the only 
 wise foundation of all governments ; and let there not be 
 adopted any wdld theories, more unknown than the nortli- 
 . west coast of America. In this point of view he approv- 
 ed of the division, as accommodated to the circumstances 
 
 ^ i! 
 
 ! 3:1s. 
 ' 2sJs 
 
 ' lx!oi 
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 Sllpc 
 
 j»ia 
 
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 tm] 
 
 ib 
 lioint 
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 m\c 
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89 
 
 >*.l ‘he country, and the natural prejudices of the inbabi- 
 recommended that system of government which 
 ion^ to promote the union of the good of the individual 
 
 and of the public, in opposition to that which attempted to 
 f ^ methodize anaimhy. He admired the division ; no, he did 
 jikiiL possess sufficient local knowledge to admire it : but he 
 
 could at least say that he did not disapprove of it. * Situ- 
 ^ ^ ated as he was, in a state supported by no party, there 
 was a voice which cried to him, beware. In the short 
 lime during which he remained in parliament, and it would 
 be but a very short time, he would, however, support those 
 principles of government which were founded upon the 
 n ; \yisdom of antiquity, and sanctioned by the experience of 
 .*^^1 time. On the present bill^ necessary as it was for him to 
 be careful of what he should say, he would state the argu- 
 ments that occurred to him, as they should arise, upon 
 every clause. 
 
 3Ir- Chancellor Pitt said, that there were none who 
 from their attention to every clause were more qualified, 
 *" on the present bill, to communicate information from the 
 source of their knowledge, or draw illustration from their 
 powers of eloquence, than the right honourable gentleman ; 
 ;niCD yet he was desirous, that in considering particular clauses, 
 regard should likewise be had to their connexion with the 
 ^ general tenor of the bill. It was intended te give a free 
 constitution to Canada, according to British ideas of frec- 
 dom. This could not be done without a division of the 
 ' provinces, to prevent that clashing of opposite interests 
 which must otherwise necessarily ensue. Yet even this 
 measure, he had owned, was not free from local inconve- 
 nience, though by no means equal to the inconvenience of 
 ^ f either not giving them a new system of government, or 
 not providing in that system for this division of the pro- 
 vinces. Could it be inferred, from his Majesty’s procla- 
 ination, that he was to give Canada the whole of the En- 
 glish laws ? This proclamation was made in 1763 ; and 
 C'ji* by an act of parliament in 1773, all English laws had been 
 abolished except the criminal laws. From this fact it 
 
 i|^ 8* 
 
 sfJKf 
 
m 
 
 u 
 
 0*0 
 
 would be judged how far it was binding on his Mujesty io 
 <rive to this colony the whole of the English laws. 
 
 ° Lord Sheffield sMyih^t in addition to the objections 
 which had been made to the division of the provincej he 
 thought it not justifiable, on any principle of policy or colo- 
 nization, to encourage settlements in the interior parts oj 
 America, which the division certainly tended to do. It 
 had been much doubted whether colonies were advanta- 
 gious to the mother country. Certainly those which fur- 
 nished only the same products were not ; but those which 
 assisted our fisheries, and above all the West India plan- 
 tations, were highly advantageous ; the latter produced 
 what we could not ; we supplied them with every thing 
 we carried for them. They do not build ships, or vie 
 with us in any thing, and never could manufacture for them- 
 selves. He noticed the design of building the seat of the 
 new government on the most distant part of Lake Ontario', 
 between w'hich place and the mother country the commu- 
 nication must ever be difficult. He observed that it could 
 not be the interest of Great Britain to form a settlement 
 of farmers in a country which grows the same articles as 
 our own. The expense would be great, as it rxvust be a 
 long time before it could maintain its own government. 
 At the same time it would not be possible to retain the 
 supply of such settlements, as it would not be practicable 
 to prevent the smuggling of manuAictures from the adjoin- 
 ing United States. He concluded by saying that it would 
 be advisable to maintain a few posts to promote a fradc 
 with the Indians ; but to encourage migration from the 
 coast to the interior parts of that great continent, he con- 
 ceived to be a system extremely unwise. 
 
 Mr. Fox asserted, that it was a mistaken inference of 
 the right honourable gentleman, that those who disapprov- . 
 ed of the division of the colony rejected the whole clause. 
 They wished only to amend it, by leaving out the first 
 part. That clause contained the whole Plan of Govern- 
 ment, the Governor, the Legislative tJouncil, the Assem- 
 bly, to which no one had stated any objections. With re- 
 gard to the different opinions of the division of the colony.. 
 
 I 
 
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 jme 
 
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 91 
 
 tliere was certainly difficulties on both sides. Jf ilie di- 
 vision should take place, the French laws would be estab- 
 lished as g^eneral m one province, and the English laws 
 
 fi! *'>« colony, on 
 
 thef^thofhis Majesty’s proclamation, that the British 
 constrfution would be established. Could this division be 
 attended with a complete separation of the old and new 
 inhabitants, its views would then be answered. But 
 several of those who had come on the faith of his Majesty’s 
 proclamation resided, not in the upper, but in the lower 
 province ; and several of those who might be deemed to be 
 hardly used, resided in the upper. But it might be ans^ 
 wered, that the act made seventeen years since did away 
 the proclamation. That act had given great dissatisfaction 
 at the time, and since it had frequently been thought that 
 it ought to be repealed. If the question of right was insis- 
 ted upon, it was certainl y done away legally ; but in form- 
 ing this new constitution," it would be more desirable to act 
 upon the principles of good faith. Was it necessary, asked 
 Mr. Fox, to adhere to the proclamation, that all the En- 
 glish laws should be introduced into the oobny ? None 
 wished it, and that was a reason why they should not do it. 
 With regard to the French laws, they might be allowed to 
 liave constitutional and municipal laws, if they were desi- 
 rous that these laws should not be taken away. But, in 
 fact, these were not the French laws at the conquest of 
 Canada. They had sent only a part of their laws to their 
 colony ; they formed merely what was called the cuatom 
 of Paris ; but that had been long since abrogated. Hence 
 arose the utmost difficulty in appeals to the Privy Council j 
 the law to which they referred no longer existed ; it was 
 necessary to consult, not the French lawyer, but the an- 
 tiquarian. If any middle way could be found, he owned 
 it would be the best. He would suggest one expedient, 
 and that was to adopt the French laws in the upper, and 
 compel the government to alter them till they should have 
 accommodated them to the local circumstances of the coun- 
 try. But as for the division, he owned that he regarded 
 it as- attended with the utmost possible inconvenieuc<. 
 
02 
 
 The commerce of the upper part, in order to be r leu on, 
 must pass through the lower ; and might m its passage be 
 fettered, by the Legislature there, with whatever duties or 
 obstructions they might choose to impose. All Lnglish 
 merchants had complained of the loss which they had sus- 
 tained from the French laws ; and affirmed that, in conse- 
 quence of their uncertainty and defective regulations, 
 whatever flourishing appearance their trade might have ex- 
 hibited, they had ultimately been sufferers in every con- 
 nexion with that colony. So that the result of their experi- 
 ence had been to abandon trade, from which Mie uncertain- 
 ty of law had shut up every avenue of advantage. 
 
 Mr. W. Grant said that, in general, commercial laws 
 differed but little from one another. The commercial 
 laws of England and of France were nearly the same. 
 All commercial laws were founded on the principle of con- 
 tracts, either expressed or implied. He begged leave to 
 correct a mistake, on a subject of which he was enabled to 
 speak from his local knowledge. The custom of Paris 
 had no reference to the regulations of commerce, but of real 
 property. The merchants were aggrieved, not in conse- 
 quence of commercial decision, but of insolvency. Ihe 
 relief granted to creditors was very different in different 
 countries. It was granted in France, according to the 
 nature of the debts. The merchants thought that they 
 had reason to complain, when they found the whole of 
 the bankrupt estate run away with by French deeds, of 
 which they knew nothing. The uncertainty of laws was, 
 in every colony, necessarily a subject of complaint. They 
 brought with them, only that part of the laws of the moth- 
 er country which was applicable to their new situation. 
 In Canada, the uncertainty, from the mixture of French, 
 was still greater. Another disagreeable circumstance was, 
 a dispute whether a collection of commercial laws, made by 
 Lewis the XIV th, called the “ CJode Marchand,^^ had 
 ever been really introduced into the colony , or ought to form 
 part of the system. Instead of framing a new bankrupt 
 law, would it not be better to allow any sort of an assem- 
 bly to enter into the detail of regulations, wdiich, in the 
 
 ffir 
 
 th- 
 
 la 
 
 
93 
 
 tiet: 
 
 to local circnmstanccs ol the country, they should find most 
 Jjfa, convenient. It was not to be vrondered at, that appeals 
 should be a source of litigation, as those to whom thev 
 were made could not be supposed perfectly acquitted with 
 the P rench jaws. 
 
 real 
 
 Mr. Fox, after payingr a compliment to the abilities of 
 the honourable and learned gentleman that had spoken last, 
 thanked him for having corrected his mistake. He had 
 had, he said, his information from those merchants who 
 had been themselves sulferers. But notwithstanding 
 what had been urged, he was still in as much doubt a^ 
 ever about the unintelhgibility of the laws. It had been 
 admitted by the honourable gentleman, though he had as- 
 jj, cribed it less to the laws themselves; than to the situation 
 of the country. If the laws were English, and they were 
 iwte their defects would be easily perceived, and might 
 \abld quickly be remedied. 
 
 pf Mr Burke said, the question was whether the Englisli 
 Iiitolf better than the French laws. He 
 
 in i^ud formerly said, that the English -;ii 
 
 T. " t.>3nada were attached to the English constitution and to 
 English laws, and that the French, from their preju- 
 j dices, were equally attached to the CanaiUn laws. He 
 y then made some observations on the dilFerence between 
 ivlio)i. debtors and creditors who were landholders, and those who 
 deeik ®^^ud in that relation merely from commerce. He perfect- 
 Jy concurred, Mr Burke said, m ppinion with what had 
 'j’ljbeen advanced with so much propriety by Mr. Grant: 
 l^^^tlie English ought to enjoy the English constitution and 
 the French the old Canadian constitution. Those colonies 
 I ought to be considered both with regard to commerce and 
 tancti regard to their own internal happiness. 
 
