Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-grxwn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-26T22:25:15.224Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Parliamentary Regime: The Political Philosophy of Confederation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 August 2023

Ryan Alexander McKinnell Open the ORCID record for Ryan Alexander McKinnell [Opens in a new window]
Ryan Alexander McKinnell*
Affiliation:
Independent Scholar, 1099-B Bank St., Ottawa, ON K1S 3X4, Canada
*
Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article clarifies the intellectual origins of Canadian parliamentary government by situating Confederation within a specific strand of liberal political thought. My argument is that the Fathers of Confederation adhered to the political theory of parliamentarianism. Though liberal constitutionalists, the Fathers of Confederation expressly defended a parliamentary political framework that they considered superior to the American system of checks and balances—one characterized by a powerful elected assembly restrained by an unelected upper house, responsible ministers serving in Parliament, and a constitutional monarch. In elucidating the theory of parliamentarianism that underlies the political project of Confederation, my goal is not only to examine a problem in nineteenth-century Canadian political thought but to ground our current political situation within a larger historical perspective.

Résumé

Résumé

Cet article vise à éclaircir les origines intellectuelles du gouvernement parlementaire canadien en situant la Confédération dans un courant spécifique de la pensée politique libérale. Mon argument est que les Pères de la Confédération ont adhéré à la théorie politique du parlementarisme. Constitutionnalistes libéraux, les Pères de la Confédération ont expressément défendu un cadre politique parlementaire qu'ils considéraient supérieur au système américain de freins et de contrepoids. Ce cadre se caractérise par une assemblée élue puissante limitée par une chambre haute non élue, des ministres responsables siégeant au parlement et un monarque constitutionnel. En élucidant la théorie du parlementarisme qui sous-tend le projet politique de la Confédération, mon objectif n'est pas seulement d'examiner un problème de la pensée politique canadienne du XIXe siècle, mais aussi d'inscrire notre situation politique actuelle dans une perspective historique plus large.

