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The Beginnings of Democracy
Democratic institutions developed gradually and peacefully. The first representative assembly was
elected in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in 1758. Prince Edward Island followed in 1773, New Brunswick in 1785.
The
Constitutional Act
of 1791 divided the Province of Quebec into Upper Canada (later Ontario), which
was mainly Loyalist, Protestant and English-speaking, and Lower Canada (later Quebec), heavily Catholic
and French-speaking.
The Act also granted to the Canadas, for the first time, legislative assemblies elected by the people. The
name
Canada
also became official at this time and has been used ever since. The Atlantic colonies and
the two Canadas were known collectively as British North America.
Your Canadian Citizenship
Study Guide
16
The first elected
Assembly of Lower
Canada, in Québec City,
debates whether to use
both French and English,
January 21, 1793
(Bottom from Left to
Right)
Lieutenant-Colonel John
Graves Simcoe was
Upper Canada’s first
Lieutenant Governor
and founder of the City
of York (now Toronto).
Simcoe also made Upper
Canada the first province
in the British Empire to
abolish slavery
Mary Ann Shadd Cary
was an outspoken
activist in the movement
to abolish slavery in
the U.S.A. In 1853 she
became the first woman
publisher in Canada,
helping to found and edit
The Provincial Freeman,
a weekly newspaper
dedicated to anti-slavery,
black immigration to
Canada, temperance
(urging people to drink
less alcohol) and
upholding British rule
Abolition of slavery
Slavery has existed all over the world, from Asia,
Africa and the Middle East to the Americas. The
first movement to abolish the transatlantic slave
trade emerged in the British Parliament in the late
1700s. In 1793, Upper Canada, led by Lieutenant
Governor John Graves Simcoe, a Loyalist military
officer, became the first province in the Empire
to move toward abolition. In 1807, the British
Parliament prohibited the buying and selling of
slaves, and in 1833 abolished slavery throughout
the Empire. Thousands of slaves escaped from
the United States, followed “the North Star” and
settled in Canada via the Underground Railroad,
a Christian anti-slavery network.
A growing economy
The first companies in Canada were formed
during the French and British regimes and
competed for the fur trade. The Hudson’s Bay
Company, with French, British and Aboriginal
employees, came to dominate the trade in the
northwest from Fort Garry (Winnipeg) and Fort
Edmonton to Fort Langley (near Vancouver) and
Fort Victoria—trading posts that later became
cities.
The first financial institutions opened in the
late 18th and early 19th centuries. The Montreal
Stock Exchange opened in 1832. For centuries
Canada’s economy was based mainly on farming
and on exporting natural resources such as fur,
fish and timber, transported by roads, lakes,
rivers and canals.