 ‘ ^ Mr. Alderman Watson observed, that the English were 
 attached to the constitution and laws of their country, and 
 sought protection under them. The French were certain 
 ^ ly attached to the Canadian laws. He complimented Mr. 
 
 I ^ (jlrant on his abilities and knowledge, and said, no man in 
 that House was better qualified, from his experience 
 ^ ’ * and good understanding, to give them information on the 
 
subject than the honourable gentleman- All that he asked 
 for the inhabitants of Canada, be said, was that they should 
 enjoy the security of British laws on commercial principles. 
 With regard to the division of the province, ne saw no 
 other mode of securing the quiet of the colony. 
 
 The Attorney frcncra/ desired to make a few observa* 
 tions on what had fallen from the worthy alderman, respect- 
 ing the state of the mercantile law in Canada, and the un- 
 certain manner in which it was administered. He said it 
 had fallen within his official duty, some years ago, to ex- 
 amine that subject very fulljs and he rose from that ex- 
 amination confirmed in the opinion of his honourable and 
 learned friend, that the fundamental principles upon which 
 a merchant could recover his debt from a solvent man 
 were not very different from those which prevailed in this 
 country, and he believed almost every other country ; and 
 that excepting upon the subject of the law of insolvency 
 there was a reasonable degree of uniformity in the deci- 
 sion of the judges. The doubt arising from the law of in- 
 scivency arose from its being a question whether the code 
 morchand of Louis the XlVth, was ever adopted in that 
 countr}’’. It was contended on the one hand that it did 
 not appear ever to have been registered by the Supreme 
 Council. On the other hand, it was insisted that it had 
 been sufficiently acted upon to shew that it might have 
 been registered, or m some other manner adopted. In 
 this consisted the great complaint of uncertainty ; htat sub- 
 ject, however, was in a course of decision, and consequently 
 it would be ascertained that au insolvent law did exist, and 
 that a law must be made suitable to the local circumstances 
 of that country. But if it were true that the mercantile 
 law of Canada was imperfect, the remedy of overturning it 
 and putting a law different in it^ forms and all its detail, al- 
 though similar in principles, would be attended with the ut- 
 most inconvenience. It must be considered, he said, how 
 mercantile law had been established in this country ; it wai 
 by pursuing the practice of merchants in this country, 
 which local experiment had shewn to be best adapted to 
 their profession, and as such adopted and confirmed by our 
 courts of law. . 
 
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 most embarrassment mi^ht follow In ut- 
 
 stances thaf detail miirl.f t,l f j' • ^ 1 '"'"“‘e in- 
 
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 m? "’oulJ l>e practicable in that country 
 
 tTni in i‘ would-be con- 
 
 n I ^ country ? J’lie forms of actions which 
 
 ren'"' fi then, would be suddenly introduced 
 
 require the sudden introdnetian of pleaders and advocates’ 
 
 LllTstm'i ar’^’-t almost unirer- 
 
 perhans tfe mt'f f P”"«ples, was in its detail 
 
 P na|>s the most local of any other subject of law He 
 
 what had faUen from the worthy alderman 
 
 ionofre ‘he introduc 
 
 present law , ,f was forgot that it would go far Cyond the 
 
 ("'h® seemed only ^to be in 
 
 f uHt T" and they were chiefly English;! 
 
 dm of ^verv^® ‘h« ‘ra- 
 
 T^T ^description in the whole country. 
 
 ceedeJfn^ Attorney General pro- 
 
 -Cam ] had himself conversed with several 
 
 crrc^^\ ^ upon representing to them the 
 
 faw If E "i ‘’^“7 ®‘^"P‘ ‘he whole mercantile 
 
 aw 01 ii,ngla.nd, they unanimously exclaimed against nar- 
 ticular parts, cspeciallyjhc bankrupt law. It would there- 
 ore become necessary to reflect before any mode wasad- 
 that such a selection could only be 
 made by a legislature on the spot, who would gradually, 
 and as particular exigencies called for it, adopt so much of 
 the English law as should be necessary. He observed, 
 that the idea of ascribiig losses to the imperfection of the 
 subissting law in Canada, prevailed so much in the minds 
 of English merchants, that he bad heard it mentioned as 
 a grievance, that a great cargo of goods sent to Montreal 
 l^d been sold, the money laid out in land, and settled by^ 
 

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 06 
 
 familv settlement, on a marriage, avliich by the pi 
 
 nada 'could not be reclaimed by the merchants. He observ- J 
 ed that the law of England would have said the same, and L,; 
 hrconceivedthatitwouldbeso inmost other countries : Ij, 
 he therefore concluded with observing, fliat as far asleav- 
 Lit to the wisdom of the Iccxl legislature to assimilate ^ 
 their mercantile law to that of England, instead of over- 
 turning the present law, was an object to the division of 
 the province, he thought it wise and proper to give to the . 
 one part the law of England, which they were acquainted [ 
 with, and leave the law of the other, subject to temperate ^ 
 and gradual alteration. . 
 
 Mv. Francis asked Mr. Chancellor Pitt if it was his m- 1 
 tention,by the division of the province, to assimilate the 
 Canadians to the language, the manners, the haWts, and, " 
 above all, to the laws and constitution of Great Britain . J 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pill replied, that he certainly did meaar" 
 to do so, and that he was clearly of opinion, in the present 
 .•ase, that an attempt to force on them those laws to which 
 
 their own prejudices were averse, was not the way ever to 
 reconcile them to the British laws and constitution. He 
 
 Tlob' 
 iat cir 
 aadet 
 leariD^ 
 
 reconcile them to tne Driuain laws anu j 
 
 said a great part of the commercial law of this country was 
 already in Canada, and he intended to leave it to the 1®*^, 
 gislature of Canada to adopt such laws as they thought 
 were suited for their situation. , . , « 
 
 Mr. Fox said, that it was not hii wish to introduce all 
 tlie English laws into Canada : but he thought that the 
 system which was now pursued with regard to the goverD-j ■ 
 rnent had a tendency to prevent even the probability of wan 
 adopting English regulations. By being mixed, they i 
 would certainly be more liable to coalesce : and it was not at 
 recollected that while they were consulting the prejudice ^oue 
 of the inhabitants of Lower Canada they were leaving un- 
 provided those of Upper Canada, who were really desirous 
 of English laws. ^ , 
 
 Mr. Hussey wished to make some inquiry about a cir- 
 cumstance which he believed it might be as proper to men- 
 tion now as at any future stage of the bill. He had in his 
 pocket an attested copy of a memorial to Lord Dorchester, 
 
 '5Teno 
 
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y7 
 
 ^4 
 
 m 
 
 ilUi 
 
 m. 
 
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 ac^ 
 
 si-neJ by many respectable inhabitants of the province of 
 
 Canada, complaining that their ao’ent Mr f :t>rv ' 
 
 ulle) for a copy of the proposed bill, which was meant to 
 frame aconstitu lon for Canada, had been refused In hit 
 opinion It won d have been better that the persons who 
 were principally interested in this bill, should have had an 
 opportunity of knowing its contents, that we might be cer- 
 tain, when we were framing a law for their government, 
 that we were doing it in a way which was likely to give 
 them satisfaction. ° 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt thought, that if it was deemed ne- 
 ^1,1 ccssary to consult the province of Canada, further than they 
 imik! of their sentiments already upon the necessity for 
 
 fliiVt constitution, which his Majesty’s Ministers had 
 
 pledged themselves to bring forward, it would have been 
 ^^'Jch better that the honourable gentleman, or any person 
 ieffl iiad any information upon the subject, had mentioned 
 
 iSloR circumstance before this time. As to the application 
 
 Majesty’s Secretary of State, he recollected 
 jtm\ jl^^ring something of it; but at the time it was made he bc- 
 untry Secretary of Stata thought it improper to give 
 
 10 tlit jop to the person who a^ppiied, without any particu- 
 
 tjuv authority ; because he considered that while he was 
 taking every step to obtain information upon the subject, 
 
 [rodia ^^Py ^bat was likely to be brought 
 
 ii,. before Parliament. 
 
 Mr. Powys wished to ask one question, and he thought 
 not an unfair one. It \vas, whether the Minister knew 
 {ixefl/ would be agreeable to that province for whose 
 
 benefit it was intended } He thought it could not be so; 
 as one set of petitioners had prayed that they might 
 have no assembly, and for them an assembly was provided. 
 
