Petition of the Counties in the District of Quebec and of the County of Warwick, District of Montreal
To the King's most Excellent Majesty:
May it please your Majesty,
WE your Majesty's faithful and loyal subjects inhabitants of your province of Lower Canada most humbly supplicate your Majesty to récrive graciously this our humble pe tition which we now lay at the loot of your Imperial throne with hearts full of gratitude and unviolable attachment to your august Person and our Majesty's paternal Government Amongst the numerous benetits for which the inlialiitauts of Lower Canada are indebted to your Majesty's Government there isnoue thatthey inore highly prize tli in the invaluable Constitution panted to this Pro vi ice bv the Act of the Parliament of ii eat Britain passed in the 31st year of the rei n of Our beloved sovereign your august Father of ever revered memory.
Called by that Act to the full enjoyment of British constitutional liberty nd become the depositaries of our own rights uniler the protection of the mother country we contracted the solemn obligation of preserving inviolate this sacred deposit and of transmitting it to our descendants sucli as it was colluded to u by the great men who then presided over the de siinies of your powerful and glorious empire.
Deeply impressed with a sense of this obligation alarmed by t e abuses лг псЬ have crept into the administration ot the tiovvrmneut of this province and siitteriiy under the evils hich wei h on its inhabitants we entertained au anxious hope t at the House of Assembly in the Session ol the Provincial Parliament called lor the dispatch of bu siuess on the Oth November last would t iUe into consideration t ie state of the province and adopt efficacious measures to obtain the remedy aad removal of these abuses and evils We had a sure reliance on the well tried lo ally and disinterested zeal of our representatives but we have bad the mortiticatioii of seeing our opes frustrated by the refusal on the part of His Excellency the Governor in Chief to approve the Speaker elected by the Assembly and by the proclamation ot the 22d oft e same month of November proro uin f the Provincial Parliament In these circumstances deprived of the services of our representatives suffering under ртеа evils and threatened with other still preater we numbly implore the protection of your Majesty the язпгсе of all grnce arid of all justice The enlightened and patriotic statesman ho devised our Constitutional Act and tho British Parliament by which it was granted intended to bestow on us a mixed govern nient modelled on the constitution of the parcel state t e opinions publicly expressed at the time iu Parliament and the Act itself record the beneficent views of the Imperial Legislature a Governor a Legislative Council and an Assembly were to form three distiuct an independent branches representing the Kiny t e Lords and the Commons but the true spirit of that fundamental law ha not been observed in the composition of tie Legislative Council for the majority of its members consisting of persons whose principal resources for the support of themselves and their families are t e salaries emolumenta aod feel derived from offices which they hold during pleasure t ey are interested in maintaining and inrreasing the salaries emoluments and fees of public officer I 1 ky the people and also in supporting divers abuses favourable to persons holding oil cos The Legislative Council b these means isiu effect the executive power under a different пнше aud the Provincial Leginlature is in truth reduced totwp branches a Governor ami an Assembly leaving the province without the benefit of the intermediate branch as intended by the aforesaid Act and from this tiret and capital abuse have resulted aud still continue to result a multitude of abuses and the impossibility of procuring aremely.
We acknowledge that the Legislative Council ought to be independent; and if it were, we should not be entitled to complain to your Majesty of the repeated refusals of that branch to proceed upon various bills sent up by the Assembly, however useful and indispensable they might be; considering these refusals as the natural result of the composition of that body, and of the state of dependence in which the majority of its members are placed, we are compelled to consider its acts as the acts of the Executive Government; and we most humbly represent to your Majesty, that the Legislative Council of this province, the majority of which in composed of Executive Councillors, judges, and other persons dependent on the Executive, have, year after year, rejected several bills, refused and neglected to proceed on several other bills sent up by the Assembly, for the remedy of abuses, for encouraging education, promoting the general convenience of the subject, the improvement of the country, for increasing the security of persons and property, and furthering the common welfare and prosperity of the province: particularly —
- Various annual bills granting the necessary sums for all the expenses of the Civil Government of the province, but regulating and settling limits to the expenditure.
- For affording a legal recourse to the subject having claims against the Provincial Government.
- For regulating certain fees and offices.
- For enabling the inhabitants of the towns to have a voice in the management of their local concerns, and a check on the expenditure of monies levied upon them by assessment.
