FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[167]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[168]Can. Arch., C. 284, p. 211.[169]Memoir of G. J. Mountain, D.D., Montreal, 1866, p. 53.[170]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[171]C. F. Grece,Facts and Observations respecting Canada, London, 1819, p. 52.[172]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[173]Quebec Almanac, 1818, andCan. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, II.[174]Quebec Gazette, July 17, 1826.[175]Record Office,Admiralty-Secretary In Letters, Bundle 4073.[176]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[177]Ibid.[178]Can. Arch., Q. 166, p. 371.[179]Ibid., C. 285, p. 63.[180]Ibid., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[181]Memorandum of W.B. Felton, October 1826 (Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, II.).[182]At the inquiry respecting Hill's proposition for penny postage, the assistant secretary of the general post office stated that the American packet, which sailed from England every ten days, carried 4000 letters each voyage, which did not pass through the post office (Life of Sir Rowland Hill, by George Birkbeck Hill, I. 303).[183]Can. Arch., G.P.O., Br. P.O. Transcripts, II.[184]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[185]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[186]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[187]Ibid., Q. 173, p. 372.[188]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.[189]Ibid., II.

[167]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[168]Can. Arch., C. 284, p. 211.

[169]Memoir of G. J. Mountain, D.D., Montreal, 1866, p. 53.

[170]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[171]C. F. Grece,Facts and Observations respecting Canada, London, 1819, p. 52.

[172]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[173]Quebec Almanac, 1818, andCan. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, II.

[174]Quebec Gazette, July 17, 1826.

[175]Record Office,Admiralty-Secretary In Letters, Bundle 4073.

[176]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[177]Ibid.

[178]Can. Arch., Q. 166, p. 371.

[179]Ibid., C. 285, p. 63.

[180]Ibid., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[181]Memorandum of W.B. Felton, October 1826 (Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, II.).

[182]At the inquiry respecting Hill's proposition for penny postage, the assistant secretary of the general post office stated that the American packet, which sailed from England every ten days, carried 4000 letters each voyage, which did not pass through the post office (Life of Sir Rowland Hill, by George Birkbeck Hill, I. 303).

[183]Can. Arch., G.P.O., Br. P.O. Transcripts, II.

[184]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[185]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[186]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[187]Ibid., Q. 173, p. 372.

[188]Can. Arch., Br. P.O. Transcripts, III.

[189]Ibid., II.

Postal conditions in Upper Canada—Serious abuses—Agitation for provincial control.

To those who have followed the course of events thus far, noting the uncompromising attitude of the general post office towards all propositions for the extension of the postal system in Canada, it will be obvious that a struggle for the means of communication impended, which the rapid growth of the country was fast precipitating.

The general post office claimed that it, and it alone, had power to establish a postal service in any part of the country, and it used its arrogated powers in the same manner as any commercial monopoly would be exercised. Post offices were opened in all the better settled parts of the country, where they could be operated profitably. They were refused in the newer districts, unless satisfactory guarantees were given that there would be no loss in working them.

A population was coming into the country rapidly, and was tending towards the inland parts of the province far from the line of post offices which skirted the shores of the St. Lawrence and lake Ontario, and the situation was becoming embarrassing, as well as humiliating to the sensitive pride of the people.

It was easy enough to open post offices on the route pursued by the mail courier from the eastern boundary of the province to Niagara. But it was frequently expensive to open new routes, and the provincial government of Upper Canada was disinclined to give guarantees against loss on particular routes, while it had evidence that considerable profits were being taken from the older routes, and sent to the general post office in London.

Just how acute the position of matters was becoming will be clear from a survey of the distribution of population in Upper Canada at this time, with a view of the post offices provided for the accommodation of the several parts. We are able to throw out our sketch of the state of settlement in Upper Canada, by employing the results of the census of 1824.

The total population of the province in 1824 was 149,941, of whom 63,000 were in the western district, that is, west of York. Between the eastern boundary of the province and York, there were twenty-six post offices. Four of these—Perth, Lanark, Richmond and Hawkesbury—served inland settlements, the nearest of which was over twenty-five miles from the St. Lawrence. The line of settlements which these four offices served was scattered over a territory over one hundred miles in length, and from twenty to thirty in width. It comprised a population of 12,476.

The remaining twenty-two offices, east of York, were, with one exception, situated on the shores of the river St. Lawrence and lake Ontario. Each afforded accommodation to a district about fourteen miles in length, and between twenty and thirty miles in depth. The mails were carried twice a week over this route. These arrangements gave a fair service to the settlements through which the couriers passed, but they compared meanly with the daily service from New York to Buffalo, on the other side of lake Ontario.

But it was the inland settlements west of York that had most reason to complain of the lack of facilities for communication. The Niagara peninsula, embracing the territory between lake Ontario and lake Erie, and lying west of a line dropped perpendicularly from Hamilton to lake Erie, contained a population of 20,000, distributed with fair evenness over a stretch of country forty-five miles in length, and from twenty-five to thirty in breadth.

