1 SEPTEMBER 1838, Page 9

TIIE GOVERNMENT DOINGS IN CANADA. TO TOE EDITOR OF THE

SPECTATOR.

Slit—As it is by no means improbable that Lord Dr ItTi.% at may return to' England, and as, in that event. there will be a great outcry among the Whigs howl againet Lord BILOCC.IIA at, it is worth while to reeerd the difficultiee which Lord Dell11.01 or his friends have created, Mile. tied est of Cie pa-were:1e ings which took place in the Ilium of Lords. I. Lord MI:LIU/Ctutu' has made many severe remarks Up0 u lie a.) ■oin•ii at of Mr. Tc eras: ; reinalke which, though not expressed in violent or strong Iiihgutge, cannot but be bitte: ly felt by Lord DI•JILIAM, and which may alreatlyt have courted a tender of his resignation.

2. Lord DURHAM miry he said to have no confidential legal adviser. The only ordinance that he has trissed, was of sueli a character, that it is impossible to predict what nre the legal questions that his proceedings may occasion.

3. 'Flue publication of the letter of 31r. Cii A 'mats Busse:is in the Morning Vero/aide, must seriously ettilaarratie Lord DUNHAM. No Government prose- cution can take place, without its being at once more than suepected, if the Government gains a verdict, that the jury has been tampered with. 4. The only Canadian papers which are cited in England are of the most Tory character. 'The opinions of the Canadians have no press to report them. Every Liberal paper in Canada leas been put down. The peivare tenets of the Canadian Liberals give a very different neenunt of affairs from that which the papers give. These letters accuse those about Lord Di:nuns' of being engaged in petty intrigues, and with being guilty of dupli(tity. They say, that indeed of keeping aloof from parties, the utthiiiiln are anxious to engage Mr. J.AFON. FAIN s:, 31r. MORIN, and others, to sect ifice Mr. l'A rINEAD and his friends, antL to form a new Canadian party that eliall be countenanced by the Government,— an intrigue of which more titan due signs are alaeady apparent, but which must miserably fail, even if the persone named, which is at least doubtful. approve of it. Of duplicity there are numerous charges. The following is am extract from a letter, dated New York, January 24.

" --tot■a. that Boner i4 Atiltiong to klInVir is bent rfr•Ct an amnesty woidsl hire: 1113n Site GO, ernor is oiling to pardon all, but mould nisi' to be allre that tlio chiefs will not recommences agitat. . All. hey Yelp4, 'meal( favourably of l'apineau, tuja talents. & ; nmmti a.xIur,s a desire to become acquainted with bim."

Not one letter alone Contains a similar statement; yet on June the 2e3th, Mr. iit.:1.1.rn formed one of the Council whirl" 'sentenced Mr. PA P1NEA u to death if he returned to Canada! And wily? The affidavits against all the persons charged with treason were put into the hands of Mr. Bunten, within a week after his arrival in the colony. After having seen the affidavit's, those about Lord 1)cRssAOi, and in his confidence, spoke highly of Mr. PA roma u, and d.- sued to become acquainted with him! 5. Lord Manes( dittagrees with Mr. BULLER in his statement of his mations for the ordinance, nr he ie guilty of a remarkable ouppreseion of facts. Mr. BuLLEft states, that he and the rest of the Council had sentenced twenty-three men to death, without trial, without hearing their defence, because no jury would find them guilty—not because be did not desire to have them tiled and found guilty—not because he did not desire to punish them ; and he makes an exactly similar complaint of juries as was made by land ELDON, when Attorney-General, upon being unable to prevent the acquittal of THEL- MA LL and those other persons, the meeting to eummemorate whose acquittal was only laat year preaided Over by Mr. CHARLES BULLER himself. Mr. PA PI- NEA U nid his emnpattiots were not ostracized, but convicted of treason by Lord Deena at's Council, because there was no possibility of convicting them before a jury ! 6. It is the Government, and not Lord BROUGHAM, which has disallowed the otdinance, upon account of its tolinitted 7. The real difficulties of Lord DURHAM's position—those that he found upon his arrival in Canada, not those that he has himself created—were few, and wete such that he might eastly have surmounted. The ten thousand soldiers who accompanied his descent upon the province were sufficient to re• move every obstacle, and to oppose the most open as well as the iiiii at concealed loatility. There were no peculiar circumstances in the administtation Of the country, except the absence of a popular Legislature, which nevem-sally sepa- ruted him from the disputes of political parties, and front the pecuniary con. te.tv which so much embarrassed and perplexed Lords DALlioUsIE. AYLMER, Gosroen, and Sir J. KENtr. In three small districts out iif the whole pro- vince there had beet' th • commencement of an insurrection, occasioned by the unjustifiable arrests at Chambly, which had been suppressed ; but in those dis tricts, as well as throughout the whole province, he found tin his arrival a

4 moat peaceful state of things. Yet to deal with this state of things, he thaught proper to claim moat extraordinary powers, and to commit the most arbitrary esteeaaea againat twenty-three of the most eminent men of Canada.

