Document Information
Date: 1866-12-20 – 1866-12-24
By: John A. Macdonald, British North American Delegates
Citation: John A. Macdonald Fonds, Drafts of the London Resolutions – Penultimate Draft, scrap resolutions, December 20-24th 1866 (MG 26 A, Vol. 47/1, pp. 18268-18273, 18275-18279, 18301-18302).[1]
Other formats: To view the original documents, click on the links in the document, and then view the original document from there.
Notes: The following version is an amalgamation of twelve documents [click the titles of each document to access the originals rather than this amalgamated version]. These documents have been amalgamated for use in Michael Scott & Charles Dumais, Book in Progress: The British North America Act (2025). All endnotes are from the Book in Progress and are tentative until the book is published. For more information on this publication in progress, click HERE.
18301
General [Confederate] Parliament shall have the General [illegible] of Legislation for the Peace Welfare Good Government of the Confederated Provinces / saving the sovereignty of England having also the power and excepting subjects herein [specifically and exclusively] reserved to the local legislatures—
[illegible]
20 Dec
18302
Sec. 29 to be added to Sec. 38:
And the power of repealing, amending or altering such laws shall thenceforward remain with the General Government only—
[illegible]
Mr. McCully
18278
[illegible notes in margin]
Mr. Galt moved
2ded by Mr Tilley
The construction of the Intercolonial Railway being essential to the consolidation of the Union of British North America, and to the assent of the Maritime Provinces thereto, it is agreed that provision be made for its immediate construction by the General Government under the Guarantee, and that the Imperial guarantee for three millions sterling [illegible] pledged for this work be applied thereto, so soon as the necessary authority has been obtained from the Imperial Parliament.
[Reverse][2]
20 Dec
Mr. Galt
Resl 68
Carried
18268
[omitted][3]
43 ½ All the powers privileges and duties conferred and imposed upon Catholic Separate Schools and School Trustees in Upper Canada shall be extended to the Protestant and Catholic Dissentient Schools in Lower Canada and on appeal shall be in both sections to the Governor in Council of the General Government from the acts and decisions of the Local authorities in each Province which may affect the rights or privileges of the Protestant or Catholic minority in the matter of Education and the General Parliament shall have power in the last resort to legislate on the subject.
[Reverse]
19 Dec.
Amended
24 Dec
18269
And in any Province where a system of separate or dissentient schools by law obtains, or where the Local Legislature may hereafter adopt a system of separate or dissentient schools, an appeal shall lie to the Governor General in Council of the General Gov’t, from the acts and decisions of the Local Authorities which may affect the rights or privileges of the Protestant or Catholic minority in the matter of education; and the General Parliament shall have power in the last resort to legislate on the subject.
Nova Scotia Yes
New Brunswick Yes
Canada Yes
This is the heart of the 6th subsection of 43 Clause
[Reverse]
24 Dec
Mr. McCully
43 Subsec. 6
Carried
18270
Galt’s amendment
Subsect. 6 clause 43
Taken by JHowe
[illegible] 3 March 1909 [illegible][4]
J. Pope
18271
All the powers privileges and duties conferred + imposed upon Catholic Separate Schools + School Trustees in U.C. shall be extended to the Protestant + Catholic Dissentient Schools in LC [illegible] appeal shall be in both sect to the Gov in Council of the General Government
18272
An appeal shall be in both sections to the Gov’r in Council of the Gen’l Government from the acts + decisions of the local authorities in each province which may affect the rights + privileges of the Catholic or Protestant minorities in the matter of Education + the Gen’l Parliament shall have power in the last resort to legislate on the subject.
[December, 1866: Drafts of the London Resolutions – Scrap Resolution: Draft re Provincial Legislation Required for Dissentient Schools][5]
18273
Grants of money made to denominational schools in any Province shall not be construed as creating separate schools [by this Bill] unless provision be made for the creation [therein] of separate and [a] dissentient schools by [illegible] the act [Act] of the [such] Provincial Legislation [illegible] Education in any such Province.
18275
Education – saving the rights and privileges which the Protestant or Catholic minority in any Province may have by law as to denominational schools at the time when the union goes into operation
Moved by Mr Mitchell in amend’t to 6th section of 43 section of Quebec Resolutions
Carried
24 Decr.
[December, 1866: Drafts of the London Resolutions – Scrap Resolution: Galt’s Amendments to Financial Clauses][6]
18276
61)
Add the words,
“But [illegible] [this stipulation] is in no respect intended to limit the powers given to the respective Governments of those Provinces by Legislative authority, but only to determine the maximum amount of charge to be assumed by the General Government.
62 + 63
In case Nova Scotia and [or] New Brunswick [illegible] should not have contracted Debts at the date of Union equal to the amount with which they are respectively entitled to enter the Confederation. They shall receive by half-yearly payments in advance from the General Government, the interest at Five per cent on the difference between the actual amount of their respective Debts at the time of the Union and such stipulated amounts until the full amount of Debt.
64
Add
But the General Government shall [illegible] deduct from such subsidy all sums paid as interest on the Public Debt of any Province in excess of the amount provided under the 61st resolution.
18277
64
In consideration of the transfer to the General Parliament of the powers of taxation, the following sums shall be paid to each by the General Government to each Province for the support of their Local Govts and Legislatures:—
Upper Canada $80,000
Lower Canada 70,000
Nova Scotia 60,000
New Brunswick 50,000
$260,000
and an annual grant in aid of each Province shall be made, equal to eighty cents per head of the population, as established by the Census of 1861, and in the case of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, by each subsequent decennial census until the population of each of those Provinces shall amount to 400,000 souls, at which [illegible] [rate] it shall thereafter be established [remain]. Such aid shall be in full settlement of all future demands upon the General Govt. for local purposes, and shall be paid half yearly in advance to each Province
[Reverse]
amended as 63 in [illegible] copy
passed 24 Decr
18279
That the [powers] + privileges of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of G.B. + I. shall be held to appertain to the House of Commons of the Confederation [illegible], and all such [the] powers + privileges appertaining to the House of Lords in its legislative capacity, shall be held to appertain to the Legislative Council of the Confederation.
[Reverse]
31
Council
Decr 24
Endnotes
[1] The following resolutions span two days—December 20th and December 24th, 1866. More study is needed to confirm their relation to the “penultimate working draft,” particularly the scrap resolutions from December 20th. One, document, at the very least (18301) regarding “peace, welfare, good government” was not incorporated into the penultimate draft, but has been added to this collection due to its dating. There is also a document found amidst these papers, 18274, appointing Galt, Howland, Henry, and Tilley to a finance committee. We used Pope’s Confederation… (1895), p. 96 to determine that this was from December 6, 1866. The date of document 18276 remains to be determined, but is from December, 1866.
Bracketed titles above each entry are ours and not part of the document. All of them have been hyperlinked. The intention is to separate the drafts.
[2] This means the other side of the page and will be used for other documents that have writing on both sides of the page.
[3] This is referring to the portion crossed out.
[4] This note from Joseph Pope, who had previously made use of Macdonald’s papers in his work.
[5] More study is needed to date this draft.
[6] More study is needed to date this draft more precisely.