The people of this district were served by four offices on its northern border—Dundas, Grimsby, St. Catherines and Niagara—and one office—Queenstown—on its eastern border. Although there were settlements in every part of the district, there was not a single post office within it on the lake Erie shore, or, indeed, anywhere farther inland than three miles from the shore of lake Ontario, or of the Niagara river.

Poorly provided as the Niagara district was, the people living in it had less ground for grievance in respect of post office facilities than the settlers in the London district. This district was an immense irregular block made up of the counties of Middlesex, Oxford, Brant, Norfolk and Elgin. It measured eighty miles in length, and from forty to fifty miles in depth. It contained in 1824 a population of 16,588, which, as in the other districts, was distributed through every part.

This great district had but five post offices in it, one in each county. The two offices on the lake Erie shore—Vittoria andPort Talbot—were sixty miles apart; while the three offices—Burford, Woodstock and Delaware—were twenty miles from lake Erie.

As illustrating the difficulty of moving the general post office to recognize the responsibility, which its claims of a monopoly seemed to impose on it, Dr. Rolph, who represented the county of Middlesex in the house of assembly, stated[190]that before the post office was opened at Delaware, he had made application to the deputy postmaster general for a post office in Middlesex county, and was told that the office would be established in the county if he would guarantee the expenses of the conveyance of the mails, but that his application could not be considered on any other terms.

As individual effort was plainly hopeless, the subject was taken up by the house of assembly of Upper Canada. The house dealt with the question vigorously, but not on the lines suggested by the foregoing review of the state of the postal service. More serious aspects of the case engaged their attention. Men on the streets and in farm houses believed that they were victims of imposition on the part of the deputy postmaster general, and that he was charging them more for the conveyance of their letters than the imperial statutes warranted, high as the legitimate charges were.

Discussion on these grievances brought the people forward to another point, and they asked themselves by what right the British government imposed on a self-governing community an institution like the post office, which not only fixed its charges without reference to the people of Upper Canada, but which insisted on preventing the people from establishing an institution of the same sort under their own authority.

It was to these questions that the house of assembly addressed itself. The rates of postage which were charged in Canada, were collected under the authority of an act of the imperial parliament passed in 1765. This act amended the act of Queen Anne's reign, which was regarded as the charter of the post office in British America.

The rates, as fixed by the act of 1765, were, for a single sheet of paper weighing less than an ounce, fourpence-halfpenny currency, if the distance the letter was carried did not exceed sixty miles; if the distance were from sixty to one hundred miles, the chargewas sevenpence; from one hundred to two hundred miles, ninepence, and for every one hundred miles beyond two hundred miles, twopence.

The first inquiry of the house was as to whether these rates, and no more, were charged for conveyance in Upper Canada. On February 29, 1820, William Allan, postmaster of York, was called to the bar of the house, and questioned as to the rates charged by him for letters to the several post offices in Upper Canada.

Allan did not know the distance to the post offices, but he furnished the table of rates which had been given to him. The house asked one of its members, Mahlon Burwell, a land surveyor, to state the several distances, when it appeared that every rate charged by the postmaster of York, was higher than the imperial act warranted.[191]

Thus the legal charge on a letter to Dundas was fourpence-halfpenny. The charge made by the postmaster of York was sevenpence. On letters to Grimsby, St. Catharines, Niagara and Queenston, the legal charge was sevenpence—Allan charged tenpence. Amherstburg, which was at the western limit of the province, was between two hundred and three hundred miles from York, and the charge should have been elevenpence. Instead of this sixteen pence was charged.

So far the house had made out its case, and on the following day it adopted a resolution that for several years past the rates of postage charged in Upper Canada had exceeded the charges authorized by law, and that the lieutenant governor should be requested to submit the question to the imperial authorities for a remedy.

Peregrine Maitland, the lieutenant governor, did as he was requested, and, when the resolution came before the postmaster general in England, Freeling, the secretary of the general post office, admitted, in reply[192]to the postmaster general's request for information, that the rates in British North America were regulated by the imperial act of 1765, but he held that there were other circumstances to be considered.

Freeling did not know whether the ordinary rates would produce sufficient revenue to cover the expenses of the service. If not, then he would refer the postmaster general to a letter written by General Hunter, the lieutenant governor in 1800, which containedan undertaking on the part of the lieutenant governor that, in case there was a deficit, the amount of the shortage would be made good either from the contingencies of the province, or by a vote of the legislature. Freeling would call upon the deputy postmaster general in Canada to report whether the legal postage would be equal to the expense. If so, there was no reason to require the province to grant any aid.

This explanation, like so many which had to be made at that period, lacked the essential element of sincerity. Hunter's engagement was to make good deficits, not by allowing illegal postal charges to be made, but by withdrawing the amount of the deficit from the provincial treasury. This was a point on which Freeling himself insisted on several occasions.