- For facilitating the administration of justice throughout the province, for qualifying and regulating the formation of juries, and introducing jury trials in the country parts, and diminishing the expenses occasioned by the distance of suitors from the present seats of justice. * For providing a new and sufficient gaol for the district of Montreal.
- For qualifying persons to serve in the office of justice of the peace.
- For continuing the Acts regulating the militia of the province.
- For increasing and apportioning the representation in the House of Assembly equally among the qualified electors throughout the province, particularly in the new settlements and townships.
- For the security of the public monies in the hands of His Majesty's receiver-general in this province.
- For the independence of the judges, by securing to them their present salaries, upon their being commissioned during good behaviour, and for providing a tribunal for the trial of impeachments by the Assembly, so as to ensure a just responsibility in high public officers within the province.
- For appointing and providing for an authorized agent for the province, to reside in England and attend to its interests there.
It is with the most profound grief that we fiiurourselves compelled to represent to your Majesty that during several yearspast the incomes derived from real estate in this province the profits of trade and industry and the wages of labour therein have greatly diminished and still continue to diminish that under these circumstances it would not be equitable to impose taxes or new duties on its inbabitants for the public uses and that there exists no other resource which can reasonably be depended upon to aid in the diffusion of knowledge and facilitate the exertions of individual industry than the proceeds of te existing revenues levied ithin the province.
Nevertheless more than one half of the gross amount ofall its public revenues has been applied for several years past in payment of salaries emoluments and expense of the officers of the Civil Government exclusive of the usual and indispensable special appropriation and our anxiety i the greater these lalaries and emolumcuU and expense bav been preatly increased without the consent of the Legislature and h ve in some instances been paid to persons who do not reside in the province or have rendered no ser vich therefore and in other cases the said salaries and emoluments and expenses are ex cessive when compared with the incomes derived from real täte in this province and the u ual recompense obtained therein by the individuals of taleut character and indnstry equal to those possensed by tlie persons to r om the said salaries and emoluments are paid out of the public revenue of this province and lastly in addition I ot hose unnecessary and excessive s uaries and expenses our Majesty's subject of this province are also wit various and increasing fees paid to the officers of tue vil Government which aro grievous to the subject diminishing the protection of the law s the benefits of govern ment and the resources of the conntr for its necessary wants.
We are convinced that besides the most perfect security of persons and property one of the most efficacious means of promoting the public prosperity and preventing its decline is to aid in the diffusion of useful knowledge and the free exercise of individual industry and enterprise and we have witnessed with satisfaction and gratitude that our Provincial Legislature has appropriated very large sums of money for these objects since the close of the last war with the United States of America but we have to perform the painful duty of humbly representing to your Majesty that the monies thus appro mated and applied under the direction of tue Provincial Executive have not produced the beneficial results that were to be expected from a legal and judicious application of them and have been tardily or insufficiently accounted for.
It is wit t the utmost pain that we are compelled to represent to Your Majesty that in this province of the British empire huye sun of public money of the revenue levied within this province have been applied year after year by farrrntof the Executive Government without any appropriation by the Legislature of te province at a time when the necessary appropriations were rejected in the said Legislative Council in payment of alleged expenses of the Civil Government and other expenses for whic no services were rendered to the province or for new and increased salaries and allowances never recognized by the Legislature Were we to refrain from complaining of sue an enormous abuse we should co operate in consolidating our slavery and we humbly implore your Majesty's justice.
Alike negligent in the preservation of the public monies and prodigal in their expenditure the Executive Government of this province has not only guttered the dissipation of large sums of money in the hands of the receiver general and other depositar thereof then and still under its superintendence and control but has appointed other officers in the stead of these faulty depositaries without taking any sufficient security for the future and having advanced to different persons large urns of money appropriated by the Legislature the neglect of the Executive Government in this respect has l eu such that several of tho e persons have not accounted at the time when they ought to have accounted some ave insufficiently accounted or not rendered any account and notwithstanding their negligence and default some of those persons have been appointed by the Executive Government to offices of trust honour and prolit and we most humbly represent to your Majesty that the Executive Government of the province by its negligent con ilnct in these respects has exposed your Majest s subjects in this province to heavy and grievous losses dissipated and endangered the resources of the province and subjected its inhabitants tonnnecessarv burthens.
