Province of Canada

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Province of Canada Province du Canada (French)
1841–1867
Flag Coat of arms
Anthem: God Save the Queen
Status	British colony
Capital	Kingston 1841–1844 Montreal 1844–1849 Toronto 1849–1851, 1855–1859 Quebec City 1851–1855, 1859–1865 Ottawa 1865–1867
Official languages	English • French
Religion	Church of England (modern Anglican Church of Canada), the officially Established Church in Canada's West (1841-1854)[1][2]
Government	Responsible government under a constitutional monarchy
Monarch
• 1841–1867	Queen Victoria
Governor General
• 1841	Charles Poulett Thomson, 1st Baron Sydenham
• 1861–1867	Charles Monck, 4th Viscount Monck
Premier
• 1841–1842	Samuel Harrison
Legislature	Parliament of the Province of Canada
• Upper house	Legislative Council
• Lower house	Legislative Assembly
Historical era	Pre-Confederation era
• Act of Union	10 February 1841
• Responsible government	11 March 1848
• Canadian Confederation	1 July 1867
Population
• 1860–61	2,507,657
Currency	Canadian pound sterling, 1841–1858 Canadian dollar, 1858–1867
Preceded by Succeeded by Upper Canada Lower Canada Canada
Today part of	Canada Ontario Quebec

The Province of Canada (or the United Province of Canada or the United Canadas) was a British colony in British North America from 1841 to 1867. Its formation reflected recommendations made by John Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham, in the Report on the Affairs of British North America following the Rebellions of 1837–1838.

The Act of Union 1840, passed on 23 July 1840 by the British Parliament and proclaimed by the Crown on 10 February 1841,^[3] merged the Colonies of Upper Canada and Lower Canada by abolishing their separate parliaments and replacing them with a single one with two houses, a Legislative Council as the upper chamber and the Legislative Assembly as the lower chamber. In the aftermath of the Rebellions of 1837–1838, unification of the two Canadas was driven by two factors. Firstly, Upper Canada was near bankruptcy because it lacked stable tax revenues, and needed the resources of the more populous Lower Canada to fund its internal transportation improvements. Secondly, unification was an attempt to swamp the French vote by giving each of the former provinces the same number of parliamentary seats, despite the larger population of Lower Canada.

Although Durham's report had called for the Union of the Canadas and for responsible government (a government accountable to an independent local legislature), only the first of the two recommendations was implemented in 1841. For the first seven years, the government was led by an appointed governor general accountable only to the British government. Responsible government was not achieved until the second LaFontaine–Baldwin ministry in 1849, when Governor General James Bruce, 8th Earl of Elgin, agreed that the cabinet would be formed by the largest party in the Legislative Assembly, making the premier the head of the government and reducing the governor general to a more symbolic role.

The Province of Canada ceased to exist at Canadian Confederation on 1 July 1867, when it was divided into the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. Ontario included the area occupied by the pre-1841 British colony of Upper Canada, while Quebec included the area occupied by the pre-1841 British colony of Lower Canada (which had included Labrador until 1809, when Labrador was transferred to the British colony of Newfoundland).^[4] Upper Canada was primarily English-speaking, whereas Lower Canada was primarily French-speaking.