Keywords

ConfederationEdmund Burkeparliamentarianismliberal constitutionalismConfédérationEdmund Burkeparlementarismeconstitutionnalisme libéral
Type
Research Article/Étude originale
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 56 , Issue 3 , September 2023 , pp. 550 - 570
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Canadian Political Science Association (l’Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ajzenstat, Janet. 2007. The Canadian Founding: John Locke and Parliament. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ajzenstat, Janet, Romney, Paul, Gentiles, Ian and Gairdner, William, eds. 2003. Canada's Founding Debates. 2nd ed. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ajzenstat, Janet and Smith, Peter J., eds. 1995. Canada's Origins: Liberal, Tory, or Republican ? Ottawa: Carleton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bagehot, Walter. 2001. The English Constitution, ed. Paul Smith. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baker, Dennis. 2007. Not Quite Supreme: The Courts and Coordinate Constitutional Interpretation. Doctoral dissertation. University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta.Google Scholar
Bourke, Richard. 2016. “Popular Sovereignty and Political Representation: Edmund Burke in the Context of Eighteenth-Century Thought.” In Popular Sovereignty in Historical Perspective, ed. Bourke, Richard and Skinner, Quentin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brodie, Ian. 2018. At the Centre of Government: The Prime Minister and the Limits of Political Power. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Browne, G. P., ed. 2009. Documents on the Confederation of British North America. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burke, Edmund. 1981. “Speech on Parliamentary Incapacitation.” In The Writings and Speeches of Edmund Burke. Vol. II, eds. Langford, Paul and Todd, William B. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Burke, Edmund. 1992. “A Letter to a Member of the National Assembly.” In Further Reflections on the Revolution in France, ed. Daniel Ritchie. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund.Google Scholar
Burke, Edmund. 1999a. Select Works of Edmund Burke. Vol. I, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund.Google Scholar
Burke, Edmund. 1999b. Select Works of Edmund Burke. Vol. II, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund.Google Scholar
Burke, Edmund. 1999c. Select Works of Edmund Burke. Vol. IV, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund.Google Scholar
de Lolme, Jean Louis. 2007. The Constitution of England, ed. David Lieberman. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund.Google Scholar
Ducharme, Michel. 2014. The Idea of Liberty in Canada during the Age of Atlantic Revolutions, 1776–1838, trans. Peter Feldstein. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Durham, John George Lambton. 2006. Lord Durham's Report, abr. Gerald M. Craig. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.Google Scholar
Garsten, Bryan. 2009. “Representative Government and Popular Sovereignty.” In Political Representation, Shapiro, Ian, Stokes, Susan C., Jean Wood, Elisabeth, and Kirshner, Alexander S.. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Hamilton, Alexander, Jay, John and Madison, James. 2001. The Federalist, ed. George W. Carey and James W. McClellan. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund.Google Scholar
Harding, Mark. 2022. Judicializing Everything? The Clash of Constitutionalisms in Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Horowitz, Gad. 1966. “Conservatism, Liberalism, and Socialism in Canada: An Interpretation.” Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science 32 (2): 143–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hume, David. 1985. Essays Moral and Political, ed. Eugene Miller. Indianapolis: Hackett.Google Scholar
Jefferson, Thomas. 1958. The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 15, ed. Julian P. Boyd. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
LaSelva, Samuel V. 1966. The Moral Foundations of Canadian Federalism: Paradoxes, Achievements, and the Tragedies of Nationhood. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.Google Scholar
Locke, John. 1988. Two Treatises of Government, ed. Peter Laslett. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mill, John Stuart. 1977. Considerations on Representative Government, Collected Works. Vol. 19, ed. J. M. Robson. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
Montesquieu, Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de. 1989. The Spirit of the Laws, ed. Anne Cohler, Basia Carolyn Miller, and Harold Samuel Stone. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Pangle, Thomas L. 1988. The Spirit of Modern Republicanism: The Moral Vision of the American Founders and the Philosophy of Locke. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Preece, Rod. 1984. “The Political Wisdom of Sir John A. Macdonald.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 17 (3): 459–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Province of Canada. Parliament. 1865. Parliamentary Debates on the Subject of the Confederation of the British North American Provinces. 8th Parliament, 3rd Session.Google Scholar
Rahe, Paul. 1992. Republics Ancient and Modern: Classical Republicanism and the American Revolution. 3 vols. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Resnick, Philip. 1990. The Masks of Proteus: Canadian Reflections on the State. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.Google Scholar
Romney, Paul. 1999. Getting It Wrong: How Canadians Forgot Their Past and Imperilled Confederation. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. 1997. The Social Contract and Other Later Political Writings, ed. Victor Gourevitch. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Russell, Peter, H. 2004. Constitutional Odyssey: Can Canadians Become a Sovereign People? 3rd ed. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
Russell, Peter H. 2009. “The Charter and Canadian Democracy.” In Contested Constitutionalism: Reflections on the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, ed. Kelly, James B. and Kelly, Christopher B.. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.Google Scholar
Russell, Peter H. 2017. Canada's Odyssey: A Country Based on Incomplete Conquests. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
Savoie, Donald J. 2019. Democracy in Canada: The Disintegration of Our Institutions. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schmitt, Carl. 1988. The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy, trans. Ellen Kennedy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Selinger, William. 2019. Parliamentarianism: From Burke to Weber. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sigalet, Geoffrey. 2021. “Between Populism and Juristocracy: The Republicanism of Rainer Knopff.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 54 (3): 513–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, Jennifer. 1988. “Canadian Confederation and the Influence of American Federalism.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 21 (3): 443–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, Peter J. 1987. “The Ideological Origins of Confederation.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 20 (1): 3–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sullivan, Vickie B. 2004. Machiavelli, Hobbes, and the Formation of a Liberal Republicanism in England. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tocqueville, Alexis. 2012. Democracy in America, trans. Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Todd, Alpheus. 1867. On Parliamentary Government in England: Its Origin, Development, and Practical Operation. Vol. I, London: Longmans, Green, and Co.Google Scholar
Todd, Alpheus. 1869. On Parliamentary Government in England: Its Origin, Development, and Practical Operation vol. II. London: Longmans, Green, and Co.Google Scholar
Todd, Alphues. 1880. Parliamentary Government in the British Colonies. London: Longmans, Green, and Co.Google Scholar
Vipond, Robert C. 1991. Liberty and Community: Canadian Federalism and the Failure of Confederation. Albany: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Ward, Lee. 2004. The Politics of Liberty in England and Revolutionary America. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weber, Max. 1994. Political Writings, ed. Peter Lassman and Ronald Speirs. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar