Excerpt from Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, Vol. 40

But the dimensions on which much of what subsequently passed had turned began in the year 1818. It had been for some time the practice in Canada to vote certain sums for the maintenance of the Government, what was further required being supplied by the votes of the House of Commons. The Assembly of Canada had asked that all the supplies should be voted by them selves, that their Government might not be left dependent on the votes of the House of Commons. A petition was presented to that effect, which, thou h rejected at the time, was afterwards acceded to but when the Duke of Richmond was there, a new mode of voting the supplies by chapters was proposed, and soon afterwards, under Lord Dalhousie, a permanent grant was required for a considerable part of the supplies. This led to a resistance on the part of the As sembly, and both those propositions were given up the Assembly gained its point, the supplies were regularly proposed, item by item, and nothing more beyond the eu nual vote was asked for. This decision, however, led to new debates, and after a certain time, Mr. Huskisson, who was then Colonial Secretary, thought it tit to bringthe questions under the consideration of Parlia ment, and caused a Select Committee to be appointed to consider the question then at issue with the House of Assembly. Before I state what the report of that Committee was, and the result of what was done, I wish to call the attention of the House to the ia structions which were given by Sir George Murray, who was subsequently Secretary of State under the Duke of Wellington, before the report of the Committee had been taken into consideration. I wish to quote those instructions, in order to show that the policy of the Government of that day was, as of every Government since, a policy of forbearance and moderation, evincing a constant desire to consult the interests and to meet the wishes of the inhabitants of Lower Canada, as far as possible, consist ently with a due regard to the mainte nance of British authority. Sir (3. Mur ray found, that according to the law of F rance, certain duties, imposed by an act passed by the Imperial Parliament in 1774, and which were granted in lieu of other duties that had been found more oppres sive, were the only ones that could be appropriated by the Lords of the Treasury in this country to discharge the various expenses of the Colonial Government. He, therefore, instructed Sir J. Kempt, who.

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