Canadian Relations And Law Essay, Research Paper
Essay on Material Covered in Grade 10 History
Part I. GOVERNMENT AND LAW
The Governor General represents the monarch in Canada. He/she is
appointed by the monarch on advice of the Canadian Government. Governors
General open Parliment and read the speech from the throne which outlines
the governments plans. They also give royal assent to bills, appoint
important officials, greet foreign leaders, and give out awards and medals.
The role of the Governor General is formal and symbolic.
The current Govener General is Ray Hnatyshyn. The Last one was Jeanne
Sauve. The Senate is, in essence, an independant House of Commons. It
appoints its own Speaker and runs its own affairs. The Prime Minister
(I’ll call him the PM) chooses new members for the senate whenever a
vacancy occurs. The Senate acts as a check on the power of the House of
Commons by rejecting bills. The Senate may also introduce bills itself,
pass them, and send ‘em to the House of Commons.
Elections for the House of Commons occur every five years, unless the PM
wants one sooner. Elected members of the House of Commons (MPs) each
represent a Constituency. How many members in the commons depends on how
many people in Canada. MPs must be over 18, and not disqualified by law.
The House only has to meet once a year, but usually there’s so much to do
they have to put in many months of work. Any MP can try to introduce a
bill, but the Cabinet usually controls the number of bills introduced. Most
bills come from the Cabinet, but the ideas can come from things like: A
senator, public servant, the media, party platform etc.
The PM chooses The Cabinet from fellow party members who have been
elected to the House of Commons. When choosing Cabinet members, the PM
must choose representatives of all regions and cultural groups of Canada
who together, represent and understand all of Canada. A Cabinet member is
usually made head of, and responsible for a department of government. For
example, the Minister of Finance prepares the federal budget and assumes a
big role in managing our economy. The Cabinet members meet together under
the leadership the of the PM to discuss the important decisions that the
government must make concearning proposed laws or bills. Each Cabinet
member is expected to accept decisions made by the Cabinet on the whole.
The Cabinet must always appear unified and capable to Parliment and to the
country.
How A Bill Becomes A Law:
-Cabinet Minister has idea for a bill
-Idea explained to Cabinet
-Cabinet approves idea
-Lawyers Draft bill
-Cabinet committee examines bill
-Cabinet and caucus approve bill
-Bill introduced to House of Commons or Senate (first reading)
-Second reading
-House debates and votes on principle of bill
-Parliamentary committee examines bill
-House amends bill
-Third reading, debate and vote
-Bill passes House
-Senate (or House of Commons if introduced in Senate) examines, debates, amends bill
-Bill passes Senate
-Govener general gives royal assent, Bill is now Law.
Criminal Law deals with the punishment of people who commit crimes
against the public such as murder, arson, and theft. These are considered
to be crimes against society. The rules for this are set down in the
Criminal Code of Canada. The federal government is responsible for
bringing criminal offenders to trial. Civil Law deals with the protection
of private rights. It is concearned with disputes between individuals or
groups. In civil cases, it is up to the injured party to take the case to
court. For an exmaple of a civil case, let’s say that a friend of yours
pulls out a gun and shoots a hole through your wall, but doesn’t want to
pay for it. It would be up to you to sue your friend for the cost of the
wall in a civil court.
Supreme Court of Canada
Supreme (or Superior) Court of The Province
TRIALS DIVISION APPEALS DIVISION
District (or County) Courts Provincial (Magistrate’s) Court
Family Court Youth Court
Indictable Offences Summary Conviction Offences
Classification Hearing
Alleged Offence
Rights Guaranteed by the Canadian Charter of rights and Freedoms
Fundamental freedoms:
Worship as you like, believe what you want, express your opinions,
associate with whomever you like, and gather together peacefully.
Democratic rights:
Vote in elections, run as a candidate in elections, elect a new government
at least every five years. (except, possibly in times of war.)
Mobility rights:
Enter or remain in or leave Canada, live and work wherever you wish within
Canada.
Equality rights:
Live and work and be protected by the law without discrimination based on
race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, arge, or mental or
physical disability.
(There are also Language rights and Enforcement.)
The Rights of The Accused in The Legal Process: (As outlined in the legal
rights of all Canadians in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The right to be secure from unreasonable search and seizure. This
prevents the police from searching you, your home, or your personal
belongings unless they have a good reason to believe that the search
will help them discover some information about a criminal activity.
The right of Habeus Corpus. This means that you have to be told the
reason you are being arrested. You must also be brought to trial
without undue delay.