In Sir Gordon Drummond's time, there was an application from the military authorities for a more frequent service between Kingston and Montreal, which was coupled with an offer to pay such extra postage as would be necessary to cover the cost of the service desired. Freeling declared that such an offer could not be accepted, unless the additional charges were sanctioned by the British parliament.[193]

Another case, involving the same principle, arose about this time. Sutherland, the deputy postmaster general, desired to facilitate the interchange of correspondence with the United States, and reported to the postmaster general that he had arranged to have the American postage on letters coming from the United States to Canada collected by postmasters in Canada, at the same time as they collected the Canadian postage. Freeling objected to this arrangement as of doubtful legality, on the ground that the act of 1765 prescribed the amount which postmasters should take on every letter, and it might be necessary to amend the act to permit this scheme.[194]

The house of assembly, however, did not wait for the answer to their remonstrance. In the following session they gave themselves up to the consideration of the more vital questions, as to "how far the present system is sanctioned by law, and whether and in what manner the same can be beneficially altered." This was not the first occasion on which the right of the British post office to collect postage in Canada was called in question.

Governor Simcoe, in 1791,[195]assumed it as indisputable that, when a postal system was established in Upper Canada, it wouldbe under the control of the legislature, unless the British government by express enactment, retained the management of it in the hands of the British post office, paying over to the local government all surplus revenues arising therefrom. The question was not decided at that time, and it was only when the course pursued by the general post office was so unsatisfactory to Canadians that it was again raised.

A committee was appointed in 1821, to investigate the subject with Dr. W. W. Baldwin as chairman. On December 10 the report was laid before the assembly.[196]The committee had little help from the post office in pursuit of its inquiries. The only official available, the postmaster of York, was examined, but whether from unwillingness or want of knowledge, he contributed little information to the inquiry.

Allan stated that he was appointed by the deputy postmaster general under his hand and seal. He occasionally received instructions from the deputy postmaster general, but had no idea as to the authority under which the latter acted. He had never been referred to any particular statute for his guidance, and, indeed, the postage on letters within the province had been charged at arbitrary rates, which were fixed by the deputy postmaster general.

Some valuable information respecting the revenue of his office was submitted by Allan, which completely disproved the intimation of the secretary of the general post office, that the offices in that part of the country were conducted at a loss. The post office at York yielded an annual revenue of between £800 and £900, which was remitted to the deputy postmaster general at Quebec.

The committee found it impracticable to call the postmasters of the more distant offices, but having regard to all the circumstances, they were satisfied that there was remitted each year to the deputy postmaster general at Quebec an amount exceeding £2500, of which perhaps ten per cent. or eleven per cent. was foreign postage collected in Canada, and, therefore, due to Great Britain or the United States.

Next the committee addressed themselves to the question as to how this surplus was disposed of, which, after deducting the amount owing to the other postal administrations was probably more than £2000. Allan believed, though he was unable to give it as a fact, that the money was passed over to London. What was beyond doubt, however, was that this revenue in no way inured to the benefit of Upper Canada.

Assuming, as the committee felt they might safely do, that the surplus from Canada was made part of the revenue of the general post office in London, the committee then sought to ascertain how the revenue of the general post office was dealt with, and whether any part of it was employed for the benefit of the colonies.

The post office acts of 1710[197]and 1801[198]made this point clear. It appeared that after certain deductions had been made for pensions, the revenue of the post office was applied in various specified ways to the service of Great Britain, the postal rates being avowedly levied for raising the necessary supplies, and for making a permanent addition to the public revenue. The committee could find no instance in which any part of the post office revenues was devoted to the use of the colonies.

Taking it, then, as established that a sum exceeding £2000 was raised each year in Upper Canada as profit from its post office, and that this sum was applied, not for the benefit of Upper Canada, but for the purposes of the public service in Great Britain, the committee next turned its attention to the laws bearing on the situation.

There was an act passed in 1778[199]in the hope of staying the rising rebellion in the American colonies entitled "an act for removing all doubts and apprehensions concerning taxation by the parliament of Great Britain in any of the colonies and plantations in North America and the West Indies." It declared that the king and parliament would not impose any duty, tax or assessment whatever, payable in any of the colonies in North America or the West Indies, except any such duties as it might be expedient to impose for the regulation of commerce.

But although the collection of such duties should be made by officials of the British government, it was not intended that the proceeds should go into the British treasury; for it was provided that the net produce from them should be paid over to the colony in which they were levied, to form part of the general revenue of such colony. This seems sufficiently explicit, but that there might be no doubt as to the applicability of the provisions of this act to the provinces of Canada, they were expressly incorporated in the constitutional act of 1791, which was the charter under which the provinces of Upper and Lower Canada were established.

As in the act of 1778, there was reserved to the British parliament,in the general interest of the empire, the power to make laws for the regulation of commerce, but there was also the same stipulation that the proceeds from such laws should be applied to the use of the province in which the taxes were levied, and in any manner the legislature of the province might think fit.

Applying the acts of 1778 and 1791 to the circumstances of the case in hand, the committee were of opinion that the collection of postage could not be regarded as a regulation of commerce, and as such within the scope of imperial legislation.

But even if it should appear that they were wrong in this opinion, and that the British government had the power to set up a post office in Upper Canada with the exclusive right to carry letters within the province, there was one thing the British government could not properly do. While the constitutional act of 1791 remained unrepealed, the British government could not take the net produce from the post office in Upper Canada, and use it as part of the general revenue of Great Britain.

Having satisfied themselves that, however strong the grounds might be on which the postmaster general of England had proceeded in establishing a post office in Canada, they could not prevail against the acts which have been considered, the committee next gave their attention to inquiring what those grounds might be, and how far they would bear out the pretensions of the postmaster general.

