USA > Pennsylvania > Philadelphia County > Philadelphia > Municipal government history and politics, Vol. V > Part 16
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231 Geo. III, c. 31.
3 See Proclamation in Statutes of Upper Canada, i. 23.
4Trithings or ridings were divisions peculiar to Yorkshire and Lincoln- shire, though Robertson (Scotland under her early Kings, iii. 433) is inclined to trace them in Kent and Surrey. Bishop Stubbs, however, (Constitutional History, i. 100) considers the view "very interesting but very conjectural."
5 Upp. Can. Stat. 32 Geo. III, c. 8.
3
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course of years the number was increased by the addition of the Johnstown, Newcastle, Niagara, London, and Gore Districts.1 These districts were intended mainly for legal and judicial purposes. But all these old names, so familiar in provincial history, have become obliterated by the county organizations.
The Duke de la Rochefoucault-Liancourt, who visited the country in 1795, and had several interviews with Governor Simcoe, at Newark, now Niagara, the old capital of Upper Canada, informs us that the division of the four districts into counties was "purely military, and related merely to the enlisting, completing and assembling of the militia. The militia of each county is commanded by a lieutenant."2 Whilst the Duke was, no doubt, correct in the main, it must not be forgotten that the erection of counties was also necessary for purposes of representation. A section of the act establishing the Constitution of Upper Canada expressly provided : His Majesty may authorize "the Governor or Lieutenant-Governor of each of the provinces of Upper and Lower Canada to issue a proclamation dividing such province into districts or coun- ties or circles, towns and townships, and appointing the limits thereof, and declaring and appointing the number of repre- sentatives to be chosen by each of such districts, counties or circles, towns and townships respectively."3 Members for the Legislature were then, and for many years afterward, chosen by freeholders having real property to the yearly value of forty shillings in districts, counties or circles, and five pounds sterling in towns and townships, or who paid a rental in the latter at the rate of ten pounds sterling a year.4
The Legislature was composed of plain, practical men, who. went energetically to work in the first sessions to provide for the wants of the few thousands of people scattered through- 1
1 Bouchette, p. 590. Scadding's Toronto, p. 361.
2 De la Rochefoucault-Liancourt, Voyage dans les États-Unis et le Haut Canada, i. 434.
331 Geo. III, c. 31. s. 14.
4 Imp. Stat. 31 Geo. III, c. 31.
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out the wide extent of country over which their jurisdiction reached. For many years their principal duties were con- fined to measures for carrying on local improvements. It was considered " requisite, for the maintenance of good order and the rigid execution of the laws, that proper officers should be appointed to superintend the observance thereof."1 Accord- ingly, the people were authorized by statute to meet in any parish, township or reputed township or place on the warrant of the High-Constable, who was to preside on such occasions. These assemblies were composed of the inhabitants who were householders and ratepayers in the locality interested, and were held in the early times, for convenience sake, in the parish church or chapel. They had to elect a parish or town Clerk, who was to make out annual lists of the inhabitants within a district, keep the records, and perform other business con- nected with such an office. The other officers appointed were as follows : Assessors, to assess all such rates and taxes "as shall be imposed by any Act or Acts of the Legislature ;" a Collector, "to receive such taxes and rates in the manner authorised by the Legislature;" Overseers of Roads and High- ways, "to oversee and perform such things as shall be directed by any act passed touching or concerning the highways and roads in the province," and to act as Fence-Viewers "conform- able to any resolutions that may be agreed upon by the inhabi- tants at such meetings"; a Pound-Keeper, to impound all stray cattle. The act also provided for two Town-Wardens. As soon as there should be any church built for the performance of Divine service according to the use of the Church of England, then the parson or minister was to nominate one Warden and the inhabitants the other. These Wardens were a corporation to represent the whole inhabitants of the town- ship or parish, with the right to let or sell property, to sue and be sued. The High-Constable, who called and presided over the township meetings, was appointed by the Justices in
