1907 DEPARTMENT OF LANDS, FORESTS AND MINES. 189 



pondence of the judiciary and the principal officers of the Local Government, 

 aud that to this end official incomes should be paid, "not at the pleasure of 

 the popular branch of the Legislature, but from adequate funds to be irre- 

 vocably pledged for that purpose." 



Claims of the Crown. 



It was urged that alterations on the subject of the emoluments of the 

 chief officers of the Crown, and especially of the Governor, would be deroga- 

 tory to their character. "The tendency of such controversies would 

 unavoidably be to introduce a disesteem for those functionaries by exhibit- 

 ing them in the light of pensioners on the reluctant bounty of the repre- 

 sentatives of the people." The officials of the Local Government, it was 

 contended, having frequently unpopular duties to perform, and being called 

 upon to oppose the passions and emotions of the day, should be raised 

 above all influence, and suspicion of influence, of unworthy fear or favor. 

 They should not be looking for their subsistence to the favor of a body 

 which necessarily reflected most of the fluctiiating movements of the public 

 mind. "Such are the principal motives," wrote the Colonial Secretary, 

 "which induced me to conclude that the King could not consistently with 

 the interests of his Canadian subjects relinquish, except in return for an 

 adequate Civil List, the control which His Majesty at present exercises 

 over the hereditary and territorial revenue. * • * ^ temporary cession 

 of the revenue in return for a provision for the chief public officers of the 

 Province for a corresponding period, would be the most satisfactory arrange- 

 ment." 



The despatch took strong ground against transferring from the Execu- 

 tive to the popular branch of the Legislature, the management of the 

 uncleared territory. "His Majesty's confidential advisers," says the writer, 

 "regard as conclusive and unanswerable the objections which are made to 

 confiding the management of the uncleared territory of Lower Canada to 

 either or both of the Houses of General Assembly, or to persons appointed 

 by them and subject to their control. In the distribution of the different 

 powers of the State the office of settling and alienating the uncleared terri- 

 tory properly belongs to the Executive Government." Any expectations 



1837. 



which might have been entertained of a satisfactory settlement of the dif- 

 ficulty on the basis laid down in the Lieutenant-Governor's instructions were 

 speedily dissipated by the bitter controversies which shortly afterwards arose 

 between Sir Francis Bond Head and the dominant party in the Legislature. 

 The popular feeling of irritation was further inflamed by the arbitrary 

 course pursued by Lieutenant-Governor Head, and culminated the follow- 

 ing year in the quickly suppressed outbreak led by "William Lyon Macken- 

 zie, which, though an utter failure considered as a military enterprise, did 

 much to arouse the nttention of the Government and people of Great Bri- 

 tain to the real condition of affairs in Canada and bring about responsible 

 Government. 



In the year 1838 the Committee on Finance of the House of Assembly 

 brought in a report on casual and territorial revenue, submitting a draft of 

 a bill appropriating this branch of the revenue, accompanied by a series of 

 resolutions respecting the appropriations to be made therefrom, in accord- 

 ance with the plan of settlement proposed by the Colonial Office. ThiB 

 measure passed the Assembly but failed to become law, as it did not obtain 



