CHAPTER IV. THE FIRST MINISTRY. "The members of the Administration, all of whom were heads of departments, distinctly avowed their responsibility to Parliament for the measures of Government. Whatever political differences there may have been in the House, it was felt by every one that there was an ADMINISTRATION, and that its existence depended upon the support of a Parliamentary majority."-MR. HINCKS, in The Examiner. HE first Parliament of United Canada assembled at Kingston, where the General Hospital had been fitted up for its accommodation, on Monday, the 14th of June, 1841.* The Legislative Council consisted of twenty-four members, all of whom had been appointed by His Excellency only five days before, but only fourteen out of the twenty-four presented themselves on the opening day. In accordance with the terms of the Union Act, the Legislative Assembly consisted of eighty-four members, forty-two from each of the former Provinces. Of these eighty-four, seventy-nine were present at the opening of the session.† It will not be uninteresting to glance at the personnel of this * MacMullen, Miles, Jeffers, Tuttle, and several other compilers of Canadian history, represent this First Parliament as having been convened for the 13th of June. A little investigation would have disclosed the fact that the 13th fell on a Sunday. As matter of fact Parliament was, by a proclamation dated the 15th of February, 1841, convened for the 8th of the following April. By a subsequent proclamation, dated the 6th of April, the date was fixed for the 26th of May. Finally, by a proclamation dated the 30th of April, the date was fixed for the 14th of June, which was the actual date of assembling "for the despatch of business." +See post, Chap. VI. First Parliament, for it was, in fact as well as in name, a genuine Representative Body. That is to say, it was representative of the best intellect and culture of both sections of the Province. It contained an unusual number of really capable men, and there were members of each House whose abilities would have made them conspicuous in any country where their lot might have been cast. Seniores priores. It is fitting that the Ministry should receive earliest attention; and it should be premised that the Ministry was the result of a practical coalition,* skilfully brought about by the Governor-General. Up to the day of the opening of the session, it consisted of nine members, six of whom belonged to the western, and the remaining three to the eastern section of the united Province. The Attorney-General for Upper Canada was William Henry Draper, a gentleman who for a brief period shared the leadership of the Ministerial party in the Upper Province with Mr. Harrison. Mr. Draper has stamped his name very distinctly upon the political and judicial history of his time in this country. His career had been a somewhat eventful one. He was born in London, England, in 1801. His father was a clergyman, and rector of one of the city churches there. During his early boyhood, being a high-spirited youth, he ran away to sea, and served for some time as a cadet on board an East Indiaman. In his twentieth year, having passed through his full share of adventure, he arrived in Upper Canada, and obtained a situation as teacher of a school at Port Hope. He subsequently studied law, and was in due time called to the bar. He settled at Little York, afterwards Toronto, and devoted himself assiduously to his profession. He was endowed with high natural abilities, and soon achieved success. He possessed a voice of great flexibility and sweetness, and his manner proved * As will hereafter be seen, Mr. Baldwin did not regard it in the light of a coalition, but as a mere temporary arrangement to enable the Governor-General to carry out his purposes. very effective before juries. No lawyer of his time in Canada excelled him in the subtle art of persuasion, and his silver-tongued eloquence procured for him the sobriquet of "Sweet William." In 1836 he was returned to the Upper Canadian Assembly by the city of Toronto, and at the request of the Lieutenant-Governor, Sir Francis Bond Head, he accepted a place in the Executive Council of that day, but without any portfolio. During the rebellion he served as an aide-de-camp to the Lieutenant-Governor. In March, 1837, he became Solicitor-General, and he retained that office until 1840, when he succeeded the Hon. Christopher A. Hagerman as Attorney-General. At Lord Sydenham's request he had consented to retain that office in the present Ministry. In politics he was a Conservative of a very pronounced cast. He was an upholder of Church and State doctrines, and had not got beyond the theories prevalent during the reign of George III.; but he could upon occasion simulate a positive enthusiasm for liberal sentiments, and could declaim about the sacred rights of a free people in a manner highly edifying. A newspaper