 ^ Another had wished for an assembly, and their wishes this 
 bill would not satisfy, because it gave them no assembly ; 
 
 , from which he thought it was not probable that the bill was 
 * likely to be agreeable to those whose relief and advantage 
 it was intended for. 
 
 n .. Mr. ChancelloT Pitt contended, as formerly, that Mi* 
 
 Vi:-' o 
 
98 
 
 iiisters were pledged to bring forward some proposition for 
 the government of Canada, and that it was their duty to 
 consider what was the most agreeable mode of doing it. 
 
 Mr. Sheridan said, he meant to have moved, and he 
 lioped that some person of greater weight would yet move, 
 that the bill should be sent over to Canada, since it would 
 be extremely 'desirable to know whether the plan was 
 likely to meet the wishes of the people, even though they 
 waited till next session for the answer. 
 
 Sir John Sinclair proposed an amendment to the clause, 
 the effect of which was, to prevent the division of the pro- 
 vince. 
 
 The Chairman put the question on this amendment, 
 which was negatived without a division. 
 
 The Chairman having read the next clause of the bill, 
 viz. : that for the constitution of the Legislative Council. 
 
 Mr. Fox rose to oppose the clause, and object to the 
 mode of appointing the Council. He said, that he would 
 throw out generally his ideas as to the means of substitu- 
 ting what he cculd not but conceive to be a better mode of 
 appointing a Council than the mode adopted in the clause 
 as it stood. First, he laid it down as a principle never to 
 be departed from, that every part of the British dominions 
 ought to possess a government, in the constitution of which, 
 monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy, were mutually blen- 
 ded and united ; nor could any government be a fit one for 
 British subjects to live under, which did not contain its due 
 weight of aristocracy, because that he considered to be the 
 proper poise of the constitution, the balance that equalized 
 and meliorated the powers of the two other extreme branch- 
 es and gave stability and firmness to the whole (a loud cry 
 ol hear I hear !. ) It became necessary to look to what were 
 the principles on which aristocracy was founded, and he 
 believed it would be admitted to him that they were two- 
 fold ; namely, rank and property, or both united. In this 
 country the House of Lords formed the aristocracy, and 
 that consisted of hereditary titles, in noble families of an- 
 cient origin, or possessed by peers newly created, on ac- 
 count of their extended landed property. Mr. Fox said, 
 
 aipreju* 
 
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 jsiic iol 
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 object 
 
99 
 
 that prejudice for ancient families, and that sort of pride 
 which belonged to nobility, was right to be encouraged in 
 a country like this, or one great incentive to virtue would 
 be abolished, and the national dignity, as well as its do* 
 rnestic interest, would be diminished and weakened. 
 ’Ihere was also a thing to be remembered, which gave ad- 
 ditional honour to our House of Lords, as long as establish- 
 • ed respect for the persons and families of those who, in 
 consequence either of their own superior talents and emin* 
 ent services, or of one or both in their ancestors, constituted 
 the peerage. Aristocracy, he observed, was by no means 
 peculiar to pure aristocracies, such as Venice and Genoa, 
 and even to despotic or to mixed governments. They 
 were to be found in democracies, and were there consider- 
 ed as an essential part of the constitution, affection to those 
 ^hose families had bestr«erved the public being always en- 
 tertained with the warmest sincerity and gratitude. Thus, 
 in the ancient republics of Athens and of Rome, they all 
 kacw the respect paid to those who had distinguished them- 
 selves by their services for the commonwealth. Upon 
 every ground of consideration, therefore, it would be wise, 
 and what was more, indispensably necessary, that an aris- 
 tocracy should make a branch of the constitution for Cana- 
 da : it was undoubtedly equally important with either the 
 popular or the monarchical. But then the nature of the 
 case must be considered, and he should therefore not advise 
 the giving Canada a servile imiyitiom ,pur, aristocracy, 
 because we could not give them a House of Lords lik« our 
 own. The right honourable gentleman over the way ap- 
 peared to be aware of this, and therefore he had recourse 
 to a substitute for hereditary nobility. It was, however, 
 he must contend, a verxinadequate substitute ; it was a 
 semblance, but not a substance. Lords, Tntleed, we might 
 give them, but there was no such thing as creating that 
 reverence and respect for them on which their dignity and 
 weight in the view of both the popular and monarchical 
 part of the constitution depended, and which alone could 
 give them that power ofcontroul and support that were 
 the objects of their institution. If Canada should grow in- 
 
 
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 100 
 
 to a great and flourishing colony (and he trusted that it 
 would,) as it was removed at such a distance from the 
 principal seat of parliament, it was the more necessary to 
 make the Council, in a considerable degree, independent of 
 the Governor and the people ; because the province being 
 so far off, the power of controul could not be properly ex- 
 ercised by that House with a view to the calling upon the 
 responsibility of ministers, and punishing them for any a» 
 buse of the prerogative, by giving wrong advice to the 
 Council, through the medium of the Governor. This 
 was, he said, a clear argument why the Council ought not 
 to be appointed by the crown. 
 
 Property, Mr. Fox said, was, and had ever been held 
 to be, the true foundation of aristocracy ; and when he us- 
 ed the word aristocracy, he did not mean it in the odious 
 sense of aristocrat, as it had been lately called : with that 
 he had nothing to do. He meant it in its true sense, as 
 an indespensibly necessary part of a mixed government, 
 under a free constitution. Instead, therefore, of the King’s 
 naming the Council, at that distance, (in which case they 
 had no security that persons of property and persons fit to 
 be named would be chosen) wishing, as he did, to put the 
 freedom and stability of the constitution of Canada on the 
 strongest basis, he proposed that the Council should be 
 elective. But how elective ? Not as the members of the 
 House of Assembly were intended to be, but upon another 
 footing. He proposed that the members of the Council 
 should not be eligible to be elected, unless they possessed 
 qualifications infinitely higher than those who were eligi- 
 ble to be chosen members of the House of Assembly ; and 
 in like manner, the electors of the members of Council 
 must possess qualifications also proportionally higher than 
 those of the electors to representatives in the House of 
 Assembly. By this means, Mr. Fox said, they would 
 have a real aristocracy, chosen by persons of property from 
 among persons of the highest property, and would thence 
 necessarily possess the weight, influence, and independen- 
 cy from which alone could be derived a power of guarding 
 against any innovations that might be made, either by tk 
 
 
 
 
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 people on the one part, or the crown on the other. In an- 
 swer to this proposition, Mr. Fox observed, it might possi- 
 bly be said to him, if you are decidedly in favour of an elec- 
 tive aristocracy, why do you not follow up your own princi- 
 ple, and abolish the House of Lords, and make them elec- 
 tive ? For this plain reason, because the British House 
 of Lords stood on the hereditary, known, and acknow- 
 ledged respect of the country for particular institutions ; and 
 it was impossible to put an infant constitution upon the 
 same footing. It would be as ridiculous to say, you shall 
 have a House of Lords like that in England, as for a oerson 
 in his closet to make, and say what degree of reverence and 
 respect should belong to them. From what he said, Mr. 
 Fox remarked that he might possibly be deemed an advo- 
 cate for aristocracy singly : he might, undoubtedly, with as 
 much reason as he had been called a republican. Those 
 who pretended that he was a favourer of democratical prin- 
 ciples had surely read very little, and little understood the 
 subjects. He mentioned the American governments, and 
 said he thought they had acted wisely, when, upon finding 
 themselves reduced to the melancholy and unfortunate situ- 
 ation of being obliged to change their governments, they 
 had preserved as much as they possibly could of the old 
 form of their governments, and thus made that form of go- 
 vernment which was best for themselves : most of which 
 consisted of the powers of monarchy, aristocracy, and de- 
 mocracy, blended, though under a different name. 
 
 In order to show that his idea of an elective Council was 
 not a new one, he said that, before the revolution, more of 
 the Councils in our colonies were elected by the people 
 tban the king. Mr. Fox said, he had thus generally sla- 
 ted the outline of his proposition, upon which he did not 
 mean to tak« the sense of the Committee, unless it should 
 be the general opinion that it ought to be adopted : if he 
 did take the scnce of the Committee, and their sense should 
 be against him, he should then propose that the Council 
 should either be all at the nomination of the king, or all 
 hereditary. He believed that any Council, chosen in any 
 manner, would be better than none ; to have them elected, 
 
102 
 
 as be stated, he seriously thought would be best ^ but it 
 would be more detrimental than even the not having an 
 elective Council, that the Governor should be lelt to him- 
 self to decide alone He remembered it had been once 
 said, when talking of representation, that any five hundred 
 and fifty eight gentlemen, who could be first stopped at 
 Hyde Park turnpike, and assembled in that House, would 
 be of as much service to the people as they were. Mr. 
 Fox said he by no means agreed with the proposition, or 
 any one equally extravagant, but many were always a 
 check to one, and a Governor might decide in his closet 
 upon a measure so foolish and so Wicked, that he would not 
 have the face to state it to any number of persons. The 
 very circumstance of a Governor’s being obliged to have 
 his opinion canvassed by many, was a positive advantage ; 
 and discussion, he was satisfied, always produced good. 
 After putting this pointedly j he said, if there were to be 
 hereditary members of the Council, they ought all to be so. 
 The check upon making peers here, he said, he had ever 
 considered as attended with this advantage, that when the 
 king made a peer, he recollected that he entailed an here- 
 ditary legislature on the country. A doubt existed, Mr. 
 Fox said, whether the king had a right to make a peer for 
 life, without his title being hereditary, and, at this time, 
 he understood there was such a jurkJicial question collateral- 
 ly existing in the House of Lords, which w’as a clear proof 
 that the ^radice was unknown. If (lie crown had such a 
 power, the life-peers might overw'helm the hereditary peer-< 
 age, and thus destroy the constitutional control of the aris- ; 
 tocracy, in case they attempted to resist the crown. 
 Thus, under pretence of aristocracy, lords might be intro- 
 duced as mere tools of the minister, and give government 
 an opportunity to destroy the constitution, and exercise 
 despotic power in the most open shape. If however, such 
 an use of the prerogative should be exerted, he had no 
 doubt, he said, that it would be soon remedied. 
 