1 Upp. Can. Stat. 33 Geo. III, c. 2.
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Quarter-Sessions. The presiding officer had to communicate a list of persons nominated at these meetings to a Magistrate, who was to administer to them the oath of office. In case the persons appointed at the meeting refused to act, they were subject to a penalty, and the Magistrates in Sessions called for that purpose proceeded to fill the vacancies. In case there were not thirty inhabitants in a township, then they were con- sidered to form part of the adjacent township which should contain the smallest number of inhabitants.1 1
The following extract from the early records of the town- ship of Sophiasburg, or the 6th township lying on Picton and Quinté Bays, will be read with interest, because it shows that there was an attempt made to establish a parish system on the basis of that so long existent in the parent State. No similar record can be found in the annals of the old townships of Upper Canada, although the references in the Constitutional Act of 1791, and in several provincial statutes,2 go to show that the erection of parishes was in the minds of those who were engaged in developing local institutions in the coun- try :-
" Passed at Sophiasburg, at a regular town meeting, 3rd March, 1800. And be it observed-That all well-regulated townships be divided into parishes. Be it enacted by the
1 One of the first reported town meetings (Canniff, p. 454) held in accord- ance with the act, was that of Adolphustown, which came off on the 6th of March, 1793. The following words are an exact transcript of the record :- "The following persons were chosen to officiate in their respective offices, the ensuing year, and also the regulations of the same: Reuven Bedell, township clerk; Paul IIuff and Philip Dorland, overscers of the poor ; Joseph Allison and Garit Benson, constables; Willet Cases, Paul Huff and John Huyck, Pound-Keepers; Abraham Maybee and Peter Rutland, Fence-Viewers. The height of fence to be 4 feet 8 inches; water fence voted to be no fence. Hoggs running at large to have yokes on 18 by 24 inches. No piggs to run until three months old. No stallion to run. Any person putting fire to any bush or stable, that does not his endeavour to hinder it from doing damage, shall forfeit the sum of forty shillings."
(Signed) PHILIP DORLAND, T. Clerk.
º See supra, p. 58.
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majority of votes, that this town shall be divided into parishes, and described as follows : St. John's, St. Matthew's, St. Giles, Mount Pleasant." 1
It does not appear, however, that parishes were established to any extent on the English system throughout Upper Canada, although they were general for ecclesiastical purposes. The Church of England was the dominant religious body for many years, and there was an effort made to establish it by giving it large reserves of public lands. We shall see, how- ever, later on, that parishes were established in the maritime provinces for civil purposes as in some of the old English colonies in America.
In accordance with the British system of local government in counties, the Magistrates in Sessions performed an impor- tant part in the administration of local affairs. These Courts of Quarter Sessions have long existed in English counties, and their functions have been regulated by a series of statutes commencing in the Tudor times and coming down to the present day. The English counties were subdivided into petty sessional divisions. At the head of this civil organiza- tion in a county is the Lord-Lieutenant and the Custos Rotulorum. These two offices are usually held by one person, who holds office under a special commission from the Crown, and is generally a peer of the realm or large landowner.2 " His office," says Hallam, "may be considered as a revival of the ancient local earldom, and it certainly took away from the sheriff a great part of the dignity and importance which he had acquired since the discontinuance of that office. Yet the Lord-Lieutenant has so peculiarly military an authority that it does not in any degree control the civil power of the sheriff as the executive minister of the law." 3
1 Canniff, p. 472.
2 The English Citizen Series. Local Government in England, M. D. Chalmers, p. 93.
3 Const. Hist. (Eng. ed. 1881) ii. 134.
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It appears from the old records that there was a similar officer appointed in the early times of Canada. Speaking of Lower Canada, Lord Durham says: "The Justices of the Peace scattered over the whole of Lower Canada are named by the Governor on no very accurate information, there being no Lieutenants or similar officers of counties in this as in the upper province."1 The Duke de la Rochefoucault, writing in 1795, says : "Simcoe is by no means ambitious of investing all power and authority in his own hands, but consents that the Lieutenants, whom he nominates for each county, should appoint the Justices of the Peace and the officers of the militia."2 From these and other references to the duties of the officer, he appears to have discharged functions similar to those of the Lord-Lieutenant in England, since he appointed Justices and commanded the militia. The title, however, appears to have fallen into disuse in the course of a few years,3 though there was a Custos Rotulorum or Chairman of Sessions in all the provinces. The Lieutenancy in Upper Canada never assumed as much importance as did the same office in Virginia.4
