The Legislature of the United Provinces of Canada was meeting in Quebec City on this date in 1861 when the future Father of Confederation, John A. Macdonald of Kingston, delivered a passionate address. In doing so, he called on his colleagues to look beyond themselves and their regions to imagine a greater whole. Macdonald’s speech was so effective, the press gave it great prominence.
“(Macdonald had given) without exception, the best speech he ever delivered,” one newspaper reported. “Those who are acquainted with his style of delivery need not be told that he is not what is called a ‘flowery orator.’ Metaphor and metaphysics be alike flung to the dogs, and he dashes into debate with the suddenness and strength of a whirlwind.”
You can read some of John A.’s speech below.
Attorney General Macdonald: God and nature had joined us together. Stretched the full length along the Northern Shore of the great lakes and commanding the mighty St. Lawrence, we possessed the same common interests—interests which were only now beginning to be developed ….
When they considered that at the time of the Union the country was torn by domestic dissensions, and Upper Canada overwhelmed with debt, and that now because of the Union the country possessed the best credit in the world after the mother country, would they consent to a severance of that Union, because Upper Canada had a population of a tenth or thereabouts over Lower Canada?
We were now approaching to a population of three millions of people—we were approaching to the population of the United States at the time they declared their independence, we were standing at the very threshold of nations, and when admitted we should occupy no unimportant position amongst the nations of the world.
Long might we remain connected with Great Britain. He hoped for ages forever Canada might remain united with the mother country. But we were fast ceasing to be a dependency and assuming the position of an ally of Great Britain—England would be the centre, surrounded and sustained by an alliance not only with Canada but Australia, and all her other possessions; and there would thus be formed an immense confederation of freemen, the greatest confederacy of civilization and intelligent men that ever had an existence on the face of the Globe. (Cheers.)
He hoped to live to see that day; and it would surely come, if our statesmen would only be patriotic enough to lay aside all desire to do that which tended to rend the existing Union and allowed us to continue to progress as we had progressed since 1840 …. “
He challenged his fellow members of the Legislature to take back to their constituencies when the House rose the feelings of confidence and unity he described.
“Let each go home and imbue his neighbours as far,” Macdonald continued, “as he could with his particular views on other matters; but let them all set aside party feeling in a matter of such vital consequences as this, and work together for the common good on the principle of Union, and not on the principle of one section fighting and striving against and seeking to annihilate the other. (Loud cheers.)”
The march towards Confederation had truly begun.Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.
Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.