 In the province af Canada, Mr. Fox continued to ob- 
 serve, the introduction of nobility was peculiarly improper, 
 for a variety of reasons ; in fact there was a sort of nobili- 
 
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 ty (liero already, viz. the seigneurs, who were utterly unfit, 
 and were not respected enough to be made hereditary no- 
 bles, and yet would ministers, he asked, pass by thi real 
 nobility of the country, and cieate a set of p4ple over 
 them, whom the world called nobility, and invest them 
 with hereditary honours ? By the bye, the sort of titles 
 meant to be given were named in the bill ; he presumed 
 the reason was, that they could not be named without ere* 
 ating laughter Having thus gone through his proposi- 
 tion, Mr. 1^ ox generally remarked, that so necessary was 
 aristocracy to all governments, that, in his opinion, the de- 
 struction ol all that had been destroyed could be proved to 
 have arisen from the neglect of the true aristocracy, upon 
 which it depended whether a constitution should be great, 
 energetic, and powerful. He explained that he was so far 
 a republican, that he approved all governments where the 
 res jmhlica was the universal principle, and the people, as 
 under our constitution, had considerable weight in the go- 
 vernment. Mr. Fox concluded with declaring emphatical- 
 ly, that true aristocracy gave a country that sort of energy, 
 that sort of spirit, and that sort of enterprise, which always 
 made a country great and happy. ^ 
 
 Mr. Burke and Mr. Chancellor Pitt rose at the same 
 time, but the latter persisting, Mr. Burke sat down. 
 
 Mr, Pitt then said, that it was with great reluctance he 
 had opposed the right honourable gentleman’s being first 
 heard, but as he had brought in the ImIJ, and as the subject 
 to which the right honourable gentleman who had just‘d sat 
 down applied, was extremely important, he felt himself pe- 
 culiarly anxious to explain his sentiments upon it, imme- 
 diately, while the opinion of the right honourable gentleman 
 was fresh in the minds of the Committee. It was,*hc de- 
 clared, with great satisfaction that he had heard a con- 
 siderable part of the speech which the right honourable 
 gentleman had just stated. He said he rejoiced at it with 
 the utmost sincerity, since doubts had been maintained of 
 the right honourable gentleman’s regard to our happy and 
 excellent constitution, which the cordial, and he entertain- 
 ed not the least hesitation to say, the sincere testimony of 
 
104 
 
 tiiC allacniiicnl wlilch the right honourable gentleman Lore 
 to the principles of our nncestors had completely removed. 
 He was thence proud of the advantage that he should de- 
 rive from the. support of the right honourable gentleman tc 
 resist any attempt that might be made contraiy to our con- 
 stitution. He rejoiced, he said, to have a basis for the in- 
 fusion of those principles, a mixture of the democratical. 
 the aristocratical, and the monarchical, on which had de- 
 pended the salety of our constitution in preserving pure 
 and entire the power given to the king, the people, and the 
 country, on the maintenance of which depended our happi- 
 ness and our future prospects. Aristocracy w’as, he con- 
 tended, the true poise, as the right honourable gentleman 
 had emphatically stated it, of the constitution : it was the 
 essential link that held the branches together, and gave 
 stability and strength to the whole. Aristocracy reflected 
 lustre on the crown, and lent support and effect to the 
 democracy, w’hile the democracy gave vigour and energy 
 to both, and the sovereignty crowned the constitution with 
 authority and dignity. He joined therefore, as far as that 
 went, with the right honourable gentleman, and agreed 
 with him, that as much as possible of a constitution, de- 
 servedly the glory and happiness of those w'ho lived under 
 it, and the model and envy of the world, should be extend- 
 ed to all our dependencies, as far as the local situation of 
 the colony, and the nature and circumstances of the case 
 would admit. 
 
 Where he differed with the right honourable gentleman 
 was, with respect to the aristocracy proposed to be infused 
 into the constitution, which he thought might he brought 
 much nearer to our own by other means than by those the 
 right honourable gentleman had proposed. Our aristocra- 
 cy, Mr. Pitt said, was not merely respectable on account 
 of its property, though that undoubtedly was no small con- 
 sideration in the scale of its respectability ; but it was es- 
 sentially respectable for its hereditary distinctions flowing 
 from the crown as the fountain of honour. It w’as on that 
 account not less the poise of the constitution than of our ar- 
 istocracy were elective ; on the countrary, it was more so, 
 
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 105 
 
 ‘l ‘*’® spirit of our 
 
 constitution, monarchy was the source from whence the 
 
 other parts arose, and therefore tlie more near the aristo- 
 cracy ^yas to the crown, consequently the more immediately 
 congenial was it to the constitution itself, as originally ad- 
 opted and planned by our ancestors. In that happy form, 
 and constructed and preserved upon that wise principle, we 
 felt the blessing of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy 
 all united. He should lament therefore to create an aristoc- 
 racy by a selection from property alone, or by making it 
 elective, as in either case it would render the poise nearer 
 to the people than it was to (he crown, in the Jlritish con- 
 stitution. lie agreed, he said, with the light honourable 
 gentleman, that we could not give all the respect to a new 
 nobility that belonged to an hereditary bne of nobles tra- 
 ceable to antiquity, but we could give the same degree of 
 respect to it as had accompanied the origin of our nobility, 
 ana succeeding ages would bestow all the rest. Mr. Pitt 
 liad laid great stress on the circumstances of tlie hereditary 
 honours being derived immediately from the imperial crown 
 of Great Britain, which he considered as a matter of [>c- 
 culiar value (Mr. M. A. 'lay lor having laughed out, while 
 Mr. Pitt was expressing his satisfaction at finding that Mr. 
 Fox’s principles were con.stitutional, the Chancellor of the 
 Exchequer took the jiresent opportunity of saying, that he 
 could not believ’c, even in the infancy of sucli honours, 
 there was any thing that ought to provoke a smile.^ With 
 regard to the object of hereditary nobility, he conceived it 
 could only be gradual j but he so far differed from the right 
 honourable gentleman, that he thought there was some- 
 thing in the habits, customs, and manners of Canada, that 
 ])eculiaily fitted it (or the reception of hereditary honours ; 
 and in respect to seignories, he said, he imagined that some 
 of the seignors were to be found of sufficient property and 
 respect to make it fit that they should be among others 
 named to those honours- The extension of commerce and 
 of wealth in the province, which there was every reason to 
 imagine would follow the introduction of the new constitu- 
 tion, would make them hold a fair weight in that constitu- 
 
106 
 
 
 tion, and imperceptibly clothe them with that respect and 
 influence that ought to belong to the aristocratical branch 
 of a tree government ; and he was firmly persuaded, that 
 the aristocracy flowing from the imperial crown of Great 
 Britain, would tend materially to strengthen the system of 
 connexion between the colony and the mother country. 
 The want of those honours, Mr. Pitt said, had tended to 
 accelerate the seperation of the former colonies. He de- 
 clared he neither wished the aristocracy to be dependent 
 on the crown, nor on the people, and therefore he was de- 
 sirous of bringing it as near to the model of the British ar- 
 istocracy as possible. He feared there was not enough at 
 present to form an hereditary peerage, and therefore we 
 could only expect, it being an infant aristocracy, to bring 
 it as near as circumstances would admit to our owm, but 
 they would gradually increase, till all became hereditary! 
 He took notice of the definition which M*r. Fox had given 
 of his republican principles, and said, as far as a regard for 
 all governments that had the good of the commonwealth 
 for their basis, there was scarcely a government in Europe 
 that was not in some degree republican. 
 
 Mi\ M. A. Taylor got the start of Mr. Burke, though 
 the latter gentleman was on his legs. Mr. Taylor said, 
 as the right honourable gentleman had called him to order 
 for an accidental laugh, he was anxious to say that it es-4 
 caped him at hearing the right honourable gentleman ex- 
 press his satisfaction on finding his right honourable friend 
 (^Mr. Fox) was not so republican in his principles as he 
 had imagined. Mr. Taylor contended that his right ho- 
 nourable friend had not manifested more constitutional prin- 
 ciples that day, than he had uniformly supported through- 
 out his political life. He instanced a proof of it, afforded 
 on a day when the army was voted in the last parliament, 
 and mentioned other corroborative examples. 
 
