Political Heritage
While the trial of Haldimand never took place, the actions taken by du Calvet had a decisive influence on the course of Quebec's history. He undoubtedly contributed to the involvement of citizens, French-speaking and English-speaking, Catholic and Protestant, in a common effort to obtain a House of Assembly for the Province of Quebec. Indeed, a few months after the probable arrival of the first copies of his collection of letters, numerous persons were signing the Petition of Ancient and New Subjects for a House of Assembly dated November 24, 1784.
Louis-Joseph Papineau evoked his memory in his last public speech at the Institut canadien de Montréal in December 1867. Like numerous others of his generation, he knew the story of du Calvet, and possibly met him as he was an acquaintance of his father.
In 1877, Louis Fréchette dedicated a poem entitled Du Calvet in his collection of poems La Légende d'un peuple. Relating in verse the story of his fight, he made him a national hero, the "first champion of our civic battles".
Éva Circé-Côté dedicated chapter V of her book Papineau - Son influence sur la pensée canadienne to "the one who inaugurated the most glorious period of our annals".
Read more about this topic: Pierre Du Calvet
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“Not being a K.N. [Know-Nothing] I am left as a sort of waif on the political sea with symptoms of a mild sort towards Black Republicanism.”
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