The Great Seal of Canada (French: Grand Sceau du Canada) is a seal used for official purposes of state in Canada. While the seal is affixed to Acts of Parliament that have been granted Royal Assent (and thus passing them into law), the seal is also used for granting commissions to representatives of Her Majesty the Queen, as well as cabinet ministers, judges and other senior officials. Many other officials, such as officers in Her Majesty's Canadian Forces, receive commissions affixed with the Privy Seal and not the Great Seal.
The first Great Seal of Canada was carved in the United Kingdom in 1869 and sent to Canada to replace a temporary seal which had been used since Canadian Confederation in 1867; it depicted Queen Victoria seated beneath a canopy.
Old seals are destroyed whenever a new monarch takes the throne. The current Great Seal was made at the Royal Canadian Mint when Queen Elizabeth II succeeded her father in 1952 and it went into use in 1955. The seal is made of specially tempered steel, weighs 3.75 kilograms, and is 127 millimetres in diameter. The image depicts the Queen enthroned and robed, holding the orb and sceptre, and shows her sitting on the coronation chair with the 1957 version of the Royal Arms of Canada in front, and is inscribed REINE DU CANADA— ELIZABETH II— QUEEN OF CANADA. The inscriptions on it are in French and English. Previous Great Seals of Canada were inscribed in Latin.
While the governor general is the keeper of the Great Seal, the Queen's representative places it in the protection of the Registrar General of Canada. Each of the provinces has its own unique great seal for similar purposes, which is used by the lieutenant governor of the province, and kept by the provincial attorney general.
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Famous quotes containing the words seal and/or canada:
“What is the seal of liberation?—No longer to be ashamed in our own presence.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“What makes the United States government, on the whole, more tolerable—I mean for us lucky white men—is the fact that there is so much less of government with us.... But in Canada you are reminded of the government every day. It parades itself before you. It is not content to be the servant, but will be the master; and every day it goes out to the Plains of Abraham or to the Champs de Mars and exhibits itself and toots.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)