The John A. Macdonald Retrospective 2-Book Bundle. Ged Martin

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СКАЧАТЬ influence, “to keep my place in parliament ... I can do more good there.” But while he remained in politics, sheer ability made him an inescapable choice as party leader. Even in the aftermath of the Militia Bill debacle, the “immeasurably inferior” John Hillyard Cameron failed to oust him as caucus leader. As the governor of New Brunswick wrote in 1865, “Macdonald (when not drunk) is a really powerful man.” Once again, John A. Macdonald dealt with the alcohol issue by announcing he would join the temperance movement.

      The new premier, Sandfield Macdonald, skilfully kept his insecure ministry afloat for twenty-two months. Unfortunately, his big idea, the double majority, ensured that the divided province achieved little at a time when there were so many challenges to tackle. John A. Macdonald even put out feelers for a possible alliance with George Brown. Brown replied that he would “sustain” a Conservative ministry if it enacted representation by population. However, he rejected coalition as “demoralizing” and refused “friendly personal intercourse” with Macdonald until his 1856 allegations were “entirely withdrawn.”

      John A. Macdonald promised to provide “gentlemanlike and patriotic opposition” in Parliament. Sandfield’s ministry was “in a great mess & cannot possibly go on, but I am doing what I can to keep them up,” he claimed in March 1863. “They will fall from their own weakness and not from the attacks of the opposition.” Six weeks later, as mighty American armies clashed at Chancellorsville, he carried a censure motion and forced Sandfield into a general election: continental crisis had not yet compelled Canada’s politicians to soar above faction fighting. Campaigning as “a simple citizen of Kingston,” Macdonald faced Reformer Overton S. Gildersleeve, a young, respected, and highly successful local businessman. Gildersleeve’s vote equalled Mowat’s 1861 tally, marking him as a long-term threat. The Conservatives did badly across Upper Canada but the overall political situation remained unstable. Sandfield clung to a wafer-thin majority but, on March 21, 1864, he staged a tactical resignation, boasting that his opponents could not replace him.

      At first, John A. Macdonald refused to accept office: he had “strong private reasons urging him to look more closely to his own affairs.” Once again, the wild card of mortality had intervened. Although only forty-one, his partner, Archie John MacDonell, was fatally ill: his death, on March 27, automatically dissolved their law firm. Winding up their joint accounts would reveal that the practice was chronically insolvent. “It was utter ruin to me to return to the Government and I declined,” Macdonald later recalled. Taking office would also mean fighting a ministerial by-election, and Macdonald had probably concluded months earlier that the ambitious Gildersleeve would throw money into such a contest which the near-bankrupt John A. could not match. But death took a hand here too. On March 9, aged just thirty-nine, Gildersleeve died of a heart attack. Kingston’s Reformers had no obvious alternative candidate, and John A. Macdonald might survive a by-election after all.

      Premier Sandfield Macdonald was indeed hard to replace. A Reformer, A.J. Fergusson-Blair, failed to form a ministry, Cartier ran into problems, and there was even talk of drafting Alexander Campbell, who had never held office. Étienne Taché was prepared to come out of retirement, but he demanded John A. Macdonald as his Upper Canada deputy. Macdonald was “wrapped in slumber” late one March evening when Cartier, Campbell, and Fergusson-Blair hammered at the front door of his lodgings and roused him from his midnight slumber. They delivered an ultimatum. If he would not forget his business worries and join them, they would abandon their attempts to form a Cabinet and allow Sandfield to bounce back in triumph. John A. Macdonald did not need long to consider. He returned to the dreary wasteland of colonial politics.

      4

      1864–1867

      Confederation, Under a Female Sovereign

      The insecure government formed by Etienne Taché in March 1864 faced collapse within eleven weeks. Nonetheless, John A. Macdonald’s decision to take office under Taché proved a turning point in his career. In mid-June, the Cabinet was reconstructed to become the “Great Coalition” which launched Confederation. The revised ministry was essentially a deal between Cartier’s Bleus and George Brown’s Grits: if Macdonald had not already joined in March, there would have been no room to bring him aboard in June.

      Aside from its collective desire to oust Sandfield Macdonald, the March 1864 minority government had no “big idea.” Sandfield had quarrelled with the Irish Catholics, so their representative, Reformer Michael Foley, was invited into the new Cabinet. When Foley cautiously enquired about the ministry’s guiding principles, John A. Macdonald jovially urged him to “join the Government and then help make the policy.” In Parliament, Macdonald implied that the new Cabinet endorsed the Confederation bid of 1858. “The Government had done all in its power to have this federation remedy adopted” — but, unfortunately, the Maritimers were not interested. As a policy statement, it was watertight. As a blueprint for action, it was unhelpful.

      Taking an independent line in politics, Brown secured a parliamentary committee on constitutional change. His task force reported in June “in favour of changes in the direction of a federative system” — but whether for the province of Canada or the whole of British North America remained an open question. John A. Macdonald opposed the report: he favoured “a complete union,” but he knew compromise was required. His 1861 election manifesto had briefly talked of federation, but with “an efficient central government” — the British model adapted to learn from American failures. The mid-June ministerial crisis concluded with George Brown joining the Cabinet to resolve Canada’s sectional disagreements. Although it united to carry Confederation, the Great Coalition was also a continuation of factional fighting in a new guise: Brown and Macdonald grasped each other not by the hand but by the throat. In the tense negotiations of June 1864, Macdonald out-manoeuvred his enemy on four issues, but — on the most crucial — his victory contained a time bomb.

      As in 1862, Brown initially promised independent support for constitutional reform, claiming it was “quite impossible” for him to sit in Cabinet alongside political enemies. It was easy to foresee that some issue would soon outrage Brown’s implacable conscience, and Macdonald was not alone in insisting that it was “essential” that he joined. Macdonald then faced down Brown’s reasonable demand that the Grits, dominant in Upper Canada, should have four of that section’s six Cabinet places: his rival conceded only three. Macdonald’s comment that “he had been for some time, anxious to retire from the Government, and would be quite ready to facilitate arrangements by doing so,” was a threatening reminder that he was indispensable. A third issue was Brown’s demand that Macdonald publicly retract the allegations he had made between 1849 and 1856 over the penitentiary enquiry. It seems that Macdonald soothingly sidestepped the commitment. Brown never received his “public reparation,” and his resentment festered at being cheated of revenge.

      The fourth — and major — issue concerned the coalition’s policy. Brown wanted to reorganize the province of Canada as a local (Ontario-Quebec) federation, with provision for the Maritimes and the West to join later. Initially, of course, the central legislature would be dominated by Upper Canada’s population and hence run by Upper Canada’s Grits — a structure that might be unattractive to potential new members. Macdonald’s counter-proposal, “a Federal Union of all the British North American Provinces,” was dismissed by Brown as “uncertain and remote,” no solution to the “existing evils.” However, one development worked in favour of the wider scheme. The governments of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island were considering an Atlantic regional union. If the Canadians could secure an invitation to the planned Maritime Union conference in September, and if they could argue persuasively for Confederation, then the larger union might become a practical option. “If it had not been for this fortunate coincidence of events,” Macdonald said in 1865, “never, perhaps ... would we have been able to bring this scheme to a practical conclusion.” The Great Coalition СКАЧАТЬ