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155-532: The Irish immigrants were majority Protestant before the Irish famine years of the late 1840s , when far more Catholics than Protestants arrived. Even larger numbers of Catholics headed to the United States; others went to Great Britain and Australia. Irish Canadians comprise a subgroup of European Canadians . According to the 2021 census, in terms of religion, 2,437,810 (55%) of Irish Canadians identified as Christian at

310-595: A Royal Commission , chaired by the Earl of Devon ( Devon Commission ), to enquire into the laws regarding the occupation of land. Irish politician Daniel O'Connell described this commission as "perfectly one-sided", being composed of landlords with no tenant representation. In February 1845, Devon reported: It would be impossible adequately to describe the privations which they [the Irish labourer and his family] habitually and silently endure ... in many districts their only food

465-444: A laissez-faire economic doctrine, but also because some in power believed in divine providence or that the Irish lacked moral character , with aid only resuming to some degree later. Large amounts of food were exported from Ireland during the famine and the refusal of London to bar such exports, as had been done on previous occasions, was an immediate and continuing source of controversy, contributing to anti-British sentiment and

620-583: A Dominion, joined Confederation in 1949. Nunavut was created in 1999 from the Northwest Territories. An Imperial Conference in 1926 that included the leaders of all Dominions and representatives from India (which then included Burma , Bangladesh , and Pakistan ), led to the eventual enactment of the Statute of Westminster 1931 . The statute, an essential transitory step from the British Empire to

775-399: A boost to the loyalist armed campaign and contributed to the many numbers of Catholic civilian casualties . Today, the impact of the heavy 19th-century Irish immigration to Ontario is evident as those who report Irish extraction in the province number close to 2 million people or almost half the total Canadians who claim Irish ancestry. In 2004, March 17 was proclaimed "Irish Heritage Day" by

930-779: A combination of uncodified constitution , provisions of the Constitution of Canada, and provincial statutes. Overall structures of provincial governments (like the legislature and cabinet) are described in parts of the Constitution of Canada. Governmental structure of the original four provinces (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec, and Ontario) is described in Part V of the Constitution Act, 1867 . The three colonies that joined Canada after Confederation (British Columbia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland and Labrador) had existing UK legislation which described their governmental structure, and this

1085-507: A comparatively small space. By 1800, the potato had become a staple food for one in three Irish people, especially in winter. It eventually became a staple year-round for farmers. A disproportionate share of the potatoes grown in Ireland were the Irish Lumper , creating a lack of genetic variability among potato plants, which increased vulnerability to disease. Potatoes were essential to

1240-566: A constitution "similar in principle" to the largely unwritten constitution of the United Kingdom , recognizes Canada as a constitutional monarchy and federal state , and outlines the legal foundations of Canadian federalism . The Constitution of Canada includes written and unwritten components. Section 52 of the Constitution Act, 1982 states that "the Constitution of Canada is the supreme law of Canada" and that any inconsistent law

1395-614: A constitution would. This is referred to as quasi-constitutionality . Quasi-constitutionality is often applied to human rights laws, allowing those laws to act as a de facto constitutional charter of rights. For example, laws preventing discrimination in employment, housing, and services have clauses making them quasi-constitutional in ten of thirteen jurisdictions. Section 45 of the Constitution Act, 1982 allows each province to amend its own constitution. This applies, for example, to provincial statute laws like Constitution of Quebec and Constitution Act (British Columbia) . However, if

1550-944: A disease that had attacked the potato crops in America for two years. In 1843 and 1844, blight largely destroyed the potato crops in the Eastern United States. Ships from Baltimore , Philadelphia , or New York City could have carried diseased potatoes from these areas to European ports. American plant pathologist William C. Paddock posited that the blight was transported via potatoes being carried to feed passengers on clipper ships sailing from America to Ireland. Once introduced in Ireland and Europe, blight spread rapidly. By mid-August 1845, it had reached much of northern and central Europe; Belgium, The Netherlands, northern France, and southern England had all already been affected. On 16 August 1845, The Gardeners' Chronicle and Horticultural Gazette reported "a blight of unusual character" on

1705-402: A disincentive to local relief efforts. Due to poor weather conditions, the first shipment did not arrive in Ireland until the beginning of February 1846. The initial shipments were of unground dried kernels, but the few Irish mills in operation were not equipped for milling maize and a long and complicated milling process had to be adopted before the meal could be distributed. In addition, before