The two acts, which it seemed to the committee the postmaster general would most likely depend upon, were the acts of 1710 and of 1801. The act of 1710, which was the charter for the post office in British America, was dismissed from consideration as not even by its own provisions applying to the colony of Canada, and as annulled so far as concerned any of the colonies by the act of 1778, and as regards Canada by the constitutional act of 1791.

The second of the two acts—that of 1801—repealed all the rates of postage enacted by the act of 1710, and fixed new rates for Great Britain, but made no mention of new colonial rates. Hence, since 1801, there had been no colonial postage rates having the sanction of law, and the committee concluded that the colonies were designedly omitted, when the rates for Great Britain were fixed by the act of 1801, for the reason that the act of 1778 supervened, which made it illegal for the British parliament to impose a tax on a colony for the financial benefit of Great Britain.

The committee admitted that it was a matter for argument whether the unrepealed parts of the act of 1710 might not be heldapplicable to Canada, but conceding the whole argument on this point, the utmost power remaining in the act was to authorize the establishment of a postal system in Canada. All power to fix the postal charges was taken away by the act of 1801.

As for the act of 1801, which established a scale of rates, by no liberality of construction could it be made to apply to Canada, because the act of 1778 was against it, and the constitutional act of 1791 was against it, and the fact that the revenues to be raised by the act were to be appropriated to the purposes of the United Kingdom made it illegal for the postmaster general to enforce it in the province.

There were other acts passed by the imperial parliament affecting the postage rates, but an examination of these disclosed no intention to make the acts operative in the colonies. Rates were fixed for conveyance in the United Kingdom, and to and from the colonies in America, but nothing was said as to the rates within the colonies. It was quite clear to the committee, therefore, that the only acts, which by any possibility could be made applicable to the colonies, were inoperative in the Canadas.

The committee clinched the argument by a survey of the laws passed by the British parliament, levying taxes on the colonies. They showed that whenever such taxes were imposed, the proceeds were never applied to the purposes of the United Kingdom, but always to the use of the colony concerned. There was an act passed in 1764 imposing duties on the sugar plantations. The revenue was devoted to the protection of their trade.

The Quebec revenue act of 1774[200]was the other case. This act imposed duties on rum, brandy, and other liquors coming into the province, and employed the proceeds for the establishment of a fund to aid in defraying the charges of the administration of justice and of the civil government in the province of Quebec. It was clear, then, that the acts of 1778 and 1791 contained no new principle, but were simply declaratory of the steady policy of the British government as disclosed by a review of its earlier practice; and everything combined to satisfy the committee that the legislature of the mother country never contemplated the raising of a tax by inland postage in the colony of Upper Canada.

The committee concluded by submitting for the acceptance of the house a resolution to the effect that the present system of public posts for the conveyance of letters within the province had grown into use without the sanction of law, and that a bill should be introducedestablishing public posts and fixing the rates of postage on letters and packets for the purpose of raising a permanent revenue, applicable solely to the improvement of the roads throughout the province.

The proposition of the assembly was thoroughly conservative. It was simply that the profits from the post office should be devoted to improving the means by which the post office was carried on. Settlements were springing up in all parts of the province which reason and policy made it necessary to connect with the more central districts, and it was only proper that the profits arising from the system should be used for improving and extending it.

At this period and for a long time afterwards the roads throughout the province were in a wretched condition. One of the principal mail contractors informed a committee of the house in 1829, that all the main roads in the province were very bad, and that those in the neighbourhood of York were bringing discredit on the inhabitants. The deputy postmaster general informed the same committee that he had just been advised that the contractors on the road from Montreal to Niagara had to swim their horses over some of the rivers on the route, the bridges having been carried away.

Peregrine Maitland, the lieutenant governor of Upper Canada, forwarded the report of the committee of 1821 to the colonial office, with a letter in which he explained that what the legislature desired was to have the control of the provincial posts vested in them, or at least to have a deputy postmaster general for Upper Canada. With the latter request he fully sympathised, as he was convinced that a deputy postmaster general residing in Quebec could not possibly appreciate the requirements of the rapidly rising communities, situated so far from his headquarters.

The lieutenant governor shared the opinion of the legislature that it was contrary to the acts of 1778 and 1791 to send remittances from Canada to England, but he did not believe that the legislature would have concerned themselves with the subject, if the post office authorities had provided a satisfactory service.

At the general post office in London the report was turned over to the solicitor with directions to prepare a case for submission to the law officers of the crown. The law officers were requested to give their opinion as to whether the postmaster general of the United Kingdom had the right to control and manage the internal posts in the provinces of North America, and, if so, whether the proceeds derived from the inland conveyance of letters in NorthAmerica ought to be paid into the exchequer of the United Kingdom or whether they ought to be applied to the use of the province from which they were taken.

But the case as prepared did not reach the law officers. The postmaster general had the good sense to see that his case was precarious, and he did not care to risk an adverse decision.

