#lower canada

French-speaking Quebec society, at the time [of the War of 1812], was conservative and insular, far removed from the republican ideals of the French and American revolutions; in turn, British administrators deliberately encouraged traditional institutions like the Catholic Church and preserved the property rights of the landed gentry elite that dominated social and economic relations in Lower Canada.

PAPINEAU, LOUIS JOSEPH (1786–1871), Canadian rebel, came of a French family which emigrated to Canada towards the end of the seventeenth century. He was born in Montreal on 7 Oct. 1786, his father, Joseph Papineau (d. 1831), a notary, being a member of the first legislative assembly for Lower Canada, established in 1791. Papineau was educated at the seminary of Quebec, and on leaving college he began to read for the bar. While still a law student he acquired a great reputation among the French Canadians for his oratorical talents and opposition to the existing political system. In 1809 he was elected to the legislative assembly of Lower Canada for the county of Kent. In 1811, however, he elected to sit for the west ward of the city of Montreal. He was called to the bar in 1811, but was too much devoted to politics to practice as an advocate. He opposed the war with America in 1812, but, when it became inevitable, he entered the militia and served through the campaign of that year. He commanded the company which guarded the American prisoners taken at Detroit. In 1815 Papineau was appointed speaker of the legislative assembly of Lower Canada. He held this office, at a salary of 1,000l. a year, till 1837. From the beginning of his career he was looked on as the head of the French Canadian party. The English government tried to gain him over, and in 1820 Lord Dalhousie, the governor of Lower Canada, offered him a seat on the executive council. Papineau at first accepted, but, finding that there was no chance of his advice being ever taken, immediately resigned. In 1823 he visited Europe, in company with John Neilson (1776–1848) [q. v.], to protest, in the name of the French Canadians, against the proposed union of Upper and Lower Canada. His mission was successful, and he returned in 1823. In 1827 Papineau's hostility to the executive government had become so marked that Lord Dalhousie refused to accept him as speaker. The assembly, however, insisted on their choice, and Dalhousie resigned. The French Canadian party, who enjoyed a large majority in the legislative assembly, strongly desired to obtain control over certain duties imposed in 1774, and certain hereditary profits obtained by the crown from the sale of public lands.