424 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
to the Imperial Parliament after the most full and ample discussion in all the Prov- 
inces whose Institutions it is proposed to revolutionize and whose revenues are to be 
swept away. 
Two years ago the public mind was tranquil and our people mutually respecting 
and prepared to help each other, contrasted the blessings they enjoyed with the dis- 
turbed state of things across the frontier,’ and were content. All this is changed 
and the undersigned venture to assert that there has been more distrust, animosity - 
and bitter feeling generated of this Quebec Conference and pervading all the Provinces, 
than has disturbed Society since their first foundation. 
The undersigned have seen at a moment when the Provinces were threatened 
with invasion‘, the public mind disturbed by rash attempts at innovation, and they 
see now propositions seriously made by prominent legislators in the Congress of the 
United States who are publicly entering the field in competition with Canada, for the 
possession of the Provinces and for a formal transfer of the allegiance of British Sub- 
jects.5 . 
All this is strange in British America and the people of Nova Scotia, sincerely 
believe that if any attempt is made in the interests of Canada for her territorial 
aggrandizement or to relieve her from political perplexitiesf; to break down without 
the consent of their inhabitants, the system under which all the Provinces have pros- 
pered in peace and loyalty, the bitter feuds which now disturb society may culminate 
in changes which none of us desire to contemplate and all of us will deplore. In 
view of a future so full of peril the people of Nova Scotia desire to discharge their duty 
to their Sovereign, to Her Majesty’s Ministers and to the two Houses of Parliament, 
and before they are committed to changes which they foresee will be disastrous, claim 
at least the opportunity to review the contemplated measure and to put their opinions 
upon record. 
The undersigned cannot believe that Statesmen whose lives are guarantees for 
the liberality of their sentiments and who rightly appreciate the Keen sense of justice 
which distinguishes the great Nation over whose counsels they preside will ever coun- 
tenance the policy proposed. If the elected Aldermen of any English City were in 
violation of their trust to attempt to transfer the control of its Government and of its 
Revenues to any other Corporation without the consent of their constituents they 
would have to look elsewhere than to Ministers of the Crown and to Members of the 
British Parliament for aid to consummate such a bargain, and the undersigned do 
not believe that the Act will be regarded as less reprehensible when the Government 
of a noble Province, inhabited by a spirited and loyal people who have committed 
no fault, is attempted to be transferred to a distant authority by those who were mere 
tenants for a limited term and had no right to alienate the trusts committed to their 
care. 



3 The United States were in the throes of the Reconstruction Period, with President Johnson and 
Congress at daggers drawn, and the country in a turmoil. 
4 In the plan of operation given out by Genera Sweeny, the Fenian War Secretary, in March, 1866, 
Portland was named as the general place of embarkation for ‘Expeditions against the capitals of New 
Brunswick and Nova Scotia.” In April of the same year, the Fenians made an unsuccessful attempt 
to capture the island of Campobello, in the Bay of Fundy. Macdonald, Troublous Times in Canada, 
14, 22-24. 
5 On July 2nd, 1866, a Bill was introduced in Congress entitled ‘‘A Bill for the admission of the 
States of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Canada East and Canada West, and for the organization of 
the Territories of Selkirk, Saskatchewan, and Columbia.” The text of this Bill is given in Macdonald’s 
Troublous Times in Canada, 146-48. At the time of the Annexation movement in Canada in 1849 
the Vermont Senate adopted an Annexation resolution, and the New York Legislature took similar 
action the following year. Allin and Jones, Annexation, Preferential Trade and Reciprocity, 378-79. 
6 Racial and political rivalries had produced a deadlock in the government of Canada. Bourinot, 
Canada under Britsh Rule, 195-98. 