The right to a fair trial. This means that you a right to have a
lawyer. If you cannot afford one, the court must appoint one to defend
you. You have a right to give your side of the case. The judge must
treat you in a fair manner.
The right not to be tried twice for the same crime. this means that
once you have been tried and sentenced, the government cannot decide to
take you to court again for the same crime.
The right not to be subject to cruel and unusual punishment. This means
that if you are found guilty of a crime, the courts cannot decide to
torture you. (pity.) Also, your sentance must be the same as the
sentance of other people who have been found guilty of a similar crime.
Some other rights outlined in the same section of the charter are:
The right not to be arbitrarily detained and imprisoned.
The right against self-incrimination.
The right to an interpreter.
The right to be considered innocent until proven guilty.
The right to bail.
Governor Sir Guy Carleton was convinced that the Thirteen Colnoies were
on the verge of rebellion and he felt that he had to secure the loyalty of
the Canadiens (The French-speaking inhabitants of New France) to prevent
them from joining with the rebels. To accomplish this goal, he convinced
the British government to pass The Quebec act in 1774. The Anglophone
Colonists in Quebec felt that the act made Quebec a French Colony instead
of a British colony. Generally, Canadiens were pleased. The act meant that
they could keep their land, religion, and language and participate in
politics. Basically, here are the Main points of the Quebec Act:
- Quebec border is expanded far to the west. The new area included the best fur-trapping lands.
- Freedom of religion is granted for Roman Catholics. Roman Catholics are also permitted to hold public office.
- French civil law is retained, but British (fag) criminal law is established.
- Roman Catholic churches are permitted to own property and collect tithes.
- No land is taken from the French.
- No elected assembly is created.
Red River resistance
The settlement of Red River was occupied by some Metis, (people of mixed
European (usually French) and Native Ancestry) and some Anglophone
settlers. When the Canadian Government bought the Northwest from the Hudson
Bay Company in the 1860s, the Metis were angered that they were not
consulted in the sale of the land, nor had their intrests been safeguarded.
A Metis leader, Louis Riel felt that Metis rights had to be safeguarded
before Canada took over the settlement. So he organized groups of Metis
who forced a surverying team to leave, and prevented the new Governor,
Mcdougall, from entering the colony. In November 1869, The Metis organized
a provisional government (a temporary government) with Riel as president.
They drew up a list of rights which they wanted the government to grant
before Red River joined confederation. While these were being negotiated,
some Anglophones got mad at the provisional government and one of them,
Thomas Scott, was arrested and executed for treason. This execution stopped
the negotiations with the federal government. Macdonald had wanted to bring
Red River into confederation peacefully, but he had to forget about that.
Citizens of Ontario were outraged that an Anglophone had been killed by
Francophones. the longer Macdonald delayed action in the Read River
settlement, the more complex the problem became. English speaking Canadians
wanted a military force to be sent to Red River to stop Riel’s uprising.
French speaking Canadians wanted the Metis rights to be protected. Finally
Macdonald acted. His government passed a bill that made the province of
Manitoba, sent over a new governor who the Metis agreed on, gave each Metis
240 acres of land, gave the Metis the right to vote, and gave Red River a
representative in Parliment. French was made an official language.
Macdonald also sent a military force to Red River to keep order in the
colony. The crisis was over, in 1870 the French-English relations looked
good.
The Northwest Rebellion
During the 1880s many Metis moved farther west near to present day
Saskatchewan in search of buffalo, and because of loss of land in Red River
due to more settlers. By 1885 the buffalo again disappeared and more
settlers moved into Saskatchewan. The federal Government sent out
surveryers. The Metis demanded payments of money and land and were getting
concearned about their rights again. Anglophones too wanted the land issue
resolved. Macdonald’s government, did not respond. Riel came to
Saskatchewan on request of the Metis. He drew up yet another bill of rights
for the Metis and sent it to Ottawa. Macdonald still ignored the situation
in the Northwest. After waiting about four months, Riel concluded that the
government wasn’t going to meet any demands, so Riel decided to use force
and he appointed Gabriel Dumont as his military commander and an armed
clash between the Metis and the North West Mounted police occured. The
Anglophone settlers withdrew their support when Riel decided to use force.
