Chapter Four Continued: Political Climate

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

Vote for no man whose conduct in private and public life is not above suspicion, and inquire with due diligence before you give your suffrages.* William Lyon Mackenzie

Before any European settlers arrived in Upper Canada, there was a well established governing body. In fact the Six Nations Confederacy, has been referred to as the oldest living participatory democracy on earth. Another claim to fame for this country.

Democratic government for the new settlers was a bit slower going, and did not come about without a fight. In 1841 Upper and Lower Canada united, in response to the 1837 Rebellion, with Ontario becoming Canada West and Quebec Canada East.

The Reform Party was established decades before and another protest party, the Clear Grits, under George Brown, also emerged to challenge the status quo. (Eventually becoming the Liberal Party** of Canada)

Over the next several years coalitions were formed and broken, until 1867 when Confederation** brought about the new Dominion of Canada, with Sir John A. MacDonald as it's first Prime Minister.

However, even with suffrage, democracy was not quite as democratic as it sounds, because voting for most people was difficult. Distance to polling stations and poor travel conditions kept many settlements out of the process.

Voting was also oral, resulting in intimidation, blackmail, and even violence. The law stipulated that if no one showed up at a polling station for an hour, they could simply close their doors, so candidates would use hired thugs to prevent would be voters from making it inside, and unlimited free alcohol, usually led to further violence.

One polling station reported the following in the early days:

Passions ran so high that a terrible fight broke out. Punches and every other offensive and defensive tactic were employed. In the blink of an eye table legs were turned into swords and the rest into shields. The combatants unceremoniously went for each other's nose, hair and other handy parts, pulling at them mercilessly ... The faces of many and the bodies of nearly all attested to the doggedness of the fighting.

In fact it was stated that the reason why women weren't given the right to vote, was because these events were far too dangerous. Before 1867, 20 deaths and countless injuries occurred at polling stations as a result of riots, so I guess I can understand the reasoning.

But women were not the only ones left out of the process, since the criteria for the right to vote in Upper Canada was pretty restrictive, and applied only to British subjects with often exclusive definitions of what that meant. You also had to be a land owner and have been paying taxes for at least a year, and many government employees were also barred.

The Heffler-Aberhart family did not appear to be involved in politics, at least not in running for office, though Christopher Heffler did make the voter list beginning in 1877. Whether he exercised his right to vote is not recorded.

However, several years later, his wife's biological grandson would certainly earn his place in Canada's political history, as he too started a protest movement that would culminate in a new Reform Party, eventually forming the federal government in 2006, under Stephen Harper.

Since the party of Sir John A. was disbanded in 2003, ending a 150 year tradition, this new party claimed the title: The Conservative Party of Canada with a neo-Conservative mandate.

Chapter Four Continued: William and Louisa

Footnotes:

*Address to the reformers of Upper Canada Toronto, September 1834

** In 1867, Nova Scotia was greatly apposed to joining Confederation, until a popular scholar and theologian, George Monro Grant stepped in. It is said that without his involvement, there may not have been a Dominion of Canada, at least not at that time. And as a matter of coincidence, his great, great grandson, Michael Ignatieff, is now leader of the Liberal Party of Canada (in opposition to Stephen Harper), though Grant at the time was non-partisan.

Sources:

Elections Canada: A History of the Vote in Canada, British North America, 1758–1866

Chapter One: Bold Moves

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

In 1825 the British Parliament incorporated the Canada Company, a private enterprise; to handle future settlement in the province of Upper Canada.

Whereas in and by a certain Act of Parliament made and passed in the sixth year of our reign, entitled, " An Act to enable His Majesty to grant to a Company, to be incorporated by Charter, to be called 'The Canada Company,' certain Lands in the Province of Upper Canada, and to invest the said Company with certain Powers and Privileges, and for other Purposes relating thereto: After reciting, amongst other things that divers persons had united together to establish a company for purchasing, improving, settling, and disposing of certain lands in the province of Upper Canada .... (1)

Their mandate included making necessary travel arrangements for emigrants; land distribution and the provision of the necessary tools required to carve out a life in the vast wilderness of the region. What this amounted to was the private purchase of about 2.5 million acres of land for $295,000. And since this endeavour was the brainchild of the Scottish novelist John Galt, he would act as superintendent.

In 1824, Galt dispatched a provisional committee to the province, to get the lay of the land, so to speak. The plan was to divide the province into tracts, that could be sold to wealthy investors; who in turn would further divide and sell the land again.

One of these tracts was a pie-shaped piece that stretched from present day Guelph to Goderich, which became known as the Huron Tract.

One of the members of this committee, was Martin Tucker-Smith, a London banker, who would become one of the directors of the Canada Company. When the Huron Tract was sub-divided into townships, approximately 40,850 acres would be sectioned off as Tucker-Smith, in his honour. The land was described as " ... rolling and considered by the early settlers to be one of the most fertile in the County".

However, by 1835, the official census revealed that there were only 61 souls residing in Tucker-Smith: 17 boys and 10 girls under the age of sixteen; 18 adult males and 16 adult females. (3) Hardly thriving when compared to most others.

Taverns and Mud Holes

In 1827, a new arrival, calling himself Anthony Van Egmond; would be hired to build a passable road through the bush, from Wilmot in Wellington County to Goderich; a distance of about 40 miles. His contract stipulated that he had three years to complete such a road, that must include three inns at various intervals, for the convenience of future travellers. He would receive one third of his payment in cash and the rest in land.

However, he and his son Constant completed the task in about a year and he was granted 13,000 acres in Tucker-Smith, making him the largest private landholder in the Huron Tract.

How good the road was is open for debate, but generally most in Upper Canada at the time were barely passable. In 1836, when Anna Jameson was summoned to Canada by her husband, Robert; who had been appointed chief justice of Upper Canada, she had to travel from New York to Toronto on her own, and described the conditions in her book Winter Studies and Summer Rambles in Canada:

" ... The roads were throughout so execrably bad that no words can give an idea of them. We often sank into mud-holes above the axle trees; then over trunks of trees laid across swamps, called here corduroy roads, where my poor bones dislocated. A wheel here and there, or a broken shaft lying by the wayside, told of former wrecks and disasters. In some places they had, in desperation, flung huge boughs of oak into the mud abyss, and covered them with clay and sod, the rich green foliage projecting on either side. This sort of illusive contrivance would sometimes give way, and we were nearly precipitated in the midst. By the time we arrived at the township of Blanford, my hands were swelled and blistered by continually grasping with all my strength an iron bar in front of my vehicle to keep myself from being flung out, and my limbs ached woefully."

Regardless; Van Egmond cleared about a hundred acres of land, planted the first wheat in the township and built a sturdy home, complete with the obligatory tavern.

"The erection of a church or chapel generally precedes that of a schoolhouse in Upper Canada, but the mill and tavern invariably precede both." Anna Jameson (3)

The Colonel was now open for business, with 20, four-horse wagon teams to assist the arriving emigrants.

Chapter One Continued: Family Affairs and Armed Citizens

Sources:

1. History of the colonies of the British Empire ... from the official records of the Colonial Office, By Robert Montgomery Martin, H. Allen and Co. and George Routledge, 1843, Pg. 76

2. The Canada Company and the Huron Tract, 1826-1853: Personalities, Profits and Politics, By Robert C. Lee, Natural Heritage Books, 2004, ISBN-13: 978-1896219943, Pg, 232

3. Bits and Pieces of Brantford's History, By: Gary Muir, 1913