Your Majesty's faithful subjects in this province have airead forwarded humble representations to your Majesty's Government on the subject of the college and estates heretofore in the possession of the late order of Jesuits in this province and while we deplore the unfavorable result of our past endeavours we nevertheless continue to entertain the most perfect confidence that so soon as the truth shall be fully known to your Majesty justice will be rendered unto us and we humbly represent that as the said Order vas never Míe proprietor of the said college and estates but merely the depositary thereof for the education of youth of Canada the extinction of that order could not confer on the Sovereign any other rights on that property than were possessed by the said Order and that your Majest succeeded to the possession of those estates sul ject to their being applied to the education of the youth of this province conformably to their primitive destination and it is with the most profound prief that e und ourselves still deprived of the benefit wkich were formerly derived from the actual application of thai itojierty to these objects under the direction of the Jesuits while education is langnishin amon t тя L n i 0r allt t 10S resollrt i i.
The settlement of the waste lands in this province the importance of which has al ready at varions times occupied the attention of your Majesty's Imperial ioverumeat has been neglected in te nwt unaccountable manner by the Executive loveriiinrm if tbe province so tliat large portions of the said lands granted or reserved by the Croup have been long held and continue tobe held in the midst of or in the immediate viinnitv of actual settlement without the о tiers or possessors thereof aving been compelled to perform the dutv of settlement upon w ich said lands were granted by the Crown or any other duty in relation to te said lands to the grievous burden of the actual inhabitant discouragement of new settlers and the obstructlou of the general increase aad pixw of the province.
But of all the abuses of which the inhabitants of this province hate to complain tbe most afflicting to your Petitioners is that during the prevalence of Me aforementioned and various other abuses and grievances f ilse représentations and repeated attempts have been made by divers officers of the Provincial Executive possessing the conadeiire of your Majesty's Government to obtain from your Majesty's Government in England and the Parliament of the United Kingdom various alterations in the constitution uf the Government of this province as established bj law without the knowledge ot our Majesty's faithful subjects in this province in contempt of their most sacred rights and dearest interests and this at a time w en a majority of Executive Couucillors Judge and other officers in the Legislative Council prevented the inhabitant of the proviure from having an authorized agent in England to watch over and support f eir iut iv tv and enable them to be heard by the Government of the mother country and it is utiHcr these circumstances that the Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom 4th Geo IV c 6 reviving or continuing certain temporary Acts of the Provincial Legislature 1ету1цу duties within this province and the Acts affecting the tenure of lands therein were parsed wit out the knowledge of its inhabitants to the subversion of their rights and dear t interests and particularly without the knowledge or consent of the proprietors more immediately interested inthe last mentioned Acts It is with the most afflicting sensations tliat we have witnessed the intrigues w ich have been in operation to despoil your Majesty's faithful subjects in this province of the rig ts and benefits which were granted and guaranteed to us by the supreme authority of a powerful and generous nation under t e auspices of its most illustrious citizens.
We most humbly implore your Majesty to take this our petition into your mo t gracious consideration to exercise your Royal Prerogative so that your Majesty's faithful subjects in this Province be relieved from the aforesaid abuses and grievances and justice b done in the premises that your petitioners may be maintained and secured in the lull enjoyment of the constitution of government as established by the Act passed in the 3Nt year of the reign of our late Sovereign your Royal Father without any alteration titre of whatsoever.
And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.
December, 1827.
[N. B. The Petitions to the Lords and Commons aie the same as the above with only the necessary change of style.]
Recapitulation of Signature to the above Petition:
County of Cornwallis, 3,583
Devon, 2,139
Hertford, 2,304
Dorchester, 4,157
Part of Buckinghamshire, 1,532
Ditto of Hampshire, 1,346
Quebec, 5,870
County of Orleans, 1,018
Northumberland, 2,445
Total, District of Quebec, 24,484
County of Warwick, 4,904
29,338
2nd. February 1828.
Resolutions on which the foregoing Petition was founded.
LOUIS A. LAGUEUX, President,
H. S. HUOT, Secretary.
At a meeting of the Committee, Friday, 14th December 1827, the following officers were appointed:— J. R. Vallières de St. Réal, esquire, president; Henry George Forsyth, esquire, and Louis Abraham Lagueux, esquire, vice-presidents; Messrs. H. S. Huot and J. B. E. Bacquet, secretaries.
H. S. HUOT, Secy.