of the day described him as "the most plausible of mortals, bland, insinuating, persuasive, eloquent." He had little or nothing in common with some of his colleagues, and it was impossible that any Ministry containing such incongruous elements should long hold together. As matter of fact, as will presently be seen, one of its most conspicuous members retired from office at the opening of the session. Mr. Draper, however, continued to hold the Attorney-General's portfolio, and we shall meet him frequently in the course of the following narrative. He at this time represented the county of Russell in the Assembly. Many readers of these pages are familiar with his face and figure, for he survived until about four years since, and only died on the 3rd of November, 1877. As known to the present generation he was a man of singularly kindly and venerable appearance, upon whom, nevertheless, the infirmities of age had left an ineffaceable mark. During the days of his Attorney-Generalship, on the contrary, he was in the prime and vigour of a lusty manhood. His figure was muscular and graceful, his gestures were striking, and his language was wonderfully impressive and convincing. His flow of words was smooth and easy, and his elocution almost perfect. His voice was such as fully to justify the sobriquet already mentioned, and his countenance, when lighted up with the animation of debate, was bright and attractive. His tact, adroitness and dexterity in passing executive measures through the House were unrivalled. His Parliamentary influence was long fully commensurate with his abilities. We are not, however, able to approve, or even to sympathize with much of his political career, for we are perforce led to the conclusion that his views were not consonant with the best interests of his adopted country. From any but an extreme high Tory point of view, William Henry Draper, as the Minister of Sir Charles Metcalfe, must appear in the light of a mere party politician and obstructionist, rather than in that of a statesman. It is not as a politician that those who are most careful for his fame wish to remember him. Fortunately he has left a judicial record which all persons, of whatsoever shade of political opinion, must unite in admiring. For more than thirty years he adorned the judicial bench, and when he died he left behind him a reputation for judicial learning and acumen of which his descendants may justly feel proud. One of the ablest and most influential members of the Executive Council, and in many respects one of the most estimable men known to Canadian political history, was Robert Baldwin. It has been intimated that one of the most conspicuous members of the Council resigned office at the opening of the session. That member was Mr. Baldwin, and his doing so has been made a reproach against him by Lord Sydenham's biographer, upon the ground that his resignation was calculated to embarrass the Governor. As a good deal of absurdity has been spoken and written on this subject, and as the facts are not widely known, it is desirable that existing misapprehension should be removed, and that a just appreciation of Mr. Baldwin's position should be arrived at. All his Mr. Baldwin entered political life in the year 1829, as the successor of the Hon. John Beverley Robinson in the representation of the town of York. A brief account of his previous career will tend to the elucidation of his character and position before the country at the time of his taking office under Lord Sydenham. He was the eldest son of Dr. William Warren Baldwin, a gentleman of high social and political standing, and was born at Little York in 1804. He studied law, and upon completing his studies entered upon the practice of his profession in his native town, in partnership with his father. The latter was a gentleman of very liberal and enlightened views, and brought up his son with political ideas in advance of his time and surroundings. Robert was from his boyhood conspicuous, not so much for brilliant abilities as for a very unusual degree of prudence and good sense. actions were dictated by a high sense of duty and responsibility to his Maker. He was scrupulously, almost morbidly conscientious, insomuch that he was in some degree unfitted for the exigencies of party warfare in those days. The writer of these pages cannot better express his estimate of the character and aims of Robert Baldwin than by repeating, in effect, what he has said elsewhere: The twenty and odd years which have elapsed since he was laid in his grave have witnessed many and important changes in our Constitution, as well as in our habits of thought; but his name is still regarded by the great mass of the Canadian people with feelings of respect and veneration. We can still point to him with the admiration due to a man who, during a time of the grossest political corruption, took a foremost part in our public |