Louis-Joseph Papineau - Return To Politics

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In 1848, he was elected member of the new united Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada in the riding of Saint-Maurice. In severe disagreement with the emerging French Canadian Liberal Party, he became an independent Member of Parliament. A convinced republican after a long exile in the United States and France, Papineau supported the Montreal Annexation Manifesto that called for Canada to join the United States of America. At the time, it was a logical move for Papineau and his followers. The United States was an ally of France, French was the second language of America, and the assimilation of the Louisiana Cajuns to American English culture had not occurred yet. This became a reality only after the Civil War.

Louis-Joseph Papineau, along with John Molson Jr., the son of John Molson, and Horatio Gates, served as the first Vice-Presidents of the Montreal Mechanics' Institute. He participated in the creation of the Parti rouge. He was defeated in 1851, but elected in a by-election in 1852. He did not present himself again in the elections of 1854. He retired from public life and reappeared only once to hold a conference at the Institut canadien de Montréal in December 1867. He died at his manor in Montebello, Quebec near the modern Château Montebello on September 25, 1871.

Papineau's manor house in Montebello and his house in Montreal have both been designated as National Historic Sites of Canada.

On October 21st 2012, a monument to his memory was unveiled at Saint-Denis-sur-Richelieu by Québec Premier Pauline Marois.