Freeling, accordingly, wrote to Maitland,[201]admitting that the postal transactions of Upper and Lower Canada together showed a small surplus, but he inclined to the view that the share of Upper Canada in the surplus must be very small. A number of post offices had been opened in Upper Canada and the impression in the general post office was that they were unprofitable.

If, as Maitland had intimated, the wishes of Upper Canada would be satisfied by the appointment of a separate deputy postmaster general for Upper Canada, the postmaster general, Freeling informed the governor, would make no difficulty on the point, but would naturally select for the position one of the more experienced officers such as the postmaster of York or of Kingston.

In the meantime, while the report of 1821 was being discussed by the secretary of the post office and the lieutenant governor, the members of the assembly were endeavouring to procure further information to strengthen the position they had taken. They desired to learn definitely the amount which was sent to London as postal revenue. The postmaster of York could tell them little beyond the transactions of his own office, but the contribution from that office made it clear that the revenue from the whole province must be considerable.

No information could be obtained by direct inquiry of the deputy postmaster general, but it was thought that the post office would not refuse to answer a question on the subject asked by a member of parliament.

A question was accordingly put in the house of commons in 1822, but Freeling informed the representative of the post office[202]in the house of commons that the information should not be given, as the provinces were manifesting a disposition to interfere with the internal posts, and to appropriate their revenues to their own purposes, instead of allowing them to flow into the exchequer of the United Kingdom. The maintenance of the packet service, he declared to be of the greatest political importance, as ensuring despatches against passing through foreign hands.

The course pursued by the post office under the influence of Freeling was in no way creditable to it. At a time when it was making grudging admissions that there was a small profit from the Canadian post offices, there was being sent over to London from the two provinces a sum exceeding £6000 a year, an amount which, wisely spent, would have been a considerable contribution to the road fund of the provinces.

The packet, the importance of which Freeling emphasized, was scarcely of any utility to the people of the Canadas. The service by the packets was so slow and expensive that it was not employed at all for commercial or social correspondence, the merchants in London and Liverpool using exclusively the lines of sailing vessels running between Liverpool and New York. But Freeling was obstinate and often disingenuous in maintaining his view that it was proper that the surplus revenues from the provincial post offices should be turned into the British exchequer.

The disinclination of the general post office to discuss the question of the colonial post office was not likely to suppress the subject for long. The assembly of Upper Canada had too strong a case. The political grievances from which the province was suffering were bringing into the political life of Upper Canada a group of men to voice the general dissatisfaction with the state of affairs, and so undeniable an abuse could not remain unexploited.

The house, which adopted the resolution of 1821, was on the whole favourable to the lieutenant governor and his advisers. The succeeding house, which was elected in 1825, contained a majority opposed to the government. This fact did not, however, lead to the overthrow of the lieutenant governor's advisers. They were his own choice and were in no sense responsible to the house. It was not until sixteen years later that responsible government, as now understood, was established in Canada.

The turn of affairs in 1825, which placed the control of the house in the hands of the opponents of the government had its effect on the attitude of the parties towards the provincial post office. In 1821, the lieutenant governor cordially supported the views of the house, and did what he could to make them prevail with the postmaster general. In 1825, when the post office grievance was brought up for discussion, the lieutenant governor's party upheld the position taken by the postmaster general in England.

The consequence was that, for the opposition, the post office was but one more of the many matters calling for redress, whilefor the government party it was another element in the burden which they had to sustain in their resistance to reform.

In the beginning of 1825, William Lyon Mackenzie presented a petition to the house of assembly to have the affairs of the post office investigated. Mackenzie, who had come to Upper Canada in 1820, was engaged in business until 1824, when, impressed with the various political abuses from which the country was suffering, he abandoned what had every appearance of a successful career, and gave himself to agitation. He established a newspaper—The Colonial Advocate—in 1824, and in 1828 secured a seat in the house of assembly. These vehicles of publicity he employed in ceaseless attacks on the governing clique, which from the intimacy of the ties binding its members together was known as the Family Compact, and became the principal actor in the abortive rebellion of 1837. The post office as then managed incurred his unremitting hostility.

A committee was appointed having as chairman Captain John Matthews, who represented the county of Middlesex along with Dr. Rolph, subsequently one of the leaders of rebellion in 1837. Matthews was a retired army officer, who entertained advanced political views, which were irritating to the lieutenant governor. He was later on made to feel the lieutenant governor's resentment for his opposition. As chairman of the committee Matthews reported on the 9th of March, 1825,[203]that it was in evidence that there were abuses which would be remedied, if the post offices in the province were, as they should be, under the control and supervision of the legislature.

The committee found that there were many populous districts, in which post offices were much required; that many postmasters performed their duties indifferently, letters and newspapers being opened and read before being delivered; and that complaints to the deputy postmaster general had no appreciable effect. The mail bags, the committee also discovered, were often filled with goods, having nothing to do with the post office, to the injury of contractors as well as of the post office revenues.

Editors of newspapers, it was also ascertained, suffered from the hardship of having to pay the postage on their newspapers in advance, and the committee recommended that the postage on newspapers should be collected as the postage on letters was, from those who received the newspapers. Letters on public business should, in the opinion of the committee, be carried freeof postage; and the surplus revenue should be expended on the public roads and bridges which were in a deplorable state.

The final conclusion of the committee was that the provincial legislature should take on itself the entire management of the post office, even though this should involve some temporary expense. It was not anticipated that such would be the case, but in any event the deficits would be of short duration.

In the following session—1826—the post office was again discussed. This time the discussion was on a motion of Charles Fothergill to take into consideration the state of the province. Fothergill was king's printer, and had been postmaster of Port Hope. He was dismissed from the post office for his criticism of the administration, and was soon to be deprived of the office of king's printer, on account of his advocacy of measures distasteful to the lieutenant governor.

Fothergill in his attack on the post office,[204]had the advantages of experience, and of some inside knowledge. Arguing from the revenue of Port Hope, he declared his belief that the sum remitted to London each year could not be less than £10,000, and that the business was increasing so rapidly that in a few years the surplus revenue from the post office would pay the whole expenses of civil government in the province.

Some of the postmasters, Fothergill complained, acted with much insolence towards those not in favour with the government. Their newspapers were thrown about. Their letters were handed to them open. The mails were often opened in public bar rooms. Sutherland, the deputy postmaster general, had admitted to Fothergill that he was ignorant of the geography of the province, which was a strong reason for the appointment of a resident deputy postmaster general. Fothergill's great objection to the existing arrangements was that they were unconstitutional, and that the tax on newspapers was so oppressive as to check their circulation. To test the feeling of the house Fothergill offered a resolution declaring that the acts of 1778 and 1791 were part of the constitution of the province.

John Beverly Robinson, the attorney general, traversed Fothergill's statements, and desired the house to take satisfaction from the fact that all the other colonies sent their surplus post office revenues to the general post office, without remonstrance. He did not believe that any large sum was sent from Canada. Indeed, Freeling told him (what was quite untrue) that the Canadian post office was a burden on the home department.

Fothergill was supported by Rolph, and also by Bidwell, one of the leaders of the opposition, and afterwards speaker of the house. Rolph recalled that the postmasters who had appeared before the committee testified that the provincial post office was a remunerative institution. He was satisfied that it could not be otherwise, as he had learned by experience that a post office, however much required, would not be opened until the deputy postmaster general was guaranteed against any loss which might arise. But even if the post office could be shown to be unproductive, he would propose to take it off the hands of the mother country while it was a burden to her, and not to wait until it began to be profitable.

Rolph moved an address to the king affirming that the present system was being carried on contrary to the act of 1791, an act which was held by the house to be a fundamental part of the constitution of the province; that a well-regulated post office, responsible to the constituted authorities of the province, and extended in the number of its establishments would tend to correct and prevent abuses which were found to exist under the present system, would facilitate commercial intercourse, promote the diffusion of knowledge and would eventually become an important branch of the provincial revenue. The assembly therefore begged, with many expressions of loyalty and gratitude, that the control and emoluments of the post office so far as they concerned the province might be conceded to them. There was some opposition to Rolph's motion. Eventually the address was adopted by a vote of nineteen to five.

The address, which it will be recalled had originated with the opposition, was laid before the colonial office under very different circumstances from those attending the report of 1821. On that occasion, the memorial was brought to the foot of the throne with the good wishes of both the government and the legislature. It was accompanied by a letter from the lieutenant governor, commending it to the favourable consideration of the home authorities.

The address of 1826 was also accompanied by a letter[205]from the lieutenant governor, but so far from commending it, the purpose of the letter was to suggest an answer confuting the arguments of the assembly. Dealing first with the allegation of the assembly that the postage charges were a tax, and as such repugnant to the act of 1778, Maitland recalled Franklin's contention before the British house of commons in 1765, that postageduty was not a tax, but rather a consideration for a service performed, and exacted only from those who chose to avail themselves of that service.

Assuming, as the governor did, that the revolted colonies generally acquiesced in the justice of Franklin's view, while objecting to other duties as unconstitutional, he could not see on what valid grounds the legislature rested its case. This reasoning is directly the opposite of the view expressed by the lieutenant governor in 1821. He then gave it as his opinion that the acts of 1778 and 1791 made it illegal for the Canadian post office to make remittances to London of surplus revenue, but that the matter would not have been noticed in the province, if a satisfactory service had been given by the deputy postmaster general.

Indeed, Maitland left no doubt that his real opinion was unchanged, for he went on to intimate that he would not depend upon Franklin's argument, if it could be shown that there was any considerable surplus from the postal operations in Upper Canada. The lieutenant governor enjoyed his little excursions among the statutes, however, and although the postmaster general had the benefit of the advice of the law officers of the crown, Sir Peregrine did not scruple to take on himself the rôle of legal adviser of the general post office.

Even if the duties were declared to be a tax within the meaning of the act of 1778, since the duties were collected under the amendment of 1765 to the act of 1710 which was anterior to the act of 1778, Maitland argued that it was questionable whether their collection could be regarded as a violation of the act of 1778. But there was one person to whom this gratuitous argument carried no conviction, and that was the propounder of it himself. He would still hark back to his underlying idea, and intimated his persuasion that the British government had no desire to raise a revenue from the colonies through the post office, and suggested that if it could be shown that the post office yielded a large revenue after paying the charges, the government would be prepared to reduce the rates or to place the surplus at the disposal of the colony.