1 Report, p. 41.
2 Vol. i. p. 416.
3 The Upper Canada Almanac for 1804, published at York, gives the following list of "Lieutenants of Counties :" "John Macdonell, Esq., Glen- garry; William Fortune, Esq., Prescott; Archibald Macdonell, Esq., Stor- mont; Hon. Richard Duncan, Esq., Dundas; Peter Drummond, Esq., Grenville; James Breckenridge, Esq., Leeds; Hon. Richard Cartwright, Esq., Frontenac; Hazelton Spencer, Esq., Lenox; William Johnson, Esq., Addington ; John Ferguson, Esq., Hastings; Archibald Macdonell, Esq., of Marysburg, Prince Edward; Alexander Chisholm, Esq., Northumberland ; Robert Baldwin, Esq., Durham; Hon. David William Smith, Esq., York; Hon. Robert Hamilton, Esq., Lincoln; Samuel Ryerse, Esq., Norfolk; William Claus, Esq., Oxford; (Middlesex vacant) ; Hon. Alexander Grant, Esq., Essex ; Hon. James Baby, Kent." These Lieutenants do not appear to have been appointed in subsequent years. The foregoing list recalls the names of men prominent in the early days of Canada. Some of their descendants still play a conspicuous part in public affairs.
4"One is struck by the prominence of the Lieutenant, anciently the Com- mander, who, besides being the chief of the militia in his county, was a
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As I have already shown, the Justices in sessions appointed as in England a High Constable, and discharged certain functions now performed by municipal bodies in Canada. All moneys collected by Assessors of Taxes were to be paid into the hands of Treasurers who were appointed by the Jus- tices in general quarter sessions. The Justices so assembled directed how the moneys were to be disbursed in accordance with the law. The Legislature, from time to time, regulated the time and place for holding these Courts. The Quarter- Sessions were held in 1793, at Adolphustown, Kingstown, Michillimackinac, Newark, New Johnstown, and Cornwall, then the principal towns of the province. The jurisdiction of the Justices was very extensive in those times. They had the carrying out in a great measure of the Acts of the Legislature providing for the defraying of the expenses of building court- houses and jails, of keeping the same in repair, of the payment of Jailers, of the support and maintenance of prisons, of the building and repairing of houses of correction, of the con- struction and repairs of bridges, of the fees of Coroners and other officers, and of all other matters that were essentially of a local character. Whenever it was necessary to establish a market, the Legislature had to pass a special Act giving the requisite power to the Court of Sessions. For instance, we find an Act authorizing the Justices in this Court "to fix, open and establish some convenient place in the town of Kingston as a market, where butcher's meat, butter, eggs, poultry, fish and vegetables, shall be exposed to sale, and to appoint such days and hours as shall be suitable for that pur- pose, and to make such other orders and regulations relative thereto as they shall deem expedient."1 The Justices of the
member of the Council, and as such a judge of the highest tribunal in the county. With Commissioners of the Governor he held monthly courts for the settlement of suits, not exceeding in value one hundred pounds of tobacco, and from this court, appeal was allowed to the Governor and Council." Local Institutions of Virginia. By Edw. Ingle, Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science, vol. iii. 185. 1 Upp. Can. Stat. 41 Geo. III, c. 3.
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Peace had also other important functions to discharge out of the sessions. For instance, it was on their certificate that the Secretary of State granted licenses to public houses. These licenses were only granted after full inquiry and discussion at public meetings duly called for that purpose by the High Constable or other public officer.1 The Justices in quarter sessions also appointed Surveyors of Highways, to lay out and regulate statute labor on the public roads. All persons were liable to work on the roads, in proportion to the assessment on their real and personal property.2
For the first fifteen or twenty years of the history of the administration of civil affairs in Upper Canada, the burdens of the people were exceedingly small. A Canadian historian says on this point: "No civilized country in the world was less burdened with taxes than Canada West at this period. A small direct tax on property, levied by the District Courts of Sessions, and not amounting to £3,500 for the whole country, sufficed for all local expenses. There was no poor rate, no capitation tax, no tithes, no ecclesiastical rates of any kind. Instead of a road tax, a few days of statute labor annually sufficed."3
Under such circumstances we can easily understand why the condition of Kingston, for many years the most important town of Upper Canada, should have been so pitiable accord- ing to a writer of those early times : "The streets [in 1815] require very great repairs, as in the rainy seasons it is scarcely possible to move about without being in mud to the ankles. Lamps are required. ... But first the Legislature must form a code of laws, forming a complete police. To meet expense, Government might lay a rate upon every inhabitant householder in proportion to value of property in house."4
