The greatest and ablest man among all who were notable in Lord Elgin's days in Canada, Sir John Alexander Macdonald—the greatest not simply as a Canadian politician but as one of the builders of the British empire—lived to become one of Her Majesty's Privy Councillors of Great Britain, a Grand Cross of the Bath, and prime minister for twenty-one years of a Canadian confederation which stretches for 3,500 miles from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean. When death at last forced him from the great position he had so long occupied with distinction to himself and advantage to Canada, the esteem and affection in which he was held by the people, whom he had so long served during a continuous public career of half a century, were shown by the erection of stately monuments in five of the principal cities of the Dominion—an honour never before paid to a colonial statesman. The statues of Sir John Macdonald and Sir Georges Cartier—statues conceived and executed by the genius of a French Canadian artist—stand on either side of the noble parliament building where these statesmen were for years the most conspicuous figures; and as Canadians of the present generation survey their bronze effigies, let them not fail to recall those admirable qualities of statesmanship which distinguished them both—above all their assertion of those principles of compromise, conciliation and equal rights which have served to unite the two races in critical times when the tide of racial and sectional passion and political demagogism has rushed in a mad torrent against the walls of the national structure which Canadians have been so steadily and successfully building for so many years on the continent of North America.
CHAPTER XI
POLITICAL PROGRESS
In the foregoing pages I have endeavoured to review—very imperfectly, I am afraid—all those important events in the political history of Canada from 1847 to 1854, which have had the most potent influence on its material, social, and political development. Any one who carefully studies the conditions of the country during that critical period of Canadian affairs cannot fail to come to the conclusion that the gradual elevation of Canada from the depression which was so prevalent for years in political as well as commercial matters, to a position of political strength and industrial prosperity, was largely owing to the success of the principles of self-government which Lord Elgin initiated and carried out while at the head of the Canadian executive. These principles have been clearly set forth in his speeches and in his despatches to the secretary of state for the colonies as well as in instructive volumes on the colonial policy of Lord John Russell's administration by Lord Grey, the imperial minister who so wisely recommended Lord Elgin's appointment as governor-general Briefly stated these principles are as follows:—
That it is neither desirable nor possible to carry on the government of a province in opposition to the opinion of its people.
That a governor-general can have no ministers who do not enjoy the full confidence of the popular House, or, in the last resort, of the people.
That the governor-general should not refuse his consent to any measure proposed by the ministry unless it is clear that it is of such an extreme party character that the assembly or people could not approve of it.
That the governor-general should not identify himself with any party but make himself "a mediator and moderator between all parties."
That colonial communities should be encouraged to cultivate "a national and manly tone of political morals," and should look to their own parliaments for the solution of all problems of provincial government instead of making constant appeals to the colonial office or to opinion in the mother country, "always ill-informed, and therefore credulous, in matters of colonial politics."
That the governor-general should endeavour to impart to these rising communities the full advantages of British laws, British institutions, and British freedom, and maintain in this way the connection between them and the parent state.