THE CLERGY RESERVES
The clergy reserves were for many years a fruitful source of
discontent and agitation in Canada. They had their origin in a
provision of the Constitutional Act of 1791, that there should be
reserved for the maintenance and support of a "Protestant clergy" in
Upper and Lower Canada "a quantity of land equal in value to a seventh
part of grants that had been made in the past or might be made in the
future." It was provided also that rectories might be erected and
endowed according to the establishment of the Church of England. The
legislatures were to be allowed to vary or repeal these enactments,
but such legislation was not to receive the royal assent before it had
been laid before both Houses of the imperial parliament.
Did the words "Protestant clergy" apply to any other body than the
Church of England? A vast amount of legal learning was expended on
this question; but there can be little doubt that the intention to
establish and endow the Church of England was thoroughly in accord
with the ideas of colonial government prevailing from the conquest to
the end of the eighteenth century. In the instructions to Murray and
other early governors there are constant injunctions for the support
of a Protestant clergy and Protestant schools, "to the end that the
Church of England may be established both in principles and
practice."[3] Governor Simcoe, we are told, attached much importance
to "every establishment of Church and State that upholds a distinction
of ranks and lessens the undue weight of the democratic influence."
"The episcopal system was interwoven and connected with the
monarchical foundations of our government."[4] In pursuance of this
idea, which was also that of the ruling class in Canada, the country
was to be made as much unlike the United States as possible by the
intrenchment of class and ecclesiastical privileges, and this was the
policy pursued up to the time that responsible government was
obtained. Those outside the dominant caste, in religion as in
politics, were branded as rebels, annexationists, Yankees,
republicans. And as this dominant caste, until the arrival of Lord
Elgin, had the ear of the authorities at home, it is altogether likely
that the Act of 1791 was framed in accordance with their views.
The law was unjust, improvident, and altogether unsuited to the
circumstances of the colony. Lord Durham estimated that the members
and adherents of the Church of England, allowing its largest claim,
were not more than one-third, probably not more than one-fourth, of
the population of Upper Canada. Methodists, Presbyterians, and Roman
Catholics, each claimed a larger membership. He declared that the
sanction given to the exclusive claims of the Church of England by Sir
John Colborne's establishment of fifty-seven rectories, was, in the
opinion of many persons, the chief pre-disposing cause of the
rebellion, and it was an abiding and unabated cause of discontent.[5]
Not only was the spirit of the colony opposed to the establishment and
domination of any Church, but settlement was retarded and the
hardships of the settler increased by the locking up of enormous
tracts of land. In addition to the clergy reserves, grants were made
to officials, to militia men, to the children of United Empire
Loyalists and others, in the hope that these persons would settle on
the land. Many of these fell into the hands of speculators and
jobbers, who bought farms of two hundred acres for prices ranging from
a gallon of rum to L5. "The greater part of these grants," said Mr.
Hawke, a government official whose evidence is given in the appendix
to Durham's Report, "remain in an unimproved state. These blocks of
wild land place the actual settler in an almost hopeless condition; he
can hardly expect during his lifetime to see his neighbourhood contain
a population sufficiently dense to support mills, schools,
post-offices, places of worship, markets or shops, without which
civilization retrogrades. Roads, under such circumstances, can neither
be opened by the settlers nor kept in proper repair. In 1834 I met a
settler from the township of Warwick, on the Caradoc Plains, returning
from the grist mill at Westminster, with the flour and bran of
thirteen bushels of wheat. He had a yoke of oxen and a horse attached
to his wagon, and had been absent nine days and did not expect to
reach home until the following evening. Light as his load was, he
assured me that he had to unload, wholly or in part, several times,
and after driving his wagon through the swamps, to pick out a road
through the woods where the swamps or gullies were fordable, and to
carry the bags on his back and replace them in the wagon."
It is unnecessary here to discuss differences of opinion as to the
interpretation of the law, attempts to divide the endowment among
various denominations, or other efforts at compromise. The radical
wing of the Reform party demanded that the special provision for the
support of the Church of England should be abolished, and a system of
free popular education established. With this part of their platform
Brown was heartily in accord; on this point he agreed with the Clear
Grits that the Baldwin-Lafontaine government was moving too slowly,
and when Baldwin was succeeded by Hincks in 1851, the restraining
influence of his respect for Baldwin being removed, his discontent
was converted into open and determined opposition.
Largely by the influence of Brown and the _Globe_, public opinion in
1851 was aroused to a high degree, and meetings were held to advocate
the secularization of the clergy reserves. The friends of the old
order were singularly unfortunate in their mode of expressing their
opinions. Opposition to responsible government was signalized by the
burning of the parliament buildings, and the mobbing of Lord Elgin in
Montreal. Opposition to religious equality was signalized by the
mobbing of an orderly assembly in Toronto. One meeting of the
opponents of the clergy reserves was broken up by these means, and a
second meeting was attacked by a mob with such violence as to
necessitate the calling out of a company of British soldiers. This
meeting was held in St. Lawrence Hall, over the city market bearing
that name. Mr. Brown was chosen to move a resolution denouncing State
endowments of religion, and did so in a speech of earnestness and
argumentative power. He compared the results of Church establishments
with those of voluntary effort in England, in Scotland, in France, and
in Canada, and denounced "State-churchism" as the author of pride,
intolerance and spiritual coldness. "When," he said, "I read the
history of the human race, and trace the dark record of wars and
carnage, of tyranny, robbery and injustice in every shape, which have
been the fruits of State-churchism in every age; when I observe the
degenerating effect which it has ever had on the purity and simplicity
of the Gospel of Christ, turning men's minds from its great truths, as
a religion of the heart, to the mere outward tinsel, to the forms and
ceremonies on which priestcraft flourishes; when I see that at all
times it has been made the instrument of the rich and powerful in
oppressing the poor and weak, I cannot but reject it utterly as in
direct hostility to the whole spirit of the Gospel, to that glorious
system which teaches men to set not their hearts on this world, and to
walk humbly before God." He held that it was utterly impossible for
the State to teach religious truth. "There is no standard for truth.