1 Upp. Can. Stat. 34 Geo. III, c. 12.
2 Ibid., 48 Geo. III, c .. 12.
3 McMullen's History, p. 247.
4 Canniff, p. 432.
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Subsequently, when Kingston became the seat of government, the municipal authorities were encouraged to make improve- ments in streets, drainage, sidewalks, and otherwise. When the town of York was incorporated as a city, in 1834, under the name of Toronto, it had not a single sidewalk within its limits, and the first Mayor, Mr. W. Lyon Mackenzie, had to initiate a system of local improvements under great difficulties.1
As the country filled up, and the necessity arose for roads and bridges and other local improvements, the taxes increased ; although they never became heavy under the unsatisfactory system that prevailed, until after the reunion of the Canadas in 1841. The time of the Legislature was constantly occupied in passing Acts for the construction of public works necessary for the comfort, safety, and convenience of particular localities. A large amount of "parish " business was transacted in those days by the Legislature which might as well have been done by local Councils. As compared with Lower Canada, how- ever, the people had eventually a workable system of local government, which enabled them to make many improvements for themselves. The construction of canals and other impor- tant works of provincial importance, on an expensive scale, at last left so little funds in the treasury that the Parliament of this province alone, among the North American colonies " was, fortunately for itself, compelled to establish a system of local assessment, and to leave local works in a great measure to the energy and means of the localities themselves."2 Still the sys m, as the country became more populous and enter- prising, } oved ultimately quite inadequate to meet the require- ments of the people and to develop their latent energies. The Legislature was constantly called upon to give power to local authorities to carry out measures of local necessity. What- ever taxation was necessary for local purposes had to be im-
1 Lindsey's Life of Mackenzie, i. 312.
2 Lord Durham's Report, p. 48.
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posed through the inconvenient agency of Courts of Quarter- Sessions, over which the people exercised little or no control. If the people of a city or town wished to be incorporated, they were forced to apply to the Legislature for a special Act. The powers granted to these corporations were by no means uniform, and great confusion resulted from the many statutes that existed with respect to these bodies. "No lawyer," says a writer on the subject,1 could give an opinion upon the rights of an individual in a single corporation without following the original act through the thousand sinuosities of parliamentary amendment, and no capitalist at a distance could credit a city or town without a particular and definite acquaintance with its individual history." It was not, however, until after the reunion of the Canadian provinces, that steps were taken to establish in Upper Canada a larger system of popular local government in accordance with the wise suggestions made by Lord Durham and other sagacious British statesmen. But before we can refer to this part of the subject, I must first review the early local history of the maritime provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island.
V .- THE MARITIME PROVINCES.
When Nova Scotia became a possession of England by the treaty of Utrecht in 1713, the only place of any importance was Port Royal, originally founded by a French gentleman- adventurer, Baron de Poutrincourt. The English renamed the place " Annapolis Royal," in honor of Queen Anne, and for some years it was the seat of government. The province in those days had a considerable French Acadian population, chiefly settled in the Annapolis valley, and in the fertile country watered by the streams that flow into the Bay of Fundy. For some years there was a military government in Nova Scotia. In 1719, the governor received instructions to choose a council