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1860-486: A growing proportion of them Catholic, were venturing to Canada to obtain work on projects such as canals, roads, early railroads and in the lumber industry. The labourers were known as ‘navvies’ and built much of the early infrastructure in the province. Settlement schemes offering cheap (or free) land brought over farming families, with many being from Munster (particularly counties Tipperary and Cork ). Peter Robinson organized land settlements of Catholic tenant farmers in

2015-530: A holding by a tenant became the property of the landlord when the lease expired or was terminated, the incentive to make improvements was limited. Most tenants had no security of tenure on the land; as tenants "at will", they could be turned out whenever the landlord chose. The only exception to this arrangement was in Ulster where, under a practice known as "tenant right" , a tenant was compensated for any improvement they made to their holding. According to Woodham-Smith,

2170-472: A hostile place in which to live. Some landlords visited their property only once or twice in a lifetime, if ever. The rents from Ireland were generally spent elsewhere; an estimated £6,000,000 was remitted out of Ireland in 1842. In 1843, the British Government recognized that the land management system in Ireland was the foundational cause of disaffection in the country. The Prime Minister established

2325-631: A large impact on Ontario. At its peak in the summer of 1847, boatloads of sick migrants arrived in desperate circumstances on steamers from Quebec to Bytown (soon to be Ottawa), and to ports of call on Lake Ontario, chief amongst them Kingston and Toronto , in addition to many other smaller communities across southern Ontario. Quarantine facilities were hastily constructed to accommodate them. Nurses, doctors, priests, nuns, compatriots, some politicians and ordinary citizens aided them. Thousands died in Ontario that summer alone, mostly from typhus . How permanent

2480-511: A mixture of "indoor" and "outdoor" direct relief; the former administered in workhouses through the Irish Poor Laws , the latter through soup kitchens . The costs of the Poor Law fell primarily on the local landlords, some of whom in turn attempted to reduce their liability by evicting their tenants or providing some relief through the conversionist practice of Souperism . On 1 March 1847,

2635-466: A new, urban, ethno-religious vehicle – Irish Tridentine Catholism. This culture spread from the city to the hinterland and, by means of metropolitan linkage, throughout Ontario. Privatism created a closed Irish society, and, while Irish Catholics cooperated in labour organizations for the sake of their families' future, they never shared in the development of a new working-class culture with their old Orange enemies. McGowan argues that between 1890 and 1920,

2790-420: A parallel in the world. It allowed proprietors to suck the very life-blood of that wretched race". The "Gregory clause" of the Poor Law, named after William H. Gregory , MP, prohibited anyone who held at least 1 ⁄ 4 acre (0.1 ha) from receiving relief. In practice, this meant that the many farmers who had to sell all their produce to pay rent and taxes, would have to deliver up all their land to

2945-537: A passionate advocate of Confederation . He was instrumental in enshrining educational rights for Catholics as a minority group in the Canadian Constitution . In 1868, he was assassinated in Ottawa. Historians are not sure who the murderer was, or what his motivations were. One theory is that a Fenian, Patrick James Whelan , was the assassin, attacking McGee for his recent anti-Raid statements. Others argue that Whelan

3100-519: A requested exception—the Canadian federal and provincial governments could not agree on an amending formula for the Canadian constitution. It would be another 50 years before this was achieved. In the interim, the British parliament periodically passed constitutional amendments when requested by the government of Canada. This was never anything but a rubber stamp . The patriation of the Canadian constitution

3255-494: A settlement was depended on circumstances. A case in point is Irish immigration to North Hastings County , Canada West, which happened after 1846. Most of the immigrants were attracted to North Hastings by free land grants beginning in 1856. Three Irish settlements were established in North Hastings: Umfraville, Doyle's Corner, and O'Brien Settlement. The Irish were primarily Roman Catholic. Crop failures in 1867 halted

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3410-510: A simple majority of the legislative assembly, despite section 45. For example, section 7 of the Constitution of Alberta Amendment Act, 1990 requires plebiscites of Métis settlement members before that Act can be amended. Courts have not yet ruled about whether this kind of language really would bind future legislatures, but it might do so if the higher bar was met when creating the law. Three amendments to provincial constitutions in

3565-577: A time when sectarian tensions ran at their highest. Irish Catholics in Toronto were an embattled minority among a Protestant population that included a large Irish Protestant contingent strongly committed to the Orange Order. The graph excludes those who have only some Irish ancestry. Historian and journalist Louis-Guy Lemieux claims that about 40% of Quebecers have Irish ancestry on at least one side of their family tree. Shunned by Protestant English-speakers, it