Although the assembly stated that it would be desirable in the interests of the province to have the post office under the control of its legislature, the lieutenant governor believed that the preponderance of the better opinion, whether in or out of the assembly, would be found opposed to that proposition. It would be impossible to carry on an independent system in an inland province,and the attempt to do so would involve the colony in heavy expenditure. The lieutenant governor discredited entirely the allegations that there were abuses in the service, and he had much reason for thinking that Sutherland, the deputy postmaster general, discharged his duties to the general satisfaction of the public.

Maitland's letter, which bears all the marks of having been written by the attorney general, Beverly Robinson, is a capital illustration of the vicious circle of deception sometimes practised by persons having a common purpose with reference to a scheme. The official class in York, as well as the secretary of the general post office, desired to defeat the wishes of the house of assembly respecting the post office, the family compact group, because any victory gained by the house threatened the privileges enjoyed by that class; Freeling, secretary of the post office, because it would diminish the revenues of which he was a most zealous guardian.

Freeling told the attorney general that the Canadian post office was a burden on the revenues of the general post office, and the attorney general, accepting this statement, told the secretary that such being the case, the statutes on which the house of assembly relied were not applicable. The secretary's statement was demonstrably incorrect, but it furnished the foundation for the opinion which he desired, that the law did not require, nor did expediency suggest, the transfer to the Upper Canadian legislature of the control of the post office in that province.

Robinson wrote to Freeling supporting the views of the lieutenant governor; and at the same time Freeling received a letter from Markland, a member of the executive and legislative council of Upper Canada, protesting against the attempt on the part of the assembly to interfere with the post office as the assumption of a right to which they had not the least pretension. The best-intentioned and the best-informed people in the province were against such interference.

By way of parrying the demand of the assembly for control over the post office, Markland suggested that it would be well to appoint a post office superintendent for the upper province. Upper Canada was entirely distinct from Lower Canada in all matters of government. The post office alone was subject to the control of a person, outside of the province, who never visited it. The people of Upper Canada were, he declared, energetic and enterprising, and immigration was coming in on a full tide. Freeling considered this an important letter, and laid it before the postmaster general.

The agitation in Upper Canada aroused a flutter of interest in London. When newspaper reports of the discussions in the house of assembly in December 1825, reached St. Martins-le-Grand, they fell under the notice of the postmaster general, who was moved to ask Freeling what it all meant. Freeling replied that the accounts related to great disputes in Canada as to the application of the rates of postage levied in that country, whether the rates should not be devoted to local purposes. At that time, Freeling stated, the rates formed part of the consolidated fund.

The colonial office and the treasury also made inquiries. The colonial office was informed that the revenues of Upper and Lower Canada were blended, and that for seven years previous there had been a surplus from the two provinces which amounted on the average to £5790 a year.[206]It was also pointed out that the estimated cost of the packet service was £10,000 a year.

Robinson,[207]the chancellor of the exchequer, with whom Freeling had an interview in October 1826,[208]did not fall in with Freeling's views quite as readily as the others had done. He expressed the opinion that Canada's contention was in the main sound. The net revenue from the Canadian post office ought in fairness to be applied to colonial purposes, not in the mode or on the principle put forward by the assembly, but under the direction of the home government. It should be in the nature of a civil list.

Freeling was alarmed at the chancellor's utterances, and reminded him that what was granted to Canada could not be withheld from Jamaica. The chancellor admitted this to be the case. Freeling insisted that there could be no doubt as to the legality of the present practice, though he confessed that the law officers gave no opinion on the case prepared in 1822. Indeed, it had not been submitted to them, as Lord Chichester, the postmaster general, had an invincible reluctance to taking their opinion, and would not do so unless positively instructed by the government.

Then there were the packets. Freeling could not let the opportunity pass of mentioning Canada's obligations with respect to the packet service. He did not, however, endeavour to impose on the chancellor of the exchequer his view that the cost of this service should be set against Canada's post office surplus. In his memorandum of the interview, Freeling merely notes that the opinionbetween them inclined to the view that as the packets were maintained for the benefit of Canada as well as of Nova Scotia, some part of the expense should be borne by Canada.

Up to this point, the agitation against the post office was confined to Upper Canada, which indeed was the more aggressive province during the whole course of the dispute. In 1827, however, the legislative assembly of Lower Canada took a hand in the controversy, contributing a strictly legal and even technical memorandum embodying an argument in favour of its contention that the colonies should participate with the United Kingdom in the profits of the general post office.[209]

The memorandum pointed out that the act of Queen Anne established a general post office for, and throughout Great Britain and Ireland, the colonies and plantations in North America and the West Indies, and all other of Her Majesty's dominions and territories; and that of the duties arising by virtue of this act, £700 a week were to be paid into the exchequer for public purposes in Great Britain. Certain annuities and encumbrances charged on the postal revenues by earlier acts, were continued by the act of Queen Anne. When these charges amounting to £111,461 17s.10d., and the £700 a week already mentioned were satisfied, one-third of the remaining surplus was reserved to the disposal of parliament "for the use of the public."