We cannot even agree on the meaning of words." Setting aside the
injustice of forcing men to pay money for the support of what they
deemed religious error, it was "most dangerous to admit that the
magistrate is to decide for God--for that is the plain meaning of the
establishment principle. Once admit that principle, and no curb can be
set upon its operation. Who shall restrict what God has appointed? And
thus the extent to which the conscience of men may be constrained, or
persecution for truth's sake may be carried, depends entirely on the
ignorance or enlightenment of the civil magistrate. There is no safety
out of the principle that religion is a matter entirely between man
and his God, and that the whole duty of the magistrate is to secure
every one in the peaceful observance of it. Anything else leads to
oppression and injustice, but this can never lead to either."
A notable part of the speech was a defence of free, non-sectarian
education. "I can conceive," he said, "nothing more unprincipled than
a scheme to array the youth of the province in sectarian bands--to
teach them, from the cradle up, to know each other as Methodist boys,
and Presbyterian boys, and Episcopal boys. Surely, surely, we have
enough of this most wretched sectarianism in our churches without
carrying it further."
To protect themselves from interruption, the advocates of
secularization had taken advantage of a law which allowed them to
declare their meeting as private, and exclude disturbers. Their
opponents held another meeting in the adjoining market-place where by
resolution they expressed indignation at the repeated attempts of "a
Godless association" to stir up religious strife, and declared that
the purposes of the association, if carried out, would bring about not
only the severance of British connection, but socialism,
republicanism, and infidelity. The horrified listeners were told how
Rousseau and Voltaire had corrupted France, how religion was
overthrown and the naked Goddess of Reason set up as an object of
worship. They were told that the clergy reserves were a gift to the
nation from "our good King George the Third." Abolish them and the
British flag would refuse to float over anarchy and confusion.
Finally, they were assured that they could thrash the St. Lawrence
Hall audience in a stand-up fight, but were nevertheless advised to go
quietly home. This advice was apparently accepted in the spirit of the
admonition: "Don't nail his ears to the pump," for the crowd
immediately marched to St. Lawrence Hall, cheering, groaning, and
shouting. They were met by the mayor, two aldermen, and the chief
constable, and told that they could not be admitted. Stones and bricks
were thrown through the windows of the hall. The Riot Act was read by
an alderman, and the British regiment then quartered in the town, the
71st, was sent for. There was considerable delay in bringing the
troops, and in the meantime there was great disorder; persons leaving
the hall were assaulted, and the mayor was struck in the face with a
stone and severely cut. A company of the 71st arrived at midnight,
after which the violence of the mob abated.[6]
The steps leading up to the settlement of the question may be briefly
referred to. In 1850 the Canadian parliament had asked for power to
dispose of the reserves, with the understanding that emoluments
derived by existing incumbents should be guaranteed during their
lives. The address having been forwarded to England, Lord John Russell
informed the governor-general that a bill would be introduced in
compliance with the wish of the Canadian parliament. But in 1852 the
Russell government resigned, and was succeeded by that of the Earl of
Derby. Derby (Lord Stanley) had been colonial secretary in the Peel
government, which had shown a strong bias against Canadian
self-government. Sir John Pakington declared that the advisers of Her
Majesty were not inclined to aid in the diversion to other purposes of
the only public fund for the support of divine worship and religious
instruction in Canada, though they would entertain proposals for new
dispositions of the fund. Hincks, who was then in England, protested
vigorously against the disregard of the wishes of the Canadian people.
When the legislature assembled in 1852, it carried, at his instance,
an address to the Crown strongly upholding the Canadian demand. Brown
contended that the language was too strong and the action too weak. He
made a counter proposal, which found little support, that the Canadian
parliament itself enact a measure providing for the sale of the clergy
lands to actual settlers, and the appropriation of the funds for the
maintenance of common schools.
With the fall of the Derby administration in England, ended the
opposition from that source to the Canadian demands. But Hincks, who
had firmly vindicated the right of the Canadian parliament to
legislate on the matter, now hesitated to use the power placed in his
hands, and declared that legislation should be deferred until a new
parliament had been chosen. The result was that the work of framing
the measure of settlement fell into the hands of John A. Macdonald,
the rising star of the Conservative party. The fund, after provision
had been made for the vested rights of incumbents, was turned over to
the municipalities.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] Instructions to Governor Murray, _Canadian Archives of 1904_, p.
218.
[4] Professor Shortt in the _Canadian Magazine_, September, 1901.
[5] Durham's _Report on the Affairs of British North America_.
Methuen's reprint, pp. 125, 126.
[6] The _Globe_, July, 1851.