The Story of the Upper Canada Rebellion | Page 9

vain. The
prisoner conducted his own defence, and so clearly exposed the
flimsiness of the indictment that the prosecution utterly failed. A
second arrest on a similar charge resulted in another acquittal at
Brockville. It was by this time manifest that no jury could be found
subservient enough to become blind instruments of oppression. The
alleged libel consisted of two paragraphs in a petition to the Prince
Regent, drafted by Mr. Gourlay, approved of, printed and published by
sixteen residents of Niagara District, six of whom were magistrates.
These paragraphs contained a vivid but faithful picture of the abuses
existing in the Crown Lands Department, and it would probably have
been difficult to find a jury anywhere in Upper Canada, some members
whereof had not had personal experience of those abuses. Having failed
in two attempts to convict him of libel, Mr. Gourlay's foes hit on
another and more effectual method of accomplishing his destruction.
By a Provincial statute known as the Alien Act, passed in 1804,
authority was given to certain officials to issue a warrant for the arrest
of any person not having been an inhabitant of the Province for the
preceding six months, who had not taken the oath of allegiance, and
who had given reason for suspicion that he was "about to endeavour to
alienate the minds of His Majesty's subjects of this Province from his
person or government, or in anywise with a seditious intent to disturb
the tranquillity thereof." In case the person so arrested failed to prove
his innocence, he might be notified to depart this Province within a
specified time, and if he failed so to depart he was liable to be
imprisoned until he could be formally tried at the general jail delivery.
If found guilty, upon trial, he was to be adjudged by the court to quit
the Province, and if he still proved contumacious he was to be deemed
guilty of felony, and to suffer death as a felon, without benefit of clergy.
This statute, be it observed, was not passed at Westminster during the
supremacy of the Plantagenets or the Tudors, but at York, Upper
Canada, during the forty-fourth year of the reign of George the Third.
More than one eminent authority has pronounced it an unconstitutional
measure. There was, however, some show of justification for it at the
time of its enactment, for the Province was then overrun by disloyal

immigrants from Ireland and by republican immigrants from across the
borders, many of whom tried to stir up discontent among the people,
and were notoriously in favour of annexation to the United States.[8] It
was against such persons that the Act had been levelled, and there had
never been any question of attempting to apply it to anyone else. Now,
however, it was pressed into requisition in order to compass the ruin of
as loyal a subject as could have been found throughout the wide
expanse of the British Empire; who had resided in Upper Canada for a
continuous period of nearly eighteen months; who was no more an
alien than the King upon the throne; and whose only real offence was
that he would not stand calmly by while rapacious and dishonest
placemen carried on their nefarious practices without protest.
Among the various dignitaries authorized to put the law in motion, by
the issue of a warrant under the Act, were the members of the
Legislative and Executive Councils. William Dickson and William
Claus, as has been seen, were members of the former body; and as such
they had power over the liberty of anyone whose loyalty they thought
fit to call in question. Dickson was a connection by marriage of Mr.
Gourlay, and for some months after that gentleman's arrival in this
Province had gone heart and hand with him in his schemes of reform.
For Mr. Dickson then had a grievance of his own, arising out of the
partial interdict of immigration from the United States which had been
adopted after the War of 1812-15. He was the owner of an immense
quantity of uncultivated land in the Province, including the township of
Dumfries already mentioned, which he was desirous of selling to
incoming settlers. The shutting out of United States immigrants tended
to retard the progress of settlement and the sale of his property. His
anger against the Administration had been hot and bitter, and he had
even gone so far as to state publicly that he would rather live under the
American than under the British Government. But he had managed to
induce the Assembly to pass certain resolutions, recognizing the right
of subjects of the United States to settle in Upper Canada. The
restrictions being relaxed, his only cause of hostility to the
Administration vanished, and he ceased to clamour against it.