 Afr. BurJee began with observing, on Mr. Taylor’s hav- 
 ing interrupted him, but had apologized for so doing with 
 great good humour on the subject. The honourable gen- 
 tleman, he said, had laughed first, and communicated the 
 laughter to others ; he hoped therefore that as the House 
 
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had possibly had their iaufrh out thev wmi i • i i i • 
 with a patient hearing. Sir Bu ‘k ^ *“"] 
 
 these walls. He had wasted so mucli of his life to a pre- 
 cious purpose, ,f that House would, at last, countenanie a 
 most insiduous design to ruin him in repiitalion, and crown 
 his age with infamy. 1< or the best part of the time, he 
 said, he had beena yery laborious and assiduous, thouch a 
 very unimportant servant of the public. He had not, he 
 declared, been used with friendship ; but if he was sener- 
 atcd Irom his party, and left alone by them, he hoped to 
 ' meef a iair open hostility, to which he would oppose him- 
 
 ■ sell m a firm manly way, for the very short period that he 
 
 ■ should continue a member of that House. He had felt 
 : deepW wounded, but yam certi/s eK7it(i, carpebal soinnus. 
 
 » ith regard to the friendly censures that a right honoiira- 
 ‘ ble gentleman had cast on him, he felt the difficulty that he 
 • had experienced the other night in a peculiar degree at 
 ' that moment, because if he should reply to what he had 
 ; heard from the right honourable gentleman near him, on 
 ^ ns idea ot a legislative council for Canada, and should say 
 ' that his sentiments were too democratical, he should then 
 ' be liable to be pointed out as invidiously desining to pre- 
 vent the right honourabte gentleman’s preferment, by de- 
 scribing him as unworthy of his monarch’s favour ; and if, 
 
 ' on the other hand, in observing upon the different sugges- 
 tions of the right honourable gentleman over the way, he 
 should state that they appeared to him to be too favoura- 
 ble to monarchy, then he might be said to have charged 
 that right honourable gentleman with holding principles of 
 despotism, which would render the right honourable gen- 
 tleman liable to the disfavour of that House and of the 
 ^rown, both of whom he ought to honour and respect. Mr. 
 Burke said further, that in consequence of the turn the 
 conversation between a right honourable gentleman and 
 himself had taken the other night, he had heard that there 
 was an intention to make or take an occasion of imputing 
 whatever he might say, to a base premeditated artifice, on 
 
lOS 
 
 Ills pait, to make the right honourable gentleman pass lota 
 -republican, in order that he might sooner get into power 
 himself. He had found this design conveyed to him as a 
 secret, but the very next day, a plot ! a plot ! was cried 
 out in one of the common newspapers, which was wholly 
 ascribed to him. (Mr. Burke here read, from a daily pa< 
 per, an intimation that an account of such a plot had been 
 received by the editor, but that for prudential reasons he 
 did not choose to print it.) 
 
 3/. A» Taylor rose to call Mr. Burke to order, but 
 was frustrated by the gentleman who sat next him.] 
 
 Mr. Burke resumed his argument, contending that he 
 had a right to be heard, while he endeavoured to clear him^ 
 self from the foul conduct that had been imputed to him. 
 Would the House, he asked, think he was a fit man to sit 
 ther^ while under the imputation that he had described r 
 if he had wished to attack the right honourable gentleman 
 for his opinion respecting what had happened in France, 
 he was free to do it any day he chose : as the right honour- 
 able gentleman had sufficiently often avowed those opin- 
 ions in that House. Finding himself, without any cause,, 
 seperated and excluded from his party, it was a loss which 
 he severely felt, but w’hile he felt like a man, he would 
 bear it like a man. He denied that he had ever imputed 
 democratic principles to the right honourable gentleman 
 with a view to hurt him in the mind of his sovereign, and 
 if he had pushed him to a declaration of his principles, the 
 speech of the right honourable gentleman that day would 
 prove whether he was likely to have obtained his end, if 
 he had wdshed to draw from him a declaration of democrat- 
 ic principles. In the conversation the other evening the 
 right honourable gentleman had said, he had written a book 
 which he .had thought it seasonable and proper for him to 
 go about, and reprobate, in the whole and in all its essen- 
 tial parts and principles (a call of no f no ! from the oppo- 
 sition benches.) He rose therefore to justify himself in 
 the face of that House and of his country, and in the face ! 
 of an adversary the most able, eloquent,” and powerful, that 
 ever was encountered 3 and he was sorry to perceive, the 
 
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 book and all it contained : when he wrote it Kd it t. 
 counteract the machination of one of the most despmte 
 and most n^l.gnan factions that ever existed in any a-Hr 
 country. He would still oppose the mischievous principles 
 of such a faction, though he was unfortunate e^uirh^ to 
 stand alone, unprotected, supported with no great connex! 
 ions with no peat abilities, and with no great fortune • 
 and thus was he delivered over to infamy at the end of a’ 
 long life just like the Dervise in the fable, who, after 
 living till ninety in the supposed practice of every virtue 
 was tempted at last to the commission of a sin4 error’ 
 when the devil spit in his face as a reward for Si his ac- 
 lions. Had he in order to support monarchy, said the 
 other evening that it was right to abuse every republican 
 government that ever exis'ted Had he abuL Amedca 
 or Athens, or Rome, or Sparta .> But every thimr Lad 
 been remembered that he had ever said or written, fn or- 
 der to render it the ground of censure and of abuse. He 
 
 declared he could n^ caution the House too much against 
 
 what had passed in France, but he bad not called that a re- 
 public ; no. It was an anomaly in government, he knew not 
 by what name to call it, nor in what terms to describe it 
 It was 
 
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 . — a shape. 
 
 If shape It might he called, thatshape^iad none 
 Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb ; 
 
 Or substance might be called, that shadow seemed. 
 For each seemed either ; black it stood as night. 
 Fierce as ten furies, terrible ns hell. 
 
 And shook a dreadful dart : what seemed his head 
 The likeness of a kingly crown had on ; 
 
 >Vith wide Cerberean mouths full loud, and rung 
 A hideous peal.** 
 
 It was, he adtled^ 
 
 “ A shapeless monster, born of hell and chaos.** 
 
 After having repeated these emphatical lines, Mr. Burke 
 observed, that the right honourable gentleman’s words had 
 

 no 
 
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 (jone deep to his heart, when he had told him, 
 
 Sow to draw a bill of indictment agamst a whole people. 
 He knew not how to draw any such indictnient , but he 
 would tell the House who could, viz. : the National As- 
 sembly of France, who had drawn a bill of indictment a^ 
 eainst the people of St. Domingo. He could draw a bill 
 of indictment against murder, against treason, against telo- 
 ny or he could draw such a bill against oppression, tyran- 
 ny, and corruption but not a bill of indictment against a 
 whole people. After a great deal of remark and complaint 
 on the <rround of matter personal to himself, Mr. Burke at 
 length came to consider the subject of the clause before the 
 House, and declared that the right honourable gentleman 
 opposite to him (Mr- Pitt) had spoken bis sentiments 
 much better and more eloquently than he could have done 
 himself on that subject. In a monarchy he declared the 
 aristocracy must ever be nearer to the crown than to the 
 democracy, because it originated in the crown as the foun- 
 tain of honour ; but in those governments which partook 
 not of any thing monarchical, the aristocracy there neces- 
 sarily sprang out of the democracy. In our own constifu- 
 tion, undoubtedly, as the right honourable gentleman bad 
 well defined it, continued he, our aristocracy was nearer to 
 the crown than the people, because it reflected the honours 
 of the sovereign. He must agree that a King of England 
 was the root of the constitution ; whereas in France, he 
 was only, as he had been made to state himself the first 
 minister. A King of England might, if he chose it, select 
 any person, however improper objects for honours ; but he 
 dia not do so, because it would, as he vrell knew, bring 
 bis crown into contempt \ and therefore he exercised his 
 prerog’itive in that respect cautiously and prudently. But 
 could the King of France create nobility ? He could not, 
 because he was himself degraded and a prisoner ; his orders 
 therefore would not be respected, which ought ever to be 
 the first attendant on nobility. Mr. Burke went much at 
 large into the constitution of the House of Lords, declaring 
 that the honour of a Duke, a Marquis, an Earl, or a Vis- 
 Count, wore severally familiar to us : we knew the nature 
 
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 and origin of those honours. With us the crown was the 
 ountain of honour : in other constitutions the people said 
 that they themselves were. He .spoke of the power of the 
 crown ta create a new order, as it had done in Ireland ; 
 and he said, let the title given to the hereditary nobility 
 in Canada be what it might, there could be no manner of 
 doubt that those whom the King designed to honour would 
 have more or less respect. Mr. Burke took notice of the 
 suggestion of Mr. Fox, of having the Council elective, 
 which he owned he had put forcibly, because that riorht ho- 
 nourable gentleman never said any thing that was foolish ; 
 but he had gone beyond this point. It was true we could 
 not have in Canada ancient hereditary nobility, as we had 
 here, because we could not make that one hundred years 
 old that was made but yesterday ; but an elective council 
 would clearly be a democratic council. 
 
