CHAPTER VII
THE RUSSELL RESOLUTIONS
When the legislature of Lower Canada met in the autumn of 1836, Lord Gosford earnestly called its attention to the estimates of the current year and the accounts showing the arrears unpaid. Six months, however, had passed by, and there was no sign of the redress of grievances. The royal commission, indeed, had not completed its investigations. The Assembly, therefore, refused once more to vote the necessary supplies. 'In reference to the demand for a supply,' they told the governor, 'relying on the salutary maxim, that the correction of abuses and the redress of grievances ought to precede the grant thereof, we have been of opinion that there is nothing to authorize us to alter our resolution of the last session.'
This answer marked the final and indubitable breakdown of the policy of conciliation without concession. This was recognized by Gosford, who soon afterwards wrote home asking to be allowed to resign, and recommending the appointment of a governor whose hands were 'not pledged as mine are to a mild and conciliatory line of policy.'
Two alternatives were now open to the British ministers—either to make a complete capitulation to the demands of the Patriotes, or to deal with the situation in a high-handed way. They chose the latter course, though with some hesitation and perhaps with regret. On March 6, 1837, Lord John Russell, chancellor of the Exchequer in the Melbourne administration and one of the most liberal-minded statesmen in England, introduced into the House of Commons ten resolutions dealing with the affairs of Canada. These resolutions recited that since 1832 no provision had been made by the Assembly of Lower Canada for defraying the charges for the administration of justice or for the support of the civil government; that the attention of the Assembly had been called to the arrears due; and that the Assembly had declined to vote a supply until its demands for radical political changes were satisfied. The resolutions declared that though both the bodies in question might be improved in respect of their composition, it was inadvisable to grant the demand to make the Legislative Council elective, or to subject the Executive Council to the responsibility demanded by the House of Assembly. In regard to the financial question, the resolutions repeated the offer made by Lord Aylmer and Lord Gosford—namely, to hand over to the Assembly the control of the hereditary, territorial, and casual revenues of the Crown, on condition that the Assembly would grant a permanent civil list. But the main feature of the resolutions was the clause empowering the governor to pay out of the public revenues, without authorization of the Assembly, the moneys necessary for defraying the cost of government in the province up to April 10, 1837. This, though not exactly a suspension of the constitution of Lower Canada and a measure quite legally within the competency of the House of Commons, was a flat negative to the claim of the Lower-Canadian Assembly to control over the executive government, through the power of the purse or otherwise.
A long and important debate in Parliament followed on these resolutions. Some of the chief political leaders of the day took part in the discussion. Daniel O'Connell, the great tribune of the Irish people, took up the cudgels for the French Canadians. Doubtless it seemed to him that the French Canadians, like the Irish, were victims of Anglo-Saxon tyranny and bigotry. Sir George Grey, the colleague of Gosford, Lord Stanley, a former colonial secretary, and William Ewart Gladstone, then a vigorous young Tory, spoke in support of the resolutions. The chief opposition came from the Radical wing of the Whig party, headed by Hume and Roebuck; but these members were comparatively few in number, and the resolutions were passed by overwhelming majorities.
Wolfred Nelson.
From a print in the Château de Ramezay.
As soon as the passage of the resolutions became known in Canada, Papineau and his friends began to set the heather on fire. On May 7, 1837, the Patriotes held a huge open-air meeting at St Ours, eleven miles above Sorel on the river Richelieu. The chief organizer of the meeting was Dr Wolfred Nelson, a member of the Assembly living in the neighbouring village of St Denis, who was destined to be one of the leaders of the revolt at the end of the year. Papineau himself was present at the meeting and he spoke in his usual violent strain. He submitted a resolution declaring that 'we cannot but consider a government which has recourse to injustice, to force, and to a violation of the social contract, anything else than an oppressive government, a government by force, for which the measure of our submission should henceforth be simply the measure of our numerical strength, in combination with the sympathy we may find elsewhere.' At St Laurent a week later he used language no less dangerous. 'The Russell resolutions,' he cried, 'are a foul stain; the people should not, and will not, submit to them; the people must transmit their just rights to their posterity, even though it cost them their property and their lives to do so.'
These meetings were prototypes of many that followed. All over the province the Patriotes met together to protest against what they called 'coercion.' As a rule the meetings were held in the country parishes after church on Sunday, when the habitants were gathered together. Most inflammatory language was used, and flags and placards were displayed bearing such devices as 'Papineau et le système électif,' 'Papineau et l'indépendence,' and 'A bas le despotisme.' Alarmed by such language, Lord Gosford issued on June 15 a proclamation calling on all loyal subjects to discountenance writings of a seditious tendency, and to avoid meetings of a turbulent or political character. But the proclamation produced no abatement in the agitation; it merely offered one more subject for denunciation.
During this period Papineau and his friends continually drew their inspiration from the procedure of the Whigs in the American colonies before 1776. The resolutions of the Patriotes recalled the language of the Declaration of Independence. One of the first measures of the Americans had been to boycott English goods; one of the first measures of the Patriotes was a resolution passed at St Ours binding them to forswear the use of imported English goods and to use only the products of Canadian industry. At the short and abortive session of the legislature which took place at the end of the summer of 1837, nearly all the members of the Assembly appeared in clothes made of Canadian frieze. The shifts of some of the members to avoid wearing English imported articles were rather amusing. 'Mr Rodier's dress,' said the Quebec Mercury, 'excited the greatest attention, being unique with the exception of a pair of Berlin gloves, viz.: frock coat of granite colored étoffe du pays; inexpressibles and vest of the same material, striped blue and white; straw hat, and beef shoes, with a pair of home-made socks, completed the outré attire. Mr Rodier, it was remarked, had no shirt on, having doubtless been unable to smuggle or manufacture one.' But Louis LaFontaine and 'Beau' Viger limited their patriotism, it appears, to the wearing of Canadian-made waistcoats. The imitation of the American revolutionists did not end here. If the New England colonies had their 'Sons of Liberty,' Lower Canada had its 'Fils de la Liberté'—an association formed in Montreal in the autumn of 1837. And the Lower Canada Patriotes outstripped the New England patriots in the republican character of their utterances. 'Our only hope,' announced La Minerve, 'is to elect our governor ourselves, or, in other words, to cease to belong to the British Empire.' A manifesto of some of the younger spirits of the Patriote party, issued on October 1, 1837, spoke of 'proud designs, which in our day must emancipate our beloved country from all human authority except that of the bold democracy residing within its bosom.' To add point to these opinions, there sprang up all over the country volunteer companies of armed Patriotes, led and organized by militia officers who had been dismissed for seditious utterances.
Naturally, this situation caused much concern among the loyal people of the country. Loyalist meetings were held in Quebec and Montreal, to offset the Patriote meetings; and an attempt was made to form a loyalist rifle corps in Montreal. The attempt failed owing to the opposition of the governor, who was afraid that such a step would merely aggravate the situation. Not even Gosford, however, was blind to the seriousness of the situation. He wrote to the colonial secretary on September 2, 1837, that all hope of conciliation had passed. Papineau's aims were now the separation of Canada from England and the establishment of a republican form of government. 'I am disposed to think,' he concluded, 'that you may be under the necessity of suspending the constitution.'
It was at this time that the Church first threw its weight openly against the revolutionary movement. The British government had accorded to Catholics in Canada a measure of liberty at once just and generous; and the bishops and clergy were not slow to see that under a republican form of government, whether as a state in the American Union or as an independent nation canadienne, they might be much worse off, and would not be any better off, than under the dominion of Great Britain. In the summer of 1837 Mgr Lartigue, the bishop of Montreal, addressed a communication to the clergy of his diocese asking them to keep the people within the path of duty. In October he followed this up by a Pastoral Letter, to be read in all the churches, warning the people against the sin of rebellion. He held over those who contemplated rebellion the penalties of the Church: 'The present question amounts to nothing less than this—whether you will choose to maintain, or whether you will choose to abandon, the laws of your religion.'
The ecclesiastical authorities were roused to action by a great meeting held on October 23, at St Charles on the Richelieu, the largest and most imposing of all the meetings thus far. Five or six thousand people attended it, representing all the counties about the Richelieu. The proceedings were admirably staged. Dr Wolfred Nelson was in the chair, but Papineau was the central figure. A company of armed men, headed by two militia officers who had been dismissed for disloyalty, and drawn up as a guard, saluted every resolution of the meeting with a volley. A wooden pillar, with a cap of liberty on top, was erected, and dedicated to Papineau. At the end of the proceedings Papineau was led up to the column to receive an address. After this all present marched past singing popular airs; and each man placed his hand on the column, swearing to be faithful to the cause of his country, and to conquer or die for her. All this, of course, was comparatively innocent. The resolutions, too, were not more violent than many others which had been passed elsewhere. Nor did Papineau use language more extreme than usual. Many of the Patriotes, indeed, considered his speech too moderate. He deprecated any recourse to arms and advised his hearers merely to boycott English goods, in order to bring the government to righteousness. But some of his lieutenants used language which seemed dangerous. Roused by the eloquence of their leader, they went further than he would venture, and advocated an appeal to the arbitrament of war. 'The time has come,' cried Wolfred Nelson, 'to melt our spoons into bullets.'
The exact attitude of Papineau during these months of agitation is difficult to determine. He does not seem to have been quite clear as to what course he should pursue. He had completely lost faith in British justice. He earnestly desired the emancipation of Canada from British rule and the establishment of a republican system of government. But he could not make up his mind to commit himself to armed rebellion. 'I must say, however,' he had announced at St Laurent, 'and it is neither fear nor scruple that makes me do so, that the day has not yet come for us to respond to that appeal.' The same attitude is apparent, in spite of the haughty and defiant language, in the letter which he addressed to the governor's secretary in answer to an inquiry as to what he had said at St Laurent:
SIR,—The pretension of the governor to interrogate me respecting my conduct at St Laurent on the 15th of May last is an impertinence which I repel with contempt and silence.
I, however, take the pen merely to tell the governor that it is false that any of the resolutions adopted at the meeting of the county of Montreal, held at St Laurent on the 15th May last, recommend a violation of the laws, as in his ignorance he may believe, or as he at least asserts.—Your obedient servant,
L. J. PAPINEAU.
At St Charles Papineau was even more precise in repudiating revolution; and there is no evidence that, when rebellion was decided upon, Papineau played any important part in laying the plans. In later years he was always emphatic in denying that the rebellion of 1837 had been primarily his handiwork. 'I was,' he said in 1847, 'neither more nor less guilty, nor more nor less deserving, than a great number of my colleagues.' The truth seems to be that Papineau always balked a little at the idea of armed rebellion, and that he was carried off his feet at the end of 1837 by his younger associates, whose enthusiasm he himself had inspired. He had raised the wind, but he could not ride the whirlwind.
