Not a stranger shall hold one inch of its strand,
Her face turns to Britain, her back to the Gulf,
Come near at your peril, Canadian Wolf.
(anti-Confederation song)
Within ten years of attaining responsible government in 1855,
Newfoundland faced another political debate concerning its
constitutional future, one which was not resolved until Confederation with Canada was resoundingly rejected in the 1869 Newfoundland election. The Confederation issue of this period was
played out against a background of several years in the early 1860s
of economic depression, a depression which led many Newfoundlanders
to regard the issue as a viable option to their economic woes.
This depression was of local origins caused by a succession of
short cod and seal fisheries, market difficulties, and potato
blight.
With approximately 162,000 people scattered along the Island's many bays and inlets, 89% of the workforce was involved in the fishery and fish and seal products made up 95% of Newfoundland's total exports, which went chiefly to Europe, the West Indies and Brazil. There was little market agriculture and most of imports came mainly from Britain and the United States (about 65%), while Canada provided the other 25%, and remainder came from elsewhere. The fisheries itself ran on a credit system.
Fishermen were advanced supplies on credit in
the spring, and they sold their catch to their
supplier in the fall receiving payment--assuming they had a credit balance--in
goods rather than cash. Cash was a scarce
commodity in outport Newfoundland. Merchants
tended to charge as much as they could for
supplies advanced on credit, and to pay as
little as possible for the fish. This practice, together with the natural uncertainties
of both the seal and cod fisheries, and the
vagaries of the markets, kept most fishermen
either in poverty or on the brink of it.
(Quoted in Hiller, "Newfoundland Confronts
Canada", in E.R. Forbes and D.A. Muise, eds.
The Atlantic Provinces in Confederation, 1993,
p. 435)
With regard to the fisheries, dried cod exports declined from
over 1,138,000 quintals in 1860 to less than 850,000 in 1864. This
represented a drop in value for the same period from £846,000 to
£798,000. As for the seal fishery, the total catch of seals
declined from over 440,000 in 1860 to about 268,000 in 1862.
Technological change in the seal fishery during the 1860s, which
saw St. John's and the larger Conception Bay towns begin to
dominate the fishery with large steam vessels, also resulted in
fewer men being employed. In the late 1850s over 14,000 men were
engaged in the seal fishery; by the early 1870s there were only
approximately 9,600 men declining further to 3,600 by 1900 (Hiller,
"Newfoundland Confronts Canada," p. 435).
Naturally, there was also a resultant decline in government
revenue for the early 1860s which dropped from £133,000 in 1860 to
£90,000 in 1861. For the years 1862, 1863, and 1864, the Hoyles
government ran a deficit on current account; in 1861 the floating
debt stood at £18,000, whereas in 1865 it had doubled to £36,000.
Bishop Feild observed in 1862 that, except for the St. John's fire
and hurricane in 1846, never had the colony been in a worst
depressed condition in the past twenty years. He noted that "it
has been brought into this condition partly by political troubles,
but mainly by three years' decline of the seal-fishery and two
years bad, the last very bad, cod-fishery.... This spring the
coast has been blockaded with ice in a manner and degree never
before known in the memory of any living man.... The distress and
poverty, in consequence, all over the island have been dreadful"
(Edward C. Moulton The Political History of Newfoundland, 18611869, M.A. thesis, Memorial University, 1960, 11922). Compounding
matters was the large increase in the Island's population, which
between 1857 and 1868 increased by 19.5% or 24,000 inhabitants,
almost all by natural increase.
By the early 1860s many public men recognized that the fishery
would not in itself be able to continue to support the Island's
growing population. In his 1863 pastoral message, for instance,
Bishop Mullock stressed the urgency of finding alternate sources of
employment, while in his 1864 Throne Speech, Governor Bannerman
warned that widespread poverty would be the end-result if such
sources were not found. As for the Hoyles government, it attempted
to stimulate other fisheries such as herring, salmon, mackerel, and
cod on the Grand Banks. It also encouraged efforts to diversify
the economy and in 1864 instituted a geological survey to examine
the mineral potential of the island. In 1866 it established a
scheme of bounty payments for the clearing and cultivation of
wastelands in the hope that people would mix farming and lumbering
with their fishing activities. There was also growing government
interest in the French Shore area as an outlet for population and
fishing, farming, and mining development, especially in light of
encouraging reports from the geological survey that such potential
existed there. By 1874 the French Shore had approximately 8,600
Newfoundland settlers who had no political representation in the
colonial legislature, and paid no taxes.