 He next spoke much at length of the various sorts of 
 governments that had obtained in different colonies. In 
 some there were councils, others again had been a govern- 
 ment by charter, consisting of a governor and a company, 
 in which case the settlement was governed by the govern- 
 or and freemen. He mentioned in particular the Missis- 
 sippi scheme, which had been of that nature, and quoted 
 Douglas’s remarks upon it. He spoke of mere wealth 
 alone as not a good ground for aristocracy, though wealth, 
 he admitted, was a material thing in it. Undoubtedly, he 
 said, there might be titles, and baronetage, he thought, 
 not an unfit one, as it was a species of hereditary honour, 
 though not a peerage ; but in all those things, Mr. Burke 
 said, they must resort to experience. He spoke of the 
 various constitutions that had prevailed in our own colonies 
 before we lost them : that which approached nearest perfec- 
 tion, he saidj had been that of Massachusetts, and yet the 
 province rebelled ; and so did the others, where different 
 forms of government prevailed. He did not, therefore, 
 attribute the loss of our colonies to any one form of consti- 
 tution for them : that form was undoubtedly the best under 
 which they were the most flourishing and happy. He 
 pointedly condemned what he called a close aristocracy. 
 
lla 
 
 which, he said, would prove a dead weight on any go-^ 
 vernment, counteracting and ultimately clogging its action : 
 he recommended, above all things, an open aristocracy, and 
 said he had always thought the crown having in its power 
 to make an admiral who had distinguished himself a peer, 
 and decorate the old nobility by the infusion of new ones, 
 occasionally, upon account of their merit and their talents, 
 one of the first and most excellent principles of the British 
 constitution. Having much at large spoke to the clause 
 before, he turned to a consideration of himself, he said, 
 left alone as he was, he hoped the House would not con- 
 sider him as a bad man, though he was excommunicated 
 by his party, and was too old to seek another. If his 
 book stood an object of odium, he might possibly belong to 
 a faction, but not to a party ; and consequently could be of 
 less use to his country. He defined the distinction be- 
 tween a party and a faction. A party, he said, he had ever 
 understood to mean a set of men bound and united by 
 principles to act together in watching over the conduct of 
 ministers, and taking care that nothing should be done that 
 was likely to prove injurious to the constitution ; whereas, 
 a faction did not draw together upon any known principles, 
 but vvas devoid of all principle of union and common inter- 
 est. He said his mentioning disciplined troops had been 
 deemed uncivil, when he meant no uncivility. Discipline 
 he had ever considered as one necessary quality of party, 
 and he trusted he had ever shewn himself reasonably a 
 friend to discipline, which was that sort of connexion which 
 made men act together as a compact body, having one 
 common object, and professing to feel it in common with 
 their leader. In that sense he had meant the word dis- 
 cipline the other evening, and he trusted the gentlemen of 
 the party, that had excluded him, would, with their usual 
 fairness, continue to act against their common adversaries, 
 on the common principles of public good, and not direct 
 their weapons against a poor unfortunate man, who had 
 been twenty-six years exerting his best endeavours to 
 «erve his country. 
 
 He gave an account of big first entering into parliament ; 
 
113 
 
 declaring, that he remembered that the first question he 
 ever brought forward, he lost : the next he attempted was 
 to oppose taking otT the duty ol one shilling for the land- 
 tax, being of opinion, perhaps weakly, that it was neces- 
 sary to keep up the taxes although it was peace, in order 
 the sooner to reduce the debt of the country, and nothing 
 could prevail on him to abandon his purpose. He had 
 mentioned at the time that he had laid his political princi- 
 ples very low, in order that they might stick by him, and 
 he by them, all his life. He had done so, and he had seen, 
 on one occasion, two great parties join against him, who 
 had never acted together before, viz. Mr. Grenville’s 
 party, and the late Lord Rockingham’s. He had then 
 persisted, with the same pertinacity as he had supported 
 his untortunate opinions on the French revolution. He 
 complained of being obliged to stand upon his defence by 
 that honourable gentleman, who when a young man, in 
 the vigour of his abilities, at the age of fourteen years, had 
 been brought to him, and evinced the most promising tal- 
 ents, which he had used his best endeavours to cultivate ; 
 and this man, who had arrived at the maturity of being 
 the most brilliant and powerful debater that ever existeo^ 
 had described him as having deserted and abandoned every 
 one of his principles. 
 
 He said, at a time when there was not a plot indeed, 
 but open and avowed attempts made by clubs and others 
 to circulate pamphlets, and disseminate doctrines subver- 
 sive of the prerogative, and therefore dangerous to the 
 constitution, it was unwarrantable for any good subject to 
 be day after day holding out a parade of democracy, in 
 order to set a mob raging against the crown. It should 
 not, and it ought not to be. The perpetually making vio- 
 lent and flaming panegyrics on the subject of what happen- 
 ed in France, he condemned as dangerous ; and he said he 
 now supported the monarchy, not that he thought it better 
 than the aristocracy, er the democracy, but because it was 
 attacked and endeavoured to be run down. In like man- 
 ner, when Lord George Gordon acted as a fire-brand, and 
 caused the proud city of London and Westminster to bow 
 
114 
 
 its bead to its very base, if they had joined in the cry 
 against popery, was it not clear tliat they would have 
 (lone infinite mischief? And yet he believed neither of 
 the two right honourable gentlemen, nor himself, were 
 suspected of a violent attachment to popery. But was that 
 the hour to stand up for protestantism ? If they had been 
 rash enough to do so, they must know that they would 
 have clapped a fire-brand to the pile, and not only the mc- 
 Topolis, but all England would have blazed. Let them 
 ake warning by that event. Let them recollect that the 
 nere suggestion that forty thousand persons could not as- 
 \emble in a room, for none was large enough to hold them, 
 which appeared ridiculous and contemptable at first, had 
 produced in one day such dire terror and alarm, that all 
 '*anks of people felt indescribable apprehension, and knew 
 not whether to fly for safety. Just so there was at pre- 
 sent a run against monarchy, which was said to be the 
 child of his wild ungoverned imagination : let them not rest 
 securely on such a conception, but take care in lime to pre* 
 vent the possible effects. In w'hat he said upon the sub- 
 ject, he was conscious he had done his duty, and he hoped 
 * he had averted what unnoticed might have tumbled the 
 British constitution in ruins. That being the case, separ- 
 ate and unsupported as he was, let not the party that had 
 excommunicated him imagine that he stood deprived of 
 every comfort, thcrcrglrall was solitude without, there was 
 sunshine and company enough within. 
 
 Mr. Fox said in reply, that however the right honour- 
 able gentleman might be. unkind enough to impute demo- 
 ^ cratical or republican sentiments to him, he could assure 
 him that his sentiments, whether about religion or any 
 other topic, always made a due impression on his mind. 
 He said that he did not like bestowing fulsome and unne- 
 cessary praises on the English constitution : they reminded 
 him of a passage in one of our best poet’s plays : he meant, 
 he said, King Lear, who asks his three daughters how 
 much they love him ? Goneril and Regan answer him in 
 terms of the most extravagant and studied panegyric ; but 
 when he puts the same question to Cordelia, she answers 
 
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 just as he would answer the same sort of question if it were 
 put to him respecting the constitution, when he should say, 
 lie loved the constitution of Great Britain just as much as 
 a subject of Great Britain ought to love a government un- 
 der which he enjoys such blessings. They were all, Mr. 
 Fox said, bound to love a constitution under which they 
 lived happily ; and whenever it should really be attacked, 
 all he should say was, that he would not be found the 
 most inactive in its defence. With regard to the right 
 honourable gentleman’s declaration that he was separated 
 from the party, if he was so separated, it must be his own 
 choice ; and i( he should repent that seperation, he might 
 be assured his friends would ever be ready to receive him, 
 to respect him, and to love him as heretofore. With re- 
 gard to the situation of the seigniories in Canada, the right 
 honourable gentleman had shewn himself weak in that 
 part of his argument, and had evaded an answer ; and the 
 right honourable gentleman, on the same bench with him, 
 was utterly and completely ignorant of the fact ; he did not 
 mean ignorant in an invidious sense of the word. Let the 
 two right honourable gentlemen inquire further, and they 
 would find that he was right in his declaration, because 
 there was no stuff to engraft hereditary honours upon, no 
 rank of persons at all quallified to receive those honours. 
 The right honourable gentleman near him, Mr. Fox ob- 
 served, had said he preferred an open aristocracy to a close 
 one. He would shew that the sort of aristocracy that he 
 had recommended could not be a close aristocracy, which 
 he disapproved as much as the right honourable gentleman 
 himself. With regard to the declaration of the right ho- 
 nourable gentleman near him, that the whole must be go- 
 verned by experience, experience was undoubtedly a very 
 good general guide in most matters, but it was rather a 
 strange argument to resort to in the present instance, for 
 which there never had existed a precedent. There was 
 no colony, ancient or modern, that ever had precisely the 
 same constitution. It resembled that of some of the A- 
 merican states ; but that of Massachusetts the most nearly 
 of any. Mr. Fox then took notice of Mr. Pitt’s having 
 