1 J. Sheridan Hogan, Prize Essay on Canada, 1855, p. 104.
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for the management of civil affairs from the principal English inhabitants, until an assembly should be formed to regulate matters in accordance with the instructions given to the American colonies generally. This first council was com- posed exclusively of officers of the garrison and of officials of the public departments. The French inhabitants in their respective parishes were permitted, in the absence of duly appointed magistrates, to choose deputies from among them- selves for the purpose of executing the orders of the govern- ment and acting as arbitrators in case of controversies in the French settlements. An appeal was allowed to the governor at Annapolis.1
In 1749, the city of Halifax was founded by Governor Cornwallis on the shores of Chebucto Bay, on the Atlantic coast. The government of the province was vested in a Governor and Council, and one of their first acts was to cstab- lish a Court of General Sessions, similar in its nature and conformable in its practice to the Courts of the same name in the parent State.2 In 1751 they passed an ordinance that the town and suburbs of Halifax be divided into eight wards, and the inhabitants empowered to choose annually the following officials " for managing such prudential affairs of the town as shall be committed to their care by the Governor and Coun- cil :- eight town-overseers, one town-clerk, sixteen constables, eight scavengers." 3
It was only after the establishment of the first Legislature that No .Scotia was divided into local divisions for legislative, judicial, . J civil purposes. The first House of Assembly, elected in 1758, was composed of twenty-two representatives, of whom sixteen were chosen by the province at large, four by the township of Halifax, and two by the township of Lunen- burg. It was at the same time provided that whenever fifty
1 Haliburton's History of Nova Scotia, i. 93, 96.
% Ibid., p. 163.
3 Murdoch's History, ii. 199.
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qualified householders were settled at Pisiquid (now Windsor), Minas, Cobequid, or at any other township which might be thereafter erected, it should be entitled to send two repre- sentatives to the Assembly.1 In 1759, the Governor and Council divided the province into five counties : Annapolis, Kings, Cumberland, Lunenburg and Halifax.2 A few years later the whole island of Cape Breton was formed into a county.3
The Legislature appears to have practically controlled the administration of local affairs throughout the province, except so far as it gave, from time to time, certain powers to the Courts of Quarter-Sessions to regulate taxation and carry out certain public works and improvements. In the first session of the Legislature, a joint committee of the Council and As- sembly choose the town officers for Halifax, viz., four overseers of the poor, two clerks of the market, four surveyors of the highways, two fence viewers, and two hog-reeves.4 We have abundant evidence that at this time the authorities viewed with disfavor any attempt to establish a system of town govern- ment similar to that so long in operation in New England. On the 14th of April, 1770, the Governor and Council passed a resolution that "the proceedings of the people in calling town-meetings for discussing questions relative to law and government and such other purposes, are contrary to law, and if persisted in, it is ordered that the parties be prosecuted by the attorney-general."5 The government of Nova Scotia had before it, at this time, the example of the town-meetings of Boston, presided over by the famous Samuel Adams, and
1 Haliburton, i. 208. Murdoch, ii. 334, 351.
2 Murdoch, ii. 373, 374. In the election for the Assembly that came off in August of the same year, the counties in question returned two members each; the towns of Lunenburg, Annapolis, Horton, and Cumberland, two euch, and the township of Halifax, four, or twenty-two representatives in all.
3 Ibid., p. 454.
4 Ibid., p. 361.
· Haliburton, i. 248.
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doubtless considered them as the very hotbeds of revolution.1 What the Tories thought of these popular bodies can be under- stood from the following extract, which gives the opinion of a rabid writer of those revolutionary times. "This is the foul- est, subtlest, and most enormous serpent ever issued from the egg of sedition. I saw the small seed when it was implanted; it was a grain of mustard. I have watched the plant until it has become a great trec."2
In the course of time the province was divided for legisla- tive, judicial and civil purposes, as follows :-
1. Divisions or circuits, generally consisting of one or more counties, for purposes connected with the Courts.
2. Districts, generally of one or more counties, established, as a rule, for the convenience of the people, who had the privilege conferred upon them of having a Court of Sessions of the Peace for the regulation of their internal affairs.
3. Counties, generally established for legislative purposes.
4. Townships, which were simply subdivisions of the county intended for purposes of local administration or of repre- sentation.
In each county there was a Sheriff and Justice of the Peace, whose jurisdiction extended throughout the same. Each district was generally provided with a Court-house which belonged to the county. The townships did not contain any definite quantity of land, as was generally the case in Upper Canada. The inhabitants appear, according to Judge Hali- burton, " have had no other power than that of holding an
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