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And he did not have to fight alone. There was no little dislike for the LaFontaine-Baldwin Cabinet and no slight exultation when it was supposed to be 'dismissed' by a loyal and manly governor. There is no doubt that in this struggle Metcalfe overstepped the metes and bounds within which a colonial governor could rightly act. He abandoned any attitude of official impartiality.
In later pages of this book I shall give a short review of these and other measures which show the importance of the legislation passed by the LaFontaine-Baldwin ministry.
While the Lafontaine-Baldwin ministry were in power, he revived an agitation for an elective legislative council and declared himself utterly hostile to responsible government; but his influence was at an end in the country, and he could make little impression on the assembly. The days of reckless agitation had passed, and the time for astute and calm statesmanship had come.
The Liberals had shown signs of disintegration ever since the formation of the "Clear Grits," whose most conspicuous members were Peter Perry, the founder of the Liberal party in Upper Canada before the union; William McDougall, an eloquent young lawyer and journalist; Malcolm Cameron, who had been assistant commissioner of public works in the LaFontaine-Baldwin government; Dr.
Peter between Montreal and Quebec was improved by the harbour commissioners of the former city, aided by the government. Before the LaFontaine-Baldwin cabinet left office, it was able to see the complete success of this thoroughly Canadian or national policy.
William Hamilton Merritt afterwards a member of the LaFontaine-Baldwin ministry and the first vessel passed its locks in 1829; but it was very badly managed, and the legislature, after having aided it from time to time, was eventually obliged to take control of it as a provincial work.
The Lafontaine-Baldwin government then determined to set the question at rest, and introduced legislation for the issue of debentures to the amount of $400,000 for the payment of losses sustained by persons who had not been convicted of, or charged with, high treason or other offences of a treasonable nature, or had been committed to the custody of the sheriff in the gaol of Montreal and subsequently transported to the island of Bermuda.
Among his followers in the House were Louis Hippolyte LaFontaine, destined to become, ten years later, the colleague of Robert Baldwin in the LaFontaine-Baldwin administration, and Augustin Norbert Morin, the colleague of Francis Hincks in the Hincks-Morin administration of 1851.
Negotiations for the entrance of prominent French Canadians in opposition to the government went on without result for some time, but they were at last successful, and the first LaFontaine-Baldwin cabinet came into existence in 1842, largely through the instrumentality of Sir Charles Bagot. Mr.
Most of the Patriote leaders took advantage, however, of the virtual amnesty offered them in 1842 by the first LaFontaine-Baldwin administration, and returned to Canada. Many of these, as well as many of the Patriote leaders who had not been implicated in the rebellion and who had not fled the country, rose to positions of trust and prominence in the public service of Canada.
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