IIG 
 
 suid, that Lis principles were so far republican as he had 
 described. Mr. Fox declared he had no dilTiculty to ad- 
 nait that his principles were so far republican, that he wish- 
 ed rather to give the crown les^ power, and the people 
 more, where it could be done with safety, in every go- 
 vernment, old or new ; and from that principle it was, that 
 whenever any bills for that purpose had been introduced, 
 he had given them his support, and the right honourable 
 gentleman opposite to him, he observed, had maintained 
 republican principles, according to his own mode of defin- 
 ing the word republican ; for he had made several propo- 
 sitions of that kind to the House, and it \vas well known 
 that the right honourable gentleman near him had done the 
 same : they were equally chargeable, therefore, with re- 
 publican principles, and to the extent that he had described, 
 Mr. Fox said, he was extremely willing, nay desirous, to 
 remain chargeable. With regard to foreign colonies, he 
 was of opinion that the power of the crown ought to be ^ 
 kept low. It w^as impossible to foresee what would be the ‘ 
 fate of distant colonies at a distant period of lime ; but in , 
 giving them a constitution, his idea was, that it was our'^ 
 interest, as well as our duty, to give them as much liberty 
 as we could to render them happy, flourishing, and as little 
 dependent as possible. We should make the free spirit of 
 our own constitution applicable, wherever we could render 1 
 it so ; and if there was any risk or danger in so doing, he ' 
 was persuaJed the danger was not greater on one side than 
 on the other ; indeed he thought the more despotic the con- 
 stitution we gave a colony, the more we made it the inter- 
 est of that colony to get rid of such a constitulion ^ and it 
 was evident the American states had revolted, because 
 they did not think themselves sufficiently free. ^ 
 
 Mr. Fox summed up this part of his argument by de- i 
 daring that he w^as decidedly of opinion, that the constitu- 
 tion of this country was more liable to be ruined by i>n in- 
 crease of the power of the crown, than by an increase of 
 the power of the people. He next took notice of what 
 Mr. Burke had said of inflammatory publications ; if any 
 dangerous doctrines were disseminated in phamphlets, he 
 
117 
 
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 1 
 
 said, it behoved the government to look to them, and in 
 case the law officers of the crown failed in doing so, it was 
 then the duty of that House to remind the ministers of their 
 neglect. He owned, however, that for his part, he was 
 of opinion that free discussions of the principles of the con- 
 stitution ought to be suffered : if the constitution had oppo- 
 sers, it would also have advocates, and the more it was dis- 
 cussed the better. He hinted that it was misusing the 
 functions and privileges of that House, for any member to 
 come down, and by holding long discourses, personal to 
 himself, and relative to imaginary plots, which he (Mr. 
 Fox,) really believed had no foundation in fact, prevent a 
 committee from doing its duty, and examining the clauses 
 of a bill of great importance. It was their duty also to look 
 to the conduct of the executive government, to watch and 
 examine the measures of ministers, and to guard, check, 
 and controul the public expenditure. For any gentleman 
 to suppose, that by the authority of discussions on personal 
 topics in that House, what he said there would have any 
 effect on public opinion, respecting a matter to which they 
 had made up their mind, he believed it would be found a 
 vain and fruitless expectation. 
 
 Mr. Burke rose in reply, and began with retorting on 
 Mr. Fox for what he had said respecting the eulogies on 
 the constitution. He said they were at least as useful as 
 that right honourable gentleman’s almost daily professions 
 of admiration for the revolution of France. As the right 
 honourable gentleman had thought proper to appeal to a 
 passage from one poet in praise ot the constitution, he 
 would take the liberty of remembering another line from 
 another poet. 
 
 Qui non (Jefendit, alio culpante. 
 
 Mr. Burke also told a story of a Lacedemonian, who ob- 
 serving a man for e^er praising Hercules, asked who 
 blamed him? since he thought he was going to be put to 
 the distaff, or something worse than all his labours. He 
 referred to the books that were in circulatiori, and said there 
 was serious cause for alarm, when associations publicly 
 
118 
 
 
 avowed doctrines tending to alineate the minds of all who 
 read them, from the constitution of their country, especially 
 at a time when it was notorious that it was systematically 
 run down abroad, and declaimed against as the worst in 
 existence. He again reminded the Committee from how 
 trivial a commencement Lord George Gordon’s riots began, 
 in consequence of which London had bowed its head so 
 low. Mr. Burke said, he had never desired any books to 
 be prosecuted, but the right honourable gentleman near 
 him had more than once. He took notice of what bad 
 been said, that if he would repent, he would be received. 
 He stood, he said, a man publicly disgraced by his party, 
 and therefore the right honourable gentleman ought not to 
 receive him. He declared he had gone through his youth 
 without encountering any party disgrace ; and though he 
 had then in his age been so unfortunate as to meet it, he 
 did not solicit the right honourable gentleman’s friendship, 
 nor that of any man either on one side of the house or the 
 other. 
 
 Mi\ Martin expressed his surprise at Mr. Burke’s hav- 
 ing said that certain societies had circulated doctrines and 
 pamphlets relative to the constitution, the doctrines of 
 which he reprobated as foolish and adulatory. The right 
 honourable gentleman in particular had mentioned by name 
 the Constitutional Society, the Revolution Society, and, 
 what was rather strange, the Unitarian Society. Mr. 
 Martin said, so far from thinking he had any cause to be 
 ashamed of belonging to the Constitutional Society, it was 
 his pride to be a member of it 5 persuaded as he was that 
 they acted upon motives too pure to merit reprehension ; 
 and surely no gentleman would think a society, instituted to 
 commemorate the revolution, illaudable. He said, that the 
 other day he had taken up a volume of Locke on the Hu- 
 man Understanding, from which he would read a short ex- 
 tract, which appeared to him to be opposite to the present 
 times. This extract he read, the object of which was to 
 state that innovation was not the less founded on truth be- 
 cause it was new. 
 
 Mr, Martin added, that Mr. Burke’s Reflections had 
 
 
 
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119 
 
 ouseKi 
 
 called forth many comments, and among them an excellent 
 i pamphlet, frorn a gentleman formerly a member of that 
 , House: he said, he meant Mr. Rouse, who proved him- 
 ' self to entertain sound constitutional principles. 
 
 Mr- ^Mlberforce complimented the Constitutional So- 
 ciety, declaring that he believed them more likely to re- 
 press than to excite clamour or commotion. Having said 
 this, he desired to know from Mr. Fox whether he intend- 
 ed his elective Council to bo for life or for a term of years r 
 
 Mr- Fox said, he had not decided upon that point, but 
 he rather inclined to constituting for life. 
 
 Mr- Wilherforcey objecting to this, said, that let the 
 elective Council be for life, or for a term of years, in the 
 one case they would clog the prerogative, and deprive the 
 subject of its protection ; in the other point of view, it 
 would be a democracy under another name, and give the 
 popular branch of Government too much power : whereas, 
 if they adopted an hereditary Council, they would form an 
 open aristocracy, and though, at first, produce only saplings, 
 in the course of years they would become forests, capable 
 of bearing up against any innovation either of tb« crown 
 or people. 
 
 A few words more passed between Mr. Fox and Mr. 
 Pitt, after which the question was put, and the clause 
 passed. 
 
 The House adjourned. 
 
 Thursday^ \2th May- 
 
 I 
 
 m The order of the day having been moved by Mr. Chan- 
 (sS# eellor Pitt, for resuming the Committee on the Quebec 
 ilfct Bill, and the same having been read accordingly, the 
 Speaker left the chair, and Mr. Hobart took his seat at the 
 
 I I'hc Committee then proceeded to fill up the several 
 
 /oi blanks in the clauses, beginning with page 7 of the printed 
 bill. As the conversation was for the most part loose and 
 desultory, we shall only give an account of the manner in 
 [vg, which the blanks were filled up, without entering into a de- 
 
liiil of the observations that were made, except where the? 
 require notice. 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt having proposed that' the number 
 of members to be chosen for the House of Assemblv in 
 Upper Canada should not be less than sixteen — 
 
 Mr. Fox rose, and objected to the number. He con- 
 tended, that after so much had been said about obtaining a 
 proper aristocracy for that colony, on the preceding days, 
 they were not now to lose sight of giving it a pro|)er share 
 of democracy likewise, which was allowed on all hands to 
 be requisite. Sure he was that sixteen was a good num- 
 ber for an aristocracy, but by no means for a aemocracy. 
 He was perfectly aware that it was idle to expect or to 
 maintain that in a representative House the number of the 
 elected ought to bear a strict analogy to the number of the 
 electors. He knew there was no necessity for it ; and that 
 .;58 members of that House were just as good a representa- 
 tive of the people of England, amounting to eight millions, 
 as any larger number whatever; but if they were legisla- 
 ting for a much more populous country (France, for in- 
 stance,) he did not believe he should be told that 558 mem- 
 bers were fit representatives for the people of France. 
 Mr. Fox thought sixteen by no means enough to form 
 any that could bear the name of a popular assembly ; 
 he should rather have'imagined that one hundred would 
 have been the number, if one hundred fit members of as- 
 sembly could have been -obtained in Upper Canada. 
 
 Mr. Pi// said, as there w^ere not above ten thousand 
 individuals in Upper Canada (including men, women, and 
 children,) he thought sixteen, in the present state of the 
 province, was about a reasonable proportion of those who 
 were fit persons to be chosen memoers of the House of As- 
 sembly, and could spare enough time for due attendance. 
 
 T. he blank was filled up with the w’ord sixteen. It was 
 here observed by Mr. PiU, that the bill did not limit the 
 number of members to sixteen, but only shewed that it 
 ought not to be less than sixteen. 
 
 The number of the members of the House of Assembly 
 m Lower Canada was moved to be filled up with the word 
 thirty. ' ^ 
 
12 . 
 
 .JH"' such a nomination, as infinitely too 
 
 small, lo transmit the British constitution to all the'^ co- 
 lonies Great Britain, Mr. Fox said, he well knew was 
 impossible ; but to pretend to do any thing like it, and to 
 name oO persons as a popular assembly represcntinff 100 - 
 000, was so gross a fallacy, that he hoped it would be no 
 longer attempted to be said that we gave Canada even a 
 sketch of the British constitution, or any thing like it. 
 