The major problem facing the Conservative governments of the
1860s, as it did the previous Liberal administrations, remained
poor relief. With the decline in government revenue in the early
1860s, the colony's ability to meet the growing demands for relief
expenditures became pushed to the limit. In 1861 relief
expenditures totalled £20,000 as compared to £6,000 the previous
year. Attempts by the Hoyles government to bring in stringent
regulations for applicants as well as limiting relief to the
permanent poor-- "the sick and infirm and destitute widows and
orphans"--met with abject failure. Relief expenditures for 1862
climbed to £32,000, a total equalling one-quarter of all government
revenue for that year, because assistance had to be given to the
able-bodied poor as well. 1863 did not bring any relief in such
expenditures, the figure for that year being slightly lower at
£26,000. In closing the legislature for 1863, Governor Bannerman
direly warned that, if such expenditures continued then the colony
would soon be bankrupt (Moulton, The Political History of Newfoundland, 18611869, 13435). In summary, relief expenditures between
1861 and 1865 averaged about 23 percent of current revenue. In
1864 the Hoyles government brought in legislation to provide for
the levy of poor rates, but it had to be withdrawn in the face of
Liberal opposition that the people could not afford such assessments and that the bill did nothing to alleviate the real problem
behind pauperism--the need to find employment for the people. The
following year the Assembly again refused to act on the notion of
imposing a property assessment despite its strong endorsement from
Governor Musgrave.
It is against this background that the issue of political
Confederation with Canada in 1864 first beckoned on the Newfoundland political scene. Newfoundland did not send any delegates to
the 1864 Charlottetown Conference but sent two observers, Frederick
Carter and Ambrose Shea, to the Quebec Conference held later in the
year. The two men had no authority to bind the island to any kind
of agreement, although they believed that Confederation would lead
to greater outside investment in and diversification of the local
economy. They brought back with them proposed terms of union. In
summary, these were, first, the federal government would assume
Newfoundland's public debt and pay in addition an annual amount of
$115,000 which was equal to an amount of 5% on the difference
between the greater per capita public debt of the proposed federal
government and the lesser per capita public debt of Newfoundland.
Second, the federal government would pay Newfoundland an annual
subsidy of eighty cents per capita of its population. Third, the
federal government would take over all crown lands and mineral
rights in return for an annual payment of $150,000. In Newfoundland, there was cautious reaction to the proposals, but there was
one prominent merchant and mining speculator, Charles Fox Bennett,
who strongly condemned them and would emerge as the major opponent
of Newfoundland confederating with the other colonies.
Bennett owned about one million acres in mineral rights, which
would be transferred to the federal government under such terms of
union and had much to lose. Born in Shaftesbury, Dorset, England
in 1793, he had come to Newfoundland in 1808 where he soon became
a mercantile clerk in St. John's. By the early 1820s he had
established his own general fishery supply company supplying
fishermen in Placentia, St. Mary's, and Fortune Bays. Bennett
supported the campaign for a colonial legislature in the late 1820s
and was a confidant of Governor Cochrane. From the 1830s he
differed from his fellow merchants involved in the fish trade
through his efforts at economic diversification; besides operating
a brewery, a distillery and a foundry at St. John's, he acquired
extensive land rights on which he searched for minerals. He was
active in agricultural pursuits, owning a large farm outside St.
John's. Unlike many of his fellow merchants, Bennett, exhibited
his "life-long conviction that Newfoundland had considerable
economic potential in addition to its fisheries, a point of view
that was regarded as visionary in the first half of the 19th
century" (J.K. Hiller, "Charles James Fox Bennett", Dictionary of
Canadian Biography, vol. XI). In the campaign of the 1850s for
responsible government, Bennett was an ardent opponent as an
appointed member of the Legislative Council and a member of the
Executive Council. He consistently argued that Newfoundland was
ill-suited for responsible government, because it would give
control of any elective government to the Roman Catholic population.
