Canada Day History Revolutionary Resolutions

was supplied by the Harmony Band of Smith’s Falls, this being one of those periods when Kemptville was without a band of its own. The people then adjourned back to the Hall for a supper, also served by the ladies of the Catholic Church. By the time a big storm blew in that evening, the crowds had already wound their way home.

by David Shanahan

by David Shanahan

Canada Day has become such a central part of the Canadian year that it is easy to forget that it is a very recent arrival on the scene.

On October 27, 1982, the Parliament of Canada initiated Canada Day following the repatriation of the Canadian Constitution that year. Before 1982, July 1 was known as Dominion Day, and had been acknowledged as Canada’s birthday from the date when the British North America Act came into force in 1867. The following year, 1868, the Governor General at the time suggested that Canadians celebrate Dominion Day as their National Holiday.

Surprisingly, Dominion Day was not itself a major event for decades after 1867. It took another ten years before there was any legislation passed in recognition of the holiday. In fact, the first official government celebration of Dominion Day only happened in 1917, on the 50th anniversary of Confederation. The Canadian Government started organising official celebrations in 1958, and it was after that that the name “Canada Day” started to be used. There was, however, great argument among Canadians about using that term, as it seemed a break with tradition. However, the plain truth is that there was very little tradition of Dominion Day celebrations before the 1950's.

In North Grenville one hundred years ago, Domin- ion Day was a hit and miss affair. Some years, there were celebrations in Kemptville, other years the day passed without comment or activities of any kind. It seems that the day’s events depended on various groups and organisations within the community, just as is true today. In 1911, the events were sponsored by the local Catholic Church congregation. A large dinner was held in the Agricultural Hall, put on by the ladies of the congregation, and was attended by the Secretary of State, Charles Murphy, as well as the local M.P.P., G. Howard Ferguson. Murphy pointed out that the occasion was “not racial, not sectarian; but national”, and praised the rise of Imperial sentiment in Canada in the years since Confederation. Ferguson, who would one day be Premier of Ontario, stated that the Province was the best place in the country, and would “remain the Banner Province of the Dominion”.

After the speeches came the athletics. Races were held over various distances, from the hundred yards dash, to the two-mile marathon. Needless to say, only males were allowed to race. No one from Kemptville won a race, though in the Boys’ Race, W. McGovern of Oxford came first, and Harold McGahey came second. The big event of the afternoon was the baseball match between Kemptville and Merrickville, which the home team won 3 -2. Music throughout

In 1912, it was the Baseball Club that ran the day’s events. The day started with a parade, or a “Trade Procession” as it was called then. It began at Riverside Park, wound around the streets, and ended up back at the Park again. The parade was led by the Texan Ranger Band from Ottawa. Who they were is unclear, but the Texan theme ran through the day’s festivities. The Band, accompanied by two pipers, played for an hour outside the Advance building on Prescott Street, filling in the time before the main event of the day: the sports activities in Riverside Park, where there were races, both human and horse, and a wonderful event called “Catch the Greasy Pig”. The big baseball game was between Kemptville and Spencerville, and all went well aside from some Spencerville teenagers who took to insulting anyone not from their town.

In the evening, there was a special concert at the Oddfellows Hall, which included an escape artist, whose ability to free himself from handcuffs and the “torture cabinet” amazed the audience. There were also “Scotch” dancers, and comedy from Sam and Guss, “the colored comedians”. And, to round off the day, the Texan Concert Orchestra provided the music for a dance at the Hall.

The following year, 1913, it seems that there were no celebrations, pos-

The Quebec Conferen ce of October, 1864 is where the famous 72 Resolutions were drawn up. These, in turn, became the basis of the British North America Act of 1867 which established the new Dominion of Canada. In spite of the importance of the Quebec meetings, very little is known about what actually happened there, as meetings were closed and confidential, no records or minutes exist of the deliberations, and it is extremely difficult to discover precisely what options and alternatives were discussed by the delegates. Even so, later memoirs and interviews have allowed us to catch a glimpse into the often serious debates and disagreements which eventually led to the 72 Resolutions as they were published following the conference.

One thing we know that was a source of dispute at both Charlottetown and Quebec, sibly owing to the lack of an organising group. But looking at the reports of Dominion Day one hundred years ago, what is surprising is how little it has changed. They had Dominion Day, and we have Canada Day. We still have our activities through the afternoon in both Kemptville and Oxford Mills, and an evening of music to end the day at Riverside Park. They had concerts and we have fireworks. But the event is still focussed on the celebration of Canada and its people. For years before the Government saw fit to celebrate the day officially, the people of North Grenville were marking the occasion with music, fun and sports. Long may that continue. perhaps surprisingly for us, was the composition of the Executive Council. This is the chamber we know of as the Senate, and the main area of disagreement dealt with how many members each of the British American provinces would get. The Canadian view was based on the assumption that the Maritime provinces would unite into a single entity, a new Acadia, and so they suggested that three sectors, Upper Canada, Lower Canada and Acadia, would each have an equal number of seats in the chamber.

The possible inclusion of Newfoundland, which was not at first an official participant at Quebec, threw that calculation out, and the other three, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, particularly the latter, argued for a greater share for themaelves. The further problem was raised by the hope that British Columbia and the Northwest Territories (as it was then) would also join Confederation and require seats in the upper chamber.

Other serious questions revolved around the distribution of powers between the Federal Government and the local legislatures. The majority of delegates, as well as the British Government in London, favoured a strong central government and saw the provincial assemblies as glorified municipalities. There was also an awareness of how strong state governments had helped bring about the Civil War in the United States, and there was a determination not to repeat that mistake. However, both Lower Canada (which became the Province of Quebec) and members of the Maritime delegations were intent on maintaining some form of government to reflect their historic, cultural and political traditions.

The solution reached was that powers would be divided appropriately between the two levels of government, with residual powers going to the federal level. This division of powers has remained an issue in Canadian politics ever since, with federal-provincial disputes over jurisdiction, and inter-provincial trade being two of the more obvious legacies of Confederation.

There was something even more fundamental about this debate, however. In a political structure headed by a monarchy, where did sovereignty lie? Was the federal government more “sovereign” than the provincial ones? Which was the ultimate decision-making power, and in what areas? Once again, this is a question that has dogged Canadian constitutional developments down to our own day. The challenge for the men who drafted the 92 Resolutions in 1864 was to establish a kind of government and country that had not existed before. Not following the American model completely, not a republic, but a monarchy, and yet still having a completely different structure to that of the Mother Country.

The remarkable thing is that these few men, in just a few weeks in October, 1864, put together the design of a new nation with remarkably little conflict. We don’t know how some of them, men like George Brown and John A. Macdonald, came to accept certain aspects of Confederation, ones which they had vehemently rejected in public before Quebec. We don’t know what other options may have been discussed, what other kinds of Canada they could have brought about.

But, ultimately, between the forming of the Great Coalition in June, and the conclusion of the Quebec Conference near the end of October, Confederation became a practical reality and a new nation was brought into being. All that was needed then was to get the concept passed into law. And this meant a lot more work ahead.

Confederation, as a scheme, may have been ready in October, 1864 but it would face many obstacles on its way to the British North America Act in the summer of 1867.