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expenditure in this province than that which is necessary for the support of the Civil Government, and calls upon the Provincial Legislature to make provision for the same without restriction. His Excellency the Earl of Dalhousie, in his message of the 6th February, establishes two species of expenses, distinct and separate-one "in support of his Majesty's Civil Government, and of the administration of Justice," with which his Excellency declares himself charged, to the exclusion of the Legislature, and the other, to defray "such local establishments and objects of public charge, as form no part of his Majesty's Civil Government, and are not connected with the administration of Justice." The latter portion is left to the Provincial Parliament.

"Having applied to this Message an attention the more serious, inasmuch as that official document puts in question the dearest rights of the Provincial Legislature, and of the House of Assembly more especially; and inasmuch as his Excellency has already several times referred the House of Assembly to that Message, your committee are of opinion,

"That the House of Assembly cannot in any manner acknowledge the principles laid down in that Message.

"That they cannot acknowledge the distinction which is therein made, between the expenses of the Civil Government and those of local objects, foreign to the Civil Government. "That they cannot acknowledge in the Governor in Chief the right of applying to objects which he declares foreign to the Civil Government of this province, and to the administration of Justice, the monies specially destined to these objects.

"That they cannot acknowledge in the Governor in Chief the right of applying any portion of the monies levied in this Province, and destined for defraying the expenses of the administration of Justice, and of the Civil Government of this province, without being thereunto authorized by the Provincial Legislature."

I mean not to be hypercritical when I entreat the attention of my readers to the exceeding poverty, nay inanity of language which the above extract exhibits, not that what is called fine writing ought to find its place in a document like that, but there ought to be severe accuracy of language, without which there can be no accuracy of thinking or of judging upon subjects of this nature.

To begin with the first paragraph, we are informed in it that the session of 1818 formed a remarkable epoch in the

annals of the Provincial Legislature, and more especially in the House of Assembly, for "That in that session the house began to possess in their full extent the rights which they might exercise." Euje! This is a remarkable epoch indeed to be inscribed inter fasta, the house came to be vested with the rights which they might exercise. What rights were these which they might exercise? does not the idea of a right involve always in it the power of exercising it?-This is a bad omen-stumbling at the threshold. The chairman of the committee proceeds: In that year his Majesty's representative in this province-Did he not know that his Majesty has no representative per eminentiam here; and why was it that an expression fitted only for the adulators to be found in the anti-chambers of the Castle of St. Lewis appeared in a document like this?

The second paragraph is altogether unexceptionable, it being exclusively occupied by an extract from a speech of Sir John Coape Sherbrooke.

In the 3d paragraph the writer perceives two things, one in each of the sentences whereof it is composed. The first is the offer in 1810, and the 2d is the acceptance of that offer in the speech of Sir John Sherbrooke, of which he has given us the extract: the subject before him was not one of perception but of reasoning and judgment.

The 4th clause it will be seen is confined to a reference to the speech of his Grace the Duke of Richmond at the opening of the Session in 1819.-The worthy Chairman next accounts for his entering into these details, and we are now informed that "It has been pretended that the Provincial Legislature, charged with all the expenses of the Civil Government of this province, had not at its disposal the whole revenue of the province to meet those expenses, and especially that the revenue arising from the act of the 14 Geo. III. c. 88, remained at the disposal of his Majesty's Executive Government in this province as well as the casual and territorial revenues."-Pretended! Accuracy of language is desirable

accuracy as to fact is indispensable; it never was pretended that those monies levied under the 14th of the King were otherwise disposable than by his Majesty. We here at last seem to approach the knot, and let us see how he untwists it. "Your committee" quoth he "will rather examine than refute this opinion against which argument and facts equally militate." Bonum facile dixeris the rest of the sentence, I fear, will not apply. He will not refute, kind soul! he will only examine forsooth, and what is he going to examine? why the aforesaid opinion. But if it be not for the purpose either of establishing it, or of refuting it, what is the end and object of his examination? If it be an opinion against which argument and facts equally militate, the duty of the committee was to shew that argument and those facts; and if the statement of the committee as to these last were correct, then that argument and those facts would amount to a refutation of such opinion; but why proceed with this. The writer of this paper had, in the course of his reading, met with some antithesis or other, and not being particularly abundant or redundant of words or ideas either, had evidently made his first great effort at composition in this paper.

I vainly look for any argument in the five following clauses. -The sixth is to this effect, "Thus the opinion that the Provincial Legislature alone has the right of disposing of all the revenues raised in this province rests upon public law, upon the unvarying and uniform interpretation of this House, upon the private and public acts of the Governors of this province since 1818, and lastly upon a final judgment in the last resort, a solemn act of Parliament." The remaining clauses relate exclusively to the Message of his Excellency the Earl of Dalhousie, bearing date the 6th February, 1822, distinguishing the expenses of the Civil Government of the province generally, from the expenses of local establishments, and the resolutions of the house upon that Message; but the report very modestly abstain from offering any argument or facts which "militate" against his Message. I entreat excuse

for the homeliness of the expression; but it is quite impossible to argue that down which has never been argued up; it is impossible to apply the standard of reason to that which has none. No man in his senses would attempt to measure any given interval of time with a foot rule; but the facts adverted to in this report being a part of those which I have already said I would examine in my next number, I will take occasion to make such observations upon them in their order as they arise, closing here the subject of the report of 1823, upon the 14th of the King.

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Between the interval of time which elapsed from the cession of Canada in 1763 to the year 1818, Great Britain besides supporting the Military Establishments within the Colony, and the Protestant Clergy, expended large sums of money in aid of the civil expenditure of the province.

The Colony relieved from all the expenditures incident to external defence and security from foreign violence and aggression, which press so heavily upon independent states, had advanced so rapidly in wealth, as to be able in 1810, to pay the whole of the expenditures of its Civil Government. The official men, who in Colonies constitute a peculiar class, having been entirely uncontrolled, had obtained a degree of power which overshadowed all the other classes of society; and the main object of the highly patriotic individual who introduced this measure originally in 1810, the late Honourable Mr. Justice Bedard, then advocate at the Bar of Quebec, was to obtain a check upon the official class. As a reward for this patriotic effort, this man distinguished as he was for ability, for singleness of heart, and for a devoted attachment to constitutional principles, was, with some of his supporters, lodged in the common gaol for the District of Quebec, under the authority of an act for which he himself

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