With an election due in 1865, Premier Hoyles had decided to
retire and postponed any discussion of the terms of union until
after an election to prevent Confederation from becoming a divisive
issue in any forthcoming campaign. In April 1865 he retired from
politics to accept a judgeship of the Supreme Court. His successor
was Carter who formed a coalition government with the help of two
prominent Liberals, Ambrose Shea and John Kent. While Carter and
Shea were well-known confederates, the basis for the coalition, as
noted earlier, was to implement the principle of elite accommodation, or denominational compromise, that all public figures
acknowledged would be necessary for sectarian harmony as a result
of the political events of 1861. Because there was considerable
opposition among the mercantile community to Confederation, Carter
also decided not to make Confederation an issue in the election to
be held in 1865, promising, instead, that another election would be
held on the matter. Carter's coalition government, which easily
won the election, included in its ranks both confederates and anti-confederates.
Little active public discussion took place in either 1866 or
1867 on the Confederation issue. In 1868, however, the Carter
government seized the initiative sensing that continued economic
hard times may convince people to see Confederation more favourably. Faced with a poor fishery and declining revenues in that year,
the government found itself forced to increase taxes on staples
products such as flour, pork, butter, and tea, as well as levy a
20% increase in the duty on most other imported items. Alarmed at
these tax increases, many merchants began to look to Confederation
as a means of lowering taxation, while confederates became more
vocal in advocating their cause, which had the support of all
newspapers in St. John's except the Patriot. The confederate cause
also had the strong backing of Governor Musgrave, who frequently
urged his ministers not to delay any further the Confederation
issue, now that four of the British North American colonies had
united in 1867. Anti-confederate feeling among the St. John's
Irish ran high; one petition, for instance, in 1868 against
political union had over 2,000 signatures and the endorsement of
ten leading mercantile firms.
The battle lines for the Confederation issue became drawn in
1869 when Carter decided to bring the matter before the legislature. He had terms, based on those brought back from the 1864
Quebec conference, brought before the Assembly, which accepted them
on the pre-condition, that no attempt would be made by the
government to bring about union until after the holding of an
election on the issue. The Canadian government accepted Newfoundland's proposed terms with minor modifications and had them ratified
by the Canadian Parliament. The terms were the following: first,
the federal government would assume all Newfoundland's debts and
liabilities and provide an annual payment of $106,000 to make up
for the difference in the per capita debt of Canada and Newfoundland; second, Newfoundland would receive a grant of eighty cents
per capita or $104,000 annually on an upward escalating scale as
the population increased; third, Newfoundland would receive
$150,000 annually from the transfer of crown lands and mineral
rights to the federal government; fourth, there would be a special
subsidy of $35,000 bringing the total annual financial payments to
Newfoundland to $395,000; fifth, the Canadian government would pay
for the upkeep of judges, the governor, post office, customs
houses, steamer service, fishery patrols, lighthouses, the
geological survey and would provide better steamer connections to
Canada and Great Britain; sixth, it was agreed that, to protect the
Newfoundland fishery, no tax would be placed upon Newfoundland
exports unless it was placed on similar exports from the rest of
Canada; and seventh, Newfoundland would have eight members of the
House of Commons and four senators in Parliament at Ottawa.
Opposition to Confederation came from Charles Fox Bennett and
the rump of the Liberal Party which remained in political opposition after the 1865 election. Bennett had set forth his opposition
to Confederation in numerous articles to the press between 1864 and
1869. He asserted that Confederation was of no financial benefit
to Newfoundlanders, would transfer ownership of the colony's
natural resources to Ottawa, and lead to higher taxes. For the
Liberals, who had the support of most of Newfoundland's Roman
Catholic population, they felt a strong attachment to responsible
government, which they had been so instrumental in obtaining in the
early 1850s. Details of the 1869 election, in which the Carter
Confederates lost, can be found in Hiller's Confederation Defeated:
The Newfoundland Election of 1869.
