78 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



royal «luke who .sold it foi- jewels ior his inistresseH. When responsible 

 goveriunenl was in lull and satisfactory operation, he advocated an 

 elective legislative council — a certain number of members retiring 

 periodically — with the avowed object of solving what has been for years 

 a ])roblen\ with some Canadian thinkers — to preserve and at the same 

 time strengthen the ui)])er house in our system of government. Mr. 

 Johnston was also a sincere and earnest prohibitionist, and attempted, 

 unsucceasfully. in 1855, to pass a measure to prohibit the sale and manu- 

 facture of liquor in the province ; a measure which evoked the sarcasm of 

 Joseph Howe, who never believed in its practicability and had no objection 

 to the moderate use of wine, though he himself was a man of most 

 abstemious habits at a time when over-indulgence was unhappily not 

 uncommon in the public and social life of the province. lie was the 

 first British American to propose and cany in a provincial legislature a 

 resolution in favour of a union of the provinces " as calculated to perpetu- 

 ate their connection with the parent state, promote their advancement 

 and prosperity, increase their strength and influence, and elevate their 

 po.sition in the empire." It was on this memorable occasion that Joseph 

 Howe delivered a speech on the organization of the empire in w^hich he 

 gave most eloquent expression to his imperial sentiment and advocated 

 that federation of the empire which in these later days has found so 

 many able and enthusiastic exponents.' It is an interesting fact that 

 loyalists or their descendants — notably Chief Justice Smith of Lower 

 Canada, in 1789 ,'' Chief Justice Sewell, of Lower Canada, in 1814, ^ and 

 McfrSis. Johnston and llowo in 1854 — should have been the first to urge 

 such a scheme of colonial union as was vainly pressed by Joseph 

 Galloway on the attention of the colonial congress in 1774, as a means of 

 adjusting the serious difficulties which had arisen between the thii'teen 

 colonies and the parent state .* 



In social intercourse, Mr. Johnston appeared much buried in his 

 thoughts and never displayed those magnetic and sympathetic qualities 

 that made Joseph Howe so widely liked by all classes, especially the poor 



> See Appendix I for a full report of this eloquent address. Mr. Howe's 

 famous speech on this occasion is also given in Appendix J. 



2 See Kingsfonl's "History of Canada," vol. VII., p. 311. Chief Justice Smith 

 had also been a justice of the supreme court of New York. 



3 See Sewell's " Plan of Union," London, 1814, and Lord Duihanrs Report, 1839. 

 Chief Justice Sewell was a son of the last attorney-general of Massachussets, as an 

 English colony, ai\d became chief judge of Lower Canada in 1808. He was suc- 

 ceeded in 18HK l)y the .son of another loyalist, Sir .James Stuart, Bart. 



*See pages M'rl in " The Examination of Joseph Galloway, Esciuire, late Speaker 

 of the House of Assembly of Pennsylvania, before the House of Commons in 

 committee on the American Papers, with explanatory notes. London, 1759." An 

 edition of this scarce pamphlet was printed at Philadelphia in 18.">5 by the Council of 

 the Seventy-Sixth Society. See also vol. I., pp. 'Ml'M'.i oi "The Literary History of 

 the American Revolution, 17<i3-17S;{. In 2 vols., by Profes.sor Tyler, of Cornell Uni- 

 versity. New York and London, 181>7." 



