History of Monarchy in Canada - Confederation and The Dominion

Confederation and The Dominion

Prior to the confederation of Canada, in which Queen Victoria took personal interest, a number of issues were of prime concern in the deliberations on the amalgamation of the four Canadian provinces into a country, most notably, the threat of invasion by the United States. It was the explicit intention of the Fathers of Confederation to unite the disparate British entities in North America into a single state under a constitutional monarchy, the men seeing that form of government as a balance between the autocracy of the Russian Empire and the popular sovereignty of the United States, the latter having just led to the American Civil War, which was seen as "the final stage in the discredit of democracy and republicanism." A Canadian crown, the Fathers thought, would ensure diversity and racial harmony in Canada, thereby strengthening its legal and cultural sovereignty, especially considering the presence of the United States and its policy of Manifest Destiny. At the 1864 Charlottetown Conference, the deligates agreed unanimously that the new federation should be a constitutional monarchy.

By the mid-1860s, neither the name nor the location of the capital of the hypothetical new union had been settled. On the former issue, various suggestions were put forward—including Victorialand, in honour of the Queen—but John A. Macdonald and then Governor General of the Province of Canada, the Viscount Monk, supported the name Kingdom of Canada, to "fix the monarchical basis of the constitution." The proposal, however, caused worries in the Foreign and Colonial Office in London that such a title would provoke the republican United States and a compromise term, Dominion, was adopted instead. Which city would serve as the capital of this Dominion was left by the British North America Act, 1867—the Act of Parliament confederating Canada on 1 July of that year—to be decided by Queen Victoria, who has since been dubbed the "Mother of Confederation". From a list that included various well-established cities in Upper and Lower Canada, Victoria chose the small community of Bytowne (later renamed as Ottawa) on the grounds that it was defensible, located on a major waterway, and sat on the border between the two largest provinces of Canada, Quebec and Ontario.

The new constitution vested in the Queen responsibility for peace, order, and good government, as D'Arcy McGee had desired. In practice, though, the Second Reform Act, 1867, and the emergence of a two-party system decreased Victoria's personal room for manoeuvre. Still, the ceremonial role for the monarchy remained unaltered and the first visit of a member of the Royal Family to the Dominion of Canada took place two years after its creation; the sovereign's second son, Prince Arthur, arrived for training with the Rifle Brigade based at Montreal; of the Prince, the Lady Lisgar, wife of Governor General the Lord Lisgar, noted in a letter to Victoria that Canadians seemed hopeful Prince Arthur would one day return as governor general himself. In the same year, Rupert's Land was ceded to the Crown in Right of Canada from the Hudson's Bay Company, pulling it into the jurisdiction of the Northwest Territories. This move sparked a Métis rebellion and the establishment by Louis Riel of a provisional republican government in the Red River Valley. Following negotiations with Riel's government, the province of Manitoba was established in 1870 by the granting of Royal Assent to the Manitoba Act by Governor General the Earl of Dufferin.

As successor to Dufferin, rather than sending Arthur to Canada as her representative, Queen Victoria, on the advice of her British privy council, instead appointed her son-in-law, the Marquess of Lorne, in 1878. This meant that, for the first time, Rideau Hall would have a permanent royal resident: Victoria's fourth daughter, Princess Louise. When the news reached Canada that a daughter of the Queen would be viceregal consort of Canada, a "thrill of joy burst upon the Dominion"; it was felt the Princess would be a strong link between Canadians and their sovereign. However, the couple were initially not received well by the Canadian press, which complained about the imposition of royalty on the country's hitherto un-regal society, which was only exasperated by mishaps and misunderstandings, and the resulting negative press horrified the Princess. Louise endeared herself by making clear she had no pretenses and eventually the worries of a rigid court at the Queen's Canadian residence turned out to be unfounded; the royal couple were found to be more relaxed than their predecessors, as demonstrated at the many Ice skating and tobogganing parties, balls, dinners, and other state occasions hosted by the Marquess and Marchioness. The pair also made extensive tours of the country; their three month visit to British Columbia in 1882 did much to reconcile the local inhabitants to Confederation. The Princess proved so popular that when the Governor General announced that the awaited completion of the transcontinental railway would pass through Kicking Horse Pass into what has since become Vancouver, rather than by the Yellowhead Pass to Bute Inlet, Premier Robert Beaven asked the Duke whether it would be possible for Vancouver Island to become a separate kingdom with Princess Louise as queen.

The royal couple made a number of lasting contributions to Canadian society, especially in the realm of the arts and sciences, including the establishment of the Royal Society of Canada, the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, and the National Gallery of Canada. Louise was proficient in watercolour and oil painting, hanging many of her own works around Rideau Hall and painting sprigs of apple blossoms on doors along the palace's Monck Wing corridor (one of which remains to the present), as well as overseeing the creation of the statue of Queen Victoria that stands on McGill University campus. Various locations were named for her, including Alberta, and the Princess herself gave the name Regina to the capital of Saskatchewan. In all, Louise made such an impression on Canadian life that at her funeral on 12 December 1939, her coffin was bourne by her own Canadian regiment, the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders of Canada.

In Queen Victoria's latter years, both her Golden and Diamond Jubilees—held in 1887 and 1897 to celebrate the 50th and 60th anniversaries, respectively, of the Queen's accession—were marked with great displays and public ceremonies in Canada, as well as colonial conferences held in the United Kingdom and attended by the prime ministers of the Dominions. For the Diamond Jubilee in Britain, Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier was invited and Canadian troops partook in Victoria's procession on the day of celebration, 22 June. In Canada, a series of commemorative stamps, the first ever produced by the country, was issued on 19 June and streets were decorated in cities and towns to mark Accession Day and the 22 June public holiday, on which fêtes brought Canadians of different ethnicities together. On that day, the Queen sent a telegram to all the Dominions, the message arriving in Canada five minutes after being sent from Buckingham Palace.

In between the jubilees, in December 1894, Prime Minister John Thompson died at Windsor Castle when there to be admitted by the Queen to the imperial privy council, being struck with a heart attack mere hours after the ceremony. Victoria, then aged and using a wheelchair, was wheeled into St. George's Chapel, where Thompson lay-in-state, and placed a wreath on her former prime minister's coffin. This moment was captured in a painting by Frederic Bell-Smith, but the canvas was destroyed in the burning of the Centre Block in 1916.

Victoria herself died at Osborne House on 22 January 1901, after a reign lasting almost 64 years—the longest in British and Canadian history—and was succeeded by her eldest son, King Edward VII. Canada mourned the loss of Victoria and the Earl of Minto, then governor general, and Wilfrid Laurier were at odds over which church in Ottawa should host the official memorial service for the late queen; Minto favoured the Church of England cathedral, respecting the church to which Victoria had belonged, while Laurier and other ministers attended services of their own communion. Still, this minor dispute did not affect the mark left on Canada by Victoria's long and popular reign, which resulted in many places being named in her honour and monuments to her, such as statues on Parliament Hill and throughout the provinces. The Queen's reign was permanently memorialised in Canada when, in the spring of 1901, it was decided by parliament that 24 May would continue as a holiday marking the late Queen's birthday, named as Victoria Day, to distinguish it from the King's birthday celebration to be held in November.