 Powys said, the number of inhabitants he under- 
 stood amounted to 150,000. 
 
 ’ Mr. Barnard, in answer to Mr. Powys, said, that was 
 supposed to have been the number of inhabitants in the 
 whole province of Canada, before it was attempted to be 
 divided. 
 
 Mr. Dundas said, they could not pretend to give Cana- 
 da the same constitution as they themselves lived under : 
 all they could do was to lay the foundation for the same 
 constitution, when increased population and time should 
 have made the Canadians ripe to receive it, and to enjoy 
 the same blessings. 
 
 Mr. I' ox insisted on it, that an Assembly consisting of 
 30, as the representatives of 100,000, might be an excel- 
 lent Assembly, a wise Assembly, a virtuous Assembly, or 
 an enterprising Assembly, but it could not be called a po- 
 pular Assembly. 
 
 Mr. Martin wondered that Mr Dundas should argue 
 that the constitution wooW be rained by a more equal re- 
 presentation. Did he wish the Assembly in Canada, Mr. 
 Martin asked, to resemble some representative bodies in 
 other countries, where there were sham elections, and foot- 
 men dressed up in their masters’ clothes, and sent to par- 
 liament. 
 
 Colonel Simcoe read an extract from an American pa- 
 per, to prove that the Congress thought a very small num- 
 ber sufficient for the members forming the House of Assem- 
 bly for a .western province, and that two or four would be 
 enongh to represent Montreal and Quebec. 
 
 The qualifications of electors were moved and agreed to 
 11 
 
122 
 
 at forty shillings for freeholders, in whom the choice of 
 members for districts, counties, or circles lay. 
 
 Electors of members of towns or townships to possess a 
 dwelling-house, or lot of ground, of the value of five 
 pounds yearly, or, if resident within the said town or town- 
 ship, for the six months before the date of writ of sum- 
 mons for the election, to have paid ten pounds rent. 
 
 The duration of the House of Assembly was fixed for 
 four years, instead of seven, as originally prmiosed ; and 
 the right of appeal, instead of being first to the Privy Coun- 
 cil, and then to the House of Lords, was restricted to the 
 Privy Council only. 
 
 When they came to the clauses respecting the clergy, 
 Mr. Fox begged an explanation of both the clauses, page 
 13 , 14 , 15 . 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt said that he first gave the Gover- 
 nor and Council a power, under the instructions of his IVJa- 
 jesty, to distribute out of a sum arising from the tithes lor 
 lands or possessions, and set apart for the maintenance and sup- 
 port of Protestant Clergy, in order to give them a compe- 
 tent income, and the second clause, he said, provided for 
 the permanent support of the Protestant clergy, a seventh 
 proportion of the lands to be granted in future. He de- 
 clared that the meaning of the act was to enable the Go- 
 vernor to endow, and present the Protestent clergy of the 
 establis hed church to such parsona ge or rectory as might 
 be constituted or erected witlnn eveiy 'towfi or parish, 
 which now was or might be formed, and to give, to such 
 Protestant clergyman of the established church a part, or 
 the whole, as the Governor thought proper, of the lands 
 appropriated by the act He further explained, that this 
 was done to encourage the established church, and that 
 possibly hereafter it might be proposed to send a bishop of 
 the established church to sit in the liCgislative Council 
 Mr. Fox disagreed with the whole of this plan- He 
 said he thought the Roman Catholic religion ought to be 
 the established church of the colony, or the Presbyterian 
 (that of the kirk of Scotland. ) He conceived setting a- 
 side a seventh part of the lands granted for the mainten- 
 
ance of the Protestant clergy, was too great an allotment, 
 and that the idea of sending a bishop of the established 
 church of England to sit in the Legislative Council, was 
 in every point of view unjustifiable. 
 
 Mr. Duncombe was of opinion that setting aside a se- 
 venth of the lands granted for the maintenance of the cler- 
 gy, was too much- 
 
 Mr. Ryaer, by way of explanation, said, that the mean- 
 ing was, when his Majesty granted six acres in any of the 
 new townships, an acre was to be set aside for the clergy* 
 man presented by the Governor to the parsonage or recto- 
 ry ; for the first year or two, as the clergyman would have 
 the ground to clear and cultivate, he probably would be 
 greatly underpaid. 
 
 Mr. Fox still censured the whole plan, and reminded the 
 House that Mr. Dundas had two evenings since boasted 
 that the security of the kirk of Scotland was its being erec* 
 ted on the rock of poverty : according to the professions of 
 the bill, Mr. Fox said, even the clergy of the kirk would 
 have larger incomes in Canada than in Scotland. 
 
 Mr. Dundas gave an historical detail of the mode of 
 proceenJing; by^ which the clergy'irrScullduil nbit auupurt* 
 ed. The fund out of which they were paid, he said, was 
 created in the last century ; when the whole tithes of Scot- 
 land, as they then stood, were sold, and the money 
 produced vested for the purpose. There were, he said, 
 
 about 900 parishes in Bcottenth* their clergy iaiJ, he 
 
 believed, one with another, between eighty and ninety 
 pounds a year ; and when their income, from circumstan- 
 ^s, was too small, it was made up to a certain amount to 
 such individuals-whose pittance was too scanty, by the As- 
 
 sembly of the Kirk, who managed the fund. He lament- 
 
 ed, that in consequence of an error in 
 iD<r, viz. : the vesting the sum which the sale of the tithes 
 had produced in a fund, instead of laying it out in the pur- 
 chase ol land, and dividing that land so 
 lotments for the clergy, the latter was not P«- 
 
 vided for. Had the plan he had stated been adopted, the 
 land would have risen in value in proportion to its im- 
 
"T7 
 
 mm 
 
 124 
 
 prorement as other land had, and the incumbents would 
 had the benefit of its increased produc- 
 
 Mr. PuUeney, Lord Carys/ort, and other gentlemen, 
 
 being all filled up, the House adjourned at twelve o’clock. 
 
 Monday, \ Qth May, 
 
 ^ Mr. Hobart having brought up the report of the Quebec 
 
 P« W <he discussion which the claus- 
 
 to trouble the 
 he intended 
 
 brrpJiH and they were those which related to 
 
 noSv^hThrH"’"’?'*'’’ that with regard to hereditary, 
 customer ^ j" ^ °^J®ct'on : it was at pre.sent 
 to tbp TJ to give only one moietv of property 
 
 rraif fif*** ^ t^^ttainly would much tend to 
 
 stitutio^n^t \ ^«e now to make a con- 
 
 stitution not for the jiresent moment, but for posterity, he 
 
 thought It desirable that there should be something «milar 
 
 tL“r-^ St® he would vie with 
 
 the right honourable gentleman who brought in the bill. 
 
 Co(on£l^im e oo fipoice in favw nftlfr-bHH and ha vfna 
 pronounced a panegpic on the British constitution, wished 
 it to be adopted in the present instance, as far as circum- 
 stances would admit. 
 
 »« j’ -‘T *’’®, •>®''e<^i‘ary nobility, as proposed 
 
 ino^of®TTv®k •’® upon the foot- 
 
 ing of the British House of Peers. By this bill the power 
 
 he King was no^ limited in conferring hereditary nobi- 
 lity, or only nobility for life. ^ 
 
 inoSift S®*^®!® -TT*? amendment of Icav- 
 
 mg out the clause of hereditary nobility. 
 
 Ayes 39 : Noes 88. — Majority 49. 
 
 On the clause fixing the number of the Assembly of. 
 
125 
 
 Lower Canada at thirty,- Mr. Chancellor Pitt proposed, 
 as an amendment, that the word fifty should be substituted 
 in the place of thirty ; but afterwards withdrew it to make 
 room for the amendment of Mr. Fox, who proposed to 
 enlarge the number to one hundred. 
 
 Divided upon the amendment of Mr. Fox. 
 
 Ayes 40 : Noes 91— Majority 51. 
 
 The amendment of the Chancellor of the Exchequer was 
 then put and carried. 
 
 J\Ir. Sheridan made some objections to the power that 
 assumed, after the government had been divided into two 
 separate, independent legislatures, of regulating their 
 commerce and internal intercourse, lie, at the same 
 time, intimated his intention to bring the subject into 
 consideration on a future stage of the bill. 
 
 The bill was ordered to be engrossed, and read a third 
 time on Wednesday. 
 
 The House adjourned. 
 
 Wednesday, ISlh May. 
 
 Tlie Quebec Bill having been read a third time, Lord 
 Sheffield presented a petition against it from Mr. Lime- 
 burner, agent for the province ot Canada, stating that the 
 people there had been refused, upon application, a copy of 
 that bill by which their govejnment was to b e regulated, 
 and praying that itlmght noT pass."^' 
 
 Mr. Chancellor Pitt said, that the principles of the bill 
 had been so long under consideration, and the impossibili- 
 ty that its regulations should meet the sentiments ot all w-as 
 so evident, that it was now the business of the House to 
 consider whether the objections that had been slated were 
 sufficient grounds for delaying the bill. 
 
 Mr. Alderman Watson moved, That the debate should 
 be adjourned till to-morrow.” 
 
 The motion was negatived, and the Bill passed. 
 
 11 *