But Lord Du rola M, it is tail, did what ought to have been 'lone, and he has

merely not lawfully pitnishell ththe whom he lawfully have punished as guilty of treason; and he has tnetely not lawfully banished to Bermuda the whom he might lawfully have banished to some other part of the globe. This may be denied altogether. The circumstances of the outbreak were id a charac- ter to render it both unjust and improper to puniah at all. The state of feeling in the country rendered it improper to institute a single trial. The position of the parties charged with treason—the circumstances of their resistance—the suppression by the Government, sanctioned by a vote of the house of C - woos, of the reasons of the arrests at Chambly—the violation by the Govern- ment of the Constitution of Canada, in passing the Resolutions of I8:i7—the im- possibility of convicting any of the parties, rendered a general amnesty, with- out any exception, essentially necessary. If punishment could have been legally inflicted, it ought not to have been inflicted at all. But Mr. Bui.i.Ett says that they could not gaiu a conviction which could authorize the infliction of any punishment.

The policy of Lord DURHAM's ordinance can never be defended. He was sent to Canada, not to suspend the law, but to restore the administration of the law, which the alleged rebellion had suspended. The Constitution was not suspended as a punishment fiir the rebellien, but, as land ItiroN distinctly put it. it was suspended by its own defects. It was nut supended to enable Lord Du all ttar to accomplish any thing. He was sent to Canada to inquire, to report, to suggest, and, during his stay, to administer the law. There was no blunder in the terms of the powers given to him. There was no necessity to destroy the criminal law of the pt ovince—to give to him extraoldinary powers of life and death over the opponents of the Government, in order to nil his studies of the necessities of the Govetnment, or to .enthellieh a report upon the conditions of a new constitution. There was nothing pettifogging in pie. venting him futon running loose in the commission of extravagant acts, anti in hindering hint from sentencing IIWO to death, "because there was no necessity to inflict the penalty of death." It was because the mission of Lord DURHAM Was that of a peacemaker, that he ought never to have passed the ordinance complained of. Ile has made the victors double victors, first in their having gained the destruction of the Con. stitution to wliich they were hostile, and then iu having secured the proscrip- tion of their political opponents. Was this a mode of calming feelings of mortification or of triumph ? Is this the way by which a future contest between the Legislature of Lower Canada and the Government is to be prevented? is the exasperation of the people, heightened by injustice and political servitude, to be subdued by separating them from their leaders? If it was no duty of Lord Do ROAM to regard who was right or who was wrong, then, apart from all other reasons for it. a general amnesty would have been politic and just. But it is pretended that the safety if the province required the absence of the chiefs of the popular parry. If the chiefs, who ate the most eminent men who have appeared in the history of Canada, returned, what could they do ? Have they any political privileges?—None. Could they excite a rebellion ? They did not even prepare to rebel before ten thousand troops were sent to Canada : could they have any chance of success if they now excited a rebellion ? If they would have had any chance of success, then their prosetiption is calculated to exasperate, not to calm the fears of their followers. Then it is evident that Lord DURHAM has done nothing to make himself popular ; or that the popu- larity of those whom he has proscribed, as well as their power, is greater than any that he has acquired. Ile cannot have effected the contentment of all parties, as his friends affirm.

But if these proscriptions are justifiable, "not because the men proscribed are et iminal," then it would have been most advisable that twelve members of the Legislative Council (that number would have been sufficient) should have been proscribed, in order effectually to secure the harmony of the two branches of the Legislatute. Why not prosetibe the weaker political party instead of the stronger, if the peace of the province depended upon a proscription?

The truth is, that the ordinance of Lord Deena at has no justification. It

has no precedent. It is calculated to excite the most violent disputes between the Government and the Legislature when the Legislature is restored. It realizes all the fears which the Resolutions of 1637 excited in Canada ; and it must convince the Canadians that their contest for the control over the pecuni- ary necessities of the Government was not for the assertion of a barren or insig- nificant privilege. It elan sets an example that will have a most fatal influence upon the future events of the province.

'the talk of the ordinance being a mode by which political parties may be reconciled, is idle, if not ludicrous. The Government must rest upon its con- ciliating the gteatest degree of public confidence. This conciliation can only be effected through the public institutions of the country. If they afford pro- tection—if they are wisely ordained—if all parties are taught to refer their dis- putes to the decision of those institutions—then a settled and peaceful state of things is produced. But if the public institutions of the province are unset- tled—if political disputes may lead to the suspension or to the desttuction of those institutions—political parties will resort to the most unjustifiable excesses in order to gain their engirt; the greatest degree of public insecurity will pre- vail; and the interests of Canada will be torn to pieces by no man knowing to which institution to cling for protection. These are sad and terrible evils; and Lord De 14 Heal will be responsible for many of them if he continue the policy