The house of assembly argued that this act, which by later acts was declared to be in force in Canada, applied to the people of England, Ireland and colonies of North America and in the West Indies. The word "public," therefore, being used without limitation, or qualification, could not signify exclusively the people of Great Britain and Ireland, or of the colonies. On the contrary, being equally applicable to all who were within the purview of the act, it designated the people of all the dominions of the crown in which the postal revenue was to be levied. The statute thus carried on the face of it a parliamentary declaration that the colonies were entitled to a share of the post office revenues, and it enacted, by implication, that the amount of the share should be determined by parliament at some future period.

Here followed a novel and ingenious application of the statute of 1778, which was enacted for the purpose of conciliating the colonies by conceding the point at issue between them and the mother country.

The assembly stated that by this act it was declared that, forthe peace and welfare of His Majesty's dominions, the net produce of all duties, which after the passing of that act were imposed by parliament upon the colonies, should be applied to the use of the colony in which it is levied. Unlike the assembly of Upper Canada, the assembly of Lower Canada did not maintain that the act of Queen Anne was annulled by the act of 1778.

It will be remembered that the British post office rested its claim to collect the colonial postages on Queen Anne's act with its amendments, while the Upper Canada assembly asserted that the act of 1778, which was made part of the constitutional act of 1791, deprived the British government of any right it formerly had to impose a tax on the colonies.

The Lower Canadian house of assembly made another use of the act of 1778. It submitted that, so far as postal revenues were concerned, it was the complement of the act of Queen Anne. The earlier act, in the view of the assembly, left the amounts of the shares of the postal revenues to which the colonies were entitled, to be determined by a future act of parliament, and the act of 1778 had this effect, if not in the letter, at least in its spirit; and consequently Lower Canada, as one of the colonies had a fair and equitable claim to the net produce of the post office revenue levied within the province, after deducting the expenses of the post office established therein.

Shortly before the house of assembly at York took into its consideration the question of the legality of the postal system in operation in Upper Canada, the home authorities were discussing a matter, which was a source of much embarrassment to the deputy postmaster general. The steamboats, which had been running since 1809, between Montreal and Quebec, had so far improved that they outdistanced the mail couriers, who travelled on the shore of the river, and a great many letters were carried between the two towns by the steamers.

The deputy postmaster general made provision for the conveyance of letters by steamers, by placing official letter boxes on the boats. He allowed the captains twopence for each letter they carried, and charged the public the regular postage rates. But the public paid little attention to the letter boxes. They simply threw their letters on a table in the cabin, and when the steamer reached its destination, those expecting letters sent down to the landing and got them, paying a small gratuity to the captain.

Moreover, in cases where the letters had been deposited in the letter boxes on the steamer, and were delivered by the captainat the post office, many of the people to whom the letters were addressed refused to pay the same charges as if the letters were conveyed by land, alleging that such charges were illegal.

The deputy postmaster general laid the facts before his superiors in England in 1819, asking for some document of an authoritative character, which, when published, would put a stop to the illegal practices. The solicitor of the post office to whom the matter was referred had no doubt that the acts complained of were illegal, and would render the offenders liable to penalties, if the practice were carried on in England, but he could not be sure that penalties for the infraction of the post office act could be recovered in Canada.

Freeling, the secretary, thereupon made a suggestion[210]which must have caused him some pain. The right of the post office to protect its monopoly was quite clear, and the natural course of the postmaster general would be to direct his deputy in Canada to enforce the law. But as the legislatures had in several instances manifested an inclination to interfere with the internal posts, he recommended that, instead of taking proceedings to protect His Majesty's revenues, and, as he says, to enable them to continue to flow into the exchequer of the United Kingdom, the postmaster general should state the circumstances to the colonial secretary, and request his opinion before instructions were sent out to the deputy postmaster general.

Bathurst, the colonial secretary, fully concurred in the view of the postmaster general that the subject was one of great delicacy, and wrote to the governor general, Lord Dalhousie, setting forth the facts and stating that under ordinary circumstances he would have had no difficulty in recommending a prosecution.

In view of the attention which the house of assembly had been giving to the revenues of the colonial post office, and of the doubt which had been suggested as to the right of Great Britain to receive those revenues, the colonial secretary thought it possible that the enforcement of those rights at that time might embarrass the governor general by giving the assembly an additional ground for contention with the mother country. He, therefore, had given directions that the deputy postmaster general should communicate with the governor general on the subject, and should not institute proceedings without the full concurrence of the latter.

The deputy postmaster general was instructed in this sense in September 1820, and matters remained in abeyance until 1826, when the deputy postmaster general, presumably with the concurrenceof the governor general requested the opinion of the attorney general of Lower Canada on the subject. The attorney general, James Stuart (afterwards Sir James) advised that the right of the post office was clear, and he conceived that there should be no difficulty in recovering pecuniary penalties for the infringement of the postmaster general's privilege.

But no action was taken on this opinion. The relations between the provincial governors and the assemblies were becoming more strained as time went on, and the governor general had no desire to augment the grievances of the assemblies by introducing irritating matters, in which the right of the home government might with reason be held to be disputable.

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