Return To Politics
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.
Read more about this topic: Louis-Joseph Papineau
Famous quotes containing the words return to, return and/or politics:
“I hate that word. It’s return—a return to the millions of people who’ve never forgiven me for deserting the screen.”
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“We perceive that the schemers return again and again to common sense and labor. Such is the evidence of history.”
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“...to many a mother’s heart has come the disappointment of a loss of power, a limitation of influence when early manhood takes the boy from the home, or when even before that time, in school, or where he touches the great world and begins to be bewildered with its controversies, trade and economics and politics make their imprint even while his lips are dewy with his mother’s kiss.”
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