The victors in the 1869 election consisted of a mixed group of
Protestant conservative politicians led by Premier Bennett, an
Anglican and opponent of responsible government in the 1850s but
now a champion of Newfoundland nationalism and self-government, and
Roman Catholic Liberals. Bennett was personally elected in the
Catholic district of Placentia-St. Mary's. As for the opposition,
they were a combination of moderate Protestant and Roman Catholic
politicians led by Frederick Carter, but excluding Shea who lost
his seat in the election. Carter willingly accepted the outcome of
the election and decided not to press the Confederation issue
further if his party wished to regain political power at the next
election. Since Bennett's government had the support of most of
the Island's Roman Catholic population, Carter's strategy was to
portray the Bennett government as a predominantly Roman Catholic
administration and thus prey upon Protestant fears of Roman
Catholic domination once more, a strategy in which moderate Roman
Catholics within his party acquiesced for political expediency.
As for the Bennett government, Bennett sought to retain
political support by continuing to label the opposition as
confederates and by courting the Anglican vote which, combined with
his Roman Catholic support, would assure him of a majority at the
next election. He sought to firm up the Anglican vote through
proposed legislation sub-dividing the protestant education grant,
a goal Bishop Feild still much desired. When his Inspector of
Protestant Schools in 1871 opposed the proposed legislation because
it would severely affect the quality of education and result in the
building of more schools that would be a "waste of expense and
needless trouble...when the present ones are sufficient to
accommodate the pupils" (W.D. MacWhirter, A Political History of
Newfoundland, 18651874, M.A. thesis, Memorial University, 1963,
98), Bennett withdrew the bill.
The early years of the Bennett government were prosperous
because of a succession of good fisheries since 1869. The new-found prosperity enabled the government to reduce taxation on food
and clothing and to increase the annual votes for public services,
including an improved coastal steam service and the inauguration of
a direct steam service to England was established. With the
withdrawal in 1870 of the Imperial garrison from the island, the
following year the government organized its own police force-- the
Terra Nova Constabulary--which was modelled along the lines of the
Royal Irish Constabulary. Political success followed economic
prosperity for Bennett; in 1871 he won three byelections, one of
which came from the opposition.
In the 1873 general election in which he again campaigned on
an anti-confederate theme, Bennett won re-election with a reduced
majority of four seats. Carter had managed to increase his
representation in the Assembly by playing the sectarian card of
Protestant fears of Roman Catholic domination and by using the
growing influence of the Orange Order, first established in 1863 in
Newfoundland, as part of this strategy which included the dropping
of any support for Confederation as well. Leading Orangemen such
as the Grand Master, A.J.W. McNeilly, and William Whiteway, were
members of the Carter opposition. For the most part, the Order was
responsible for Carter winning four seats from the government.
Bennett's return to office, however, was short-lived for his
government soon committed, what one historian--Ian Mcdonald--has
termed "inadvertent suicide." With one seat vacant as a result of
a retirement and expected to return a Conservative, Bennett's
simply allowed his four-seat majority to disappear. First, one
member defected to the opposition after he married Carter's
daughter. Two more resigned after Bennett conceded to their wishes
to be appointed magistrates in return for past services. They had
informed Bennett that, since other members had planned to defect,
he should permit their resignations and make the appointments
because his government would collapse anyway. Although the
rumoured three did not cross the floor, Bennett was left with a
minority of one after appointing a Speaker from the government
ranks. Bennett, however, chose to resign instead of meeting the
Assembly.
Carter formed a new administration and remained in power for
the 1874 session with the help of the Speaker's vote. Later in
1874 he won a majority victory in an election, whose outcome saw
political parties returning, to their pre-1869 formation--with the
opposition Liberals representing all the Roman Catholic seats and
the Carter government all the Protestant seats. Yet, this
religious division was no longer the basis for ideological
differences between Liberals and Conservatives since both parties
came to share in the 1870s similar views on economic development
for the colony. The denominational compromise of the early 1860s
had ensured that Roman Catholics would no longer have to worry over
their rights on education and positions in the civil service. The
political party lines by the early 1880s would become centered
along class and economic rather than religious differences.
Source: Melvin Baker, "History 3120 Manual: Newfoundland
History, 1815-1972", Division of Continuing Studies, Memorial University,
1994, revision of 1986 edition)