Meanwhile, the Cree’s economy was hurt by destruction of the Buffalo and
they used the unrest caused by the Metis to launch several attacks on the
Blackfoot. The government mistakingly thought that the Metis were
encouraging the Cree to rebel. People in eastarn Canada were in a fenzy
after the news of these events reached them, so Macdonald ordered General
Middleton, the commander of the Canadian Militia to go to Red River and
kick some %&! So, using the new Canadian Pacifac Railway, troops were
rushed to the disturbances. Dumont and his allies beat the government in
early battles, but the government had superior military equipment and
greatly outnumbered the Metis, so eventually their stronghold at Batoche
was surrounded and defeated on May 12, 1885. Riel surrendered on May 15 and
he was tried and executed for treason, which became a national
French-English conflict. Strains on French-English relations worsened with
the outbreak of World War I. In the early years of the war, Canadians were
eager to help Britain and its allies, and Canadians served in the war on a
voluntary basis and it seemed like there would be enough volunteers. By
1916, however, the death tolls in Europe were staggering. No matter how
hard Canada tried, they couldn’t recruit enough volunteers. It became
apparent that Quebec was providing fewer volunteers than Ontario, although
their populations were similar in size. The government had to resort to
other methods of recrution such as conscription. (The compulsory enlistment
of citizens into military service.) The government was hesitant to bring in
conscription, because they knew it would damage French-English relations.
(Which it did.) Many Francophones had refused to volunteer for the army.
How would they react if they were forced to join? Robert Borden was PM of
Canada when World War I broke out. He felt that Britain and its allies
would need all the help Canada could give. He thought Canada should supply
arms, ships, food, and above all, soldiers. In 1917 he attended the
Imperial War Cabinet, which convinced him even more that Britain needed
help. Consequently, when he found that he couldn’t wait for enough men to
volunteer, he passed the Military Service act (which made conscription
legal) in 1917. In 1918, conscription began, but a large number of
Canadians (mostly Francophones) refused to join the army. What wimps! Henri
Bourassa was the founder of the Francophone daily paper, Le Devoir. He used
the paper to express his ideas. Bourassa felt that Canada should think of
itself as an independant nation, not as a colony of Britain, and as far as
he was concearned, World War I had nothing to do with Canada so we
shouldn’t help Britain. He thought that Britain and France were
imperealistic and that they were just fighting Germany to see who could
build up the greatest empire. In 1960 the “impatient generation”
(Basically, these people were proud of being Francophones and felt that
Francophones were not being treated as well as they deserved to be by
Anglophones. They wanted to change this by gaining political power.) gained
political power and great changes occurred in Quebec. This period of
Radical change has become known as the Quiet Revolution. These changes were
introduced by the Liberal government of Jean Lesage, who became premier of
Quebec in the 1960 election.
Here is a list of some of the concearns of Quebeckers in 1960:
- Wages in Quebec were less than the national average.
- The unemployment rate in Quebec was 9.1%.
- Only 18% of Canada’s federal jobs were given to Francophones.
- Majority of businesses in Quebec were owned by Anglophones.
- Hospital and health care were not adequate.
- Education system was not geared towards an industrial society.
Here are the Lesage Government’s solutions to Quebec’s concearns:
- Get more hospitals and doctors in Quebec.
- Increase old age pensions.
- Have new laws which increase wages paid to workers.
- Provide more schools and education facilities.
- Provide jobs by providing money to start businesses.
- Develop Quebec’s vast natural resources.
- Take over all the hydro-electric companies in Quebec.
In 1962 Lesage campaigned under the slogan “maitres chez nous”. This
suggested that he wanted to change the relationship between Quebec and
Ottawa. He felt that English Canada had too much control over the economy
and the federal government. After the Conscription Crisis, English Canada
thought that Quebec was reletively satisfied with their situation, ergo
they were suprised when Lesage used that above mentioned slogan. The
federal government and English Canada did not see why Quebec should be
given special status over the other provinces. (i.e. Quebec wanted complete
control over all of its taxes.) French Canada argued that they are one of
Canada’s founding people, and they are Canada’s largest minority, (28%) and
they have their own language and culture to preserve, therefore they should
have special status to determine their unique way of life. Thus, during the
’60s Canada was divided into two parts. On one side were French Canadians
who demanded special status. On the other side were the rest of Canadians,
who felt that Quebec should not be given special privileges.
The Official Languages Act of 1969 had four main points:
- English and French are the official languages of Canada.
- Both languages must be recognized in parts of the country where there are large minorities of French or English speaking people.
- Both languages must be recognized in certain sections of the federal civil service.
- Both languages must be offered as the language of instruction in all schools in Ottawa.
When Trudeau made this act, it led to big changes such as all labels being bilingual, and all civil servants learning french. Bilingualism was a symbol that all Francophones were accepted in Canada. The government wanted to prove that the French didn’t have to seperate form Canada to protect their way of life. Trudeau was so sure that this act was the solution to all French-English relation problems that he made four more proposals, which were: