A House of Assumptions

During the House of Commons debate on the Franchise Bill of 1885, speeches by members of the House revealed many key assumptions affecting the right to the vote in Canada, assumptions which were to directly shape the nature of this debate. The assumptions of federalism in Canada necessitated the debate, provincial ties confused it, and the members’ beliefs and biases, trumping even party loyalty, determined its course. These beliefs included certain Nineteenth Century liberal ideas, that voters should be free, intelligent, eager to vote, and, above all, civilized to an acceptably British degree. In addition, throughout these arguments ran undertones of racial and gender-based prejudice, accompanied by the widely-held assumption that the House was not prejudiced in any way. All of these assumptions held by members of the House combined to produce a number of arguments for and against the enfranchisement of women, Natives, and Chinese people living in Canada in 1885.

The initial assumption in this debate, from which many subsequent arguments stemmed, was that of the nature of federalism. Unity across the Dominion of Canada was foremost in Sir John A. MacDonald’s mind when he stressed the importance of Canada “as a whole”,Were it not for this chief assumption of federalism, a Parliamentary debate over the issue of enfranchisement would not even have been necessary; provinces would have been free to decide for themselves who should vote and who should be denied that right. MacDonald’s insistence upon a federally based interpretation of Confederation, as opposed to one based upon provincial autonomy, thus opened up the franchise debate to a clash of views between provinces, especially in the case of Quebec. repeating this phrase twice in one sentence. MacDonald stressed this prevalent principle when he explained that it was “quite obvious” that there should be “as little difference between the franchise” from one part of the Dominion to another.

MPs from Quebec strongly held the opinions predominant in their own communities, representing the interests of their constituencies’ populations at the cost of party loyalty. Flavien Dupont, a Conservative, argued against female suffrage, exclaiming that it “is the upsetting of all the ideas which we of the Province of Quebec have entertained,” and thus placed local ties to his riding above Conservative loyalty to MacDonald’s pro-enfranchisement position. Michel-Charles Coursol, another Conservative from Quebec, similarly ignored party cohesion when he defended his constituency’s “principle …that no woman should vote.”  This reveals another assumption that had a major impact on the debate: party loyalty was not of any paramount importance and was indeed second to local ties, at least in the case of Quebec.