3720-549: A wedge for evangelicalization. In response the Church built a network of charitable institutions such as hospitals, schools, boarding homes, and orphanages, to meet the need and keep people inside the faith. The Catholic church was less successful in dealing with tensions between its French and the Irish clergy; eventually the Irish took control. Toronto had similar numbers of both Irish Protestants and Irish Catholics. Riots or conflicts repeatedly broke out from 1858 to 1878, such as during

3875-400: A working wage. They had to work for their landlords in return for a small patch of land to farm. This forced Ireland's peasantry to practice continuous monoculture , as the potato was the only crop that could meet nutritional needs. The potato was introduced in Ireland as a garden crop of the gentry . By the late 17th century, it had become widespread as a supplementary food; their main diet

4030-470: Is Part I of the Constitution Act, 1982 . The Charter is the constitutional guarantee of the civil rights and liberties of every citizen in Canada, such as freedom of expression, of religion, and of mobility. Part II addresses the rights of Aboriginal peoples in Canada . It is written in plain language to ensure accessibility to the average citizen. It applies only to government and government actions to prevent

4185-574: Is always denoted with a capital letter to express its specific historic meaning. The period of the potato blight in Ireland from 1845 to 1851 was full of political confrontation. A more radical Young Ireland group seceded from the Repeal movement in July 1846, and attempted an armed rebellion in 1848 . It was unsuccessful. In 1847, William Smith O'Brien , leader of the Young Ireland party, became one of

4340-518: Is called 'cholera' in potatoes in Ireland, especially in the north". On 13 September, The Gardeners' Chronicle announced: "We stop the Press with very great regret to announce that the potato Murrain has unequivocally declared itself in Ireland." Nevertheless, the British government remained optimistic over the next few weeks, as it received conflicting reports. Only when the crop was harvested in October did

4495-459: Is estimated that between 1845 and 1847, some 30,000 arrived, more people than were living in the city at the time. In 1847, dubbed "Black 47", one of the worst years of the Famine, some 16,000 immigrants, most of them from Ireland, arrived at Partridge Island , the immigration and quarantine station at the mouth of Saint John Harbour. Great Famine (Ireland) The Great Famine , also known as

4650-471: Is of no force or effect. It further lists written documents which are included in the Constitution of Canada; these are the Canada Act 1982 (which includes the Constitution Act, 1982 ), the acts and orders referred to in its schedule (including in particular the Constitution Act, 1867 ), and any amendments to these documents. The Supreme Court of Canada has held that this list is not exhaustive and that

4805-431: Is the potato, their only beverage water ... their cabins are seldom a protection against the weather ... a bed or a blanket is a rare luxury ... and nearly in all their pig and a manure heap constitute their only property. The Commissioners concluded they could not "forbear expressing our strong sense of the patient endurance which the labouring classes have exhibited under sufferings greater, we believe, than

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4960-463: Is the supreme law in Canada . It outlines Canada's system of government and the civil and human rights of those who are citizens of Canada and non-citizens in Canada. Its contents are an amalgamation of various codified acts , treaties between the Crown and Indigenous Peoples (both historical and modern), uncodified traditions and conventions . Canada is one of the oldest constitutional monarchies in

5115-623: The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms . Before the Charter, various statutes protected an assortment of civil rights and obligations but nothing was enshrined in the constitution until 1982. The Charter has thus placed a strong focus upon individual and collective rights of the people of Canada. The enactment of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms has fundamentally changed much of Canadian constitutional law . The act also codified many previously oral constitutional conventions and made amendment of

5270-449: The 1st Earl of Clare observed of landlords that "confiscation is their common title". According to the historian Cecil Woodham-Smith , landlords regarded the land as a source of income, from which as much as possible was to be extracted. With the peasantry "brooding over their discontent in sullen indignation" (in the words of the Earl of Clare), the landlords largely viewed the countryside as

5425-632: The American one . He contended that the numerical dominance of Protestants within the national group and the rural basis of the Irish community negated the formation of urban ghettos and allowed for a relative ease in social mobility. In comparison, the American Irish in the Northeast and Midwest were dominantly Catholic, urban dwelling, and ghettoized. There was however, the existence of Irish-centric ghettos in Toronto ( Corktown , Cabbagetown , Trinity Niagara ,

5580-778: The Canada Act 1982 , a British Act of Parliament which was introduced at the request of a joint address to Queen Elizabeth II by the Senate and House of Commons of Canada. The version of the Canada Act 1982 which is in force in Britain is in English only, but the version of the act in force in Canada is bilingual, English and French. In addition to enacting the Constitution Act, 1982 , the Canada Act 1982 provides that no further British acts of Parliament will apply to Canada as part of its law, finalizing Canada's legislative independence. As noted above, this

5735-461: The Commonwealth of Nations , provided that existing Dominions became fully sovereign of the United Kingdom and any new Dominions would be fully sovereign upon the grant of Dominion status. Although listed, Newfoundland never ratified the statute so was still subject to imperial authority when its entire system of government and economy collapsed in the mid-1930s. Canada did ratify the statute but with

5890-480: The Grand Trunk Railroad corridor often in rural areas, allowing many to farm the relatively cheap, arable land of southern Ontario. Employment opportunities in the cities, in Toronto but elsewhere, occupations included construction, liquor processing (see Distillery District ), Great Lakes shipping, and manufacturing. Women generally entered into domestic service. In more remote areas, employment centred around

6045-508: The Great Famine of Ireland (1845–52), Canada received the most destitute Irish Catholics, who left Ireland in grave circumstances. Land estate owners in Ireland would either evict landholder tenants to board on returning empty lumber ships, or in some cases pay their fares. Others left on ships from the overcrowded docks in Liverpool and Cork. Most of the Irish immigrants who came to Canada and

6200-586: The Great Hunger ( Irish : an Gorta Mór [ənˠ ˈɡɔɾˠt̪ˠə ˈmˠoːɾˠ] ), the Famine and the Irish Potato Famine , was a period of mass starvation and disease in Ireland lasting from 1845 to 1852 that constituted a historical social crisis and had a major impact on Irish society and history as a whole. The most severely affected areas were in the western and southern parts of Ireland — where

6355-531: The Irish language was dominant — hence the period was contemporaneously known in Irish as an Drochshaol , which literally translates to "the bad life" and loosely translates to "the hard times". The worst year of the famine was 1847, which became known as "Black '47". The population of Ireland on the eve of the famine was about 8.5 million, by 1901 it was just 4.4 million. During the Great Hunger, roughly 1 million people died and more than 1 million more fled

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6510-592: The Isle of Wight . A week later, on 23 August, it reported that "A fearful malady has broken out among the potato crop ... In Belgium the fields are said to be completely desolated. There is hardly a sound sample in Covent Garden market  ... As for cure for this distemper, there is none." These reports were extensively covered in Irish newspapers. On 11 September, the Freeman's Journal reported on "the appearance of what

6665-529: The Knights of Labor caused the Orange and Catholic Irish in Toronto to resolve their generational hatred and set about to form a common working-class culture . This theory presumes that Irish-Catholic culture was of little value, to be rejected with such ease. Nicolson (1985) argues that neither theory is valid. He says that in the ghettos of Toronto the fusion of an Irish peasant culture with traditional Catholism produced

6820-534: The Lord Mayor , went to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Lord Heytesbury to discuss the issue. They offered suggestions such as opening the ports to foreign corn, stopping distillation from grain, prohibiting the export of foodstuffs, and providing employment through public works. Lord Heytesbury urged them not to be alarmed, that they "were premature", that scientists were enquiring into all those matters, and that

6975-626: The Ontario Legislature in recognition of the immense Irish contribution to the development of the Province. Ontario sustains a network of Irish language enthusiasts, many of whom see the language as part of their ethnic heritage. Ontario is also home to Gaeltacht Bhuan Mheiriceá Thuaidh (the Permanent North American Gaeltacht ), an area which hosts cultural activities for Irish speakers and learners and has been recognized by

7130-514: The Ottawa Valley timber trade which eventually extending into Northern Ontario along with railroad building and mining. There was a strong Irish rural presence in Ontario in comparison to their brethren in the northern US, but they were also numerous in the towns and cities. Later generations of these poorer immigrants were among those who rose to prominence in unions, business, judiciary, the arts and politics. Redclift (2003) concluded that many of

7285-458: The United Kingdom . Part V of this act established an amending formula for the Canadian constitution, the lack of which (due to more than 50 years of disagreement between the federal and provincial governments) meant Canada's constitutional amendments still required enactment by the British parliament after Statute of Westminster in 1931. The Constitution Act, 1982 was enacted as a schedule to

7440-498: The second reading of the government's Irish Coercion Bill was defeated by 73 votes in the House of Commons by a combination of Whigs , Radicals , Irish Repealers, and protectionist Conservatives. Peel was forced to resign as prime minister on 29 June, and the Whig leader, Lord John Russell , became prime minister. The measures undertaken by Peel's successor, Russell, proved inadequate as

7595-453: The 1820s to areas of rural Eastern Ontario, which helped establish Peterborough as a regional centre. The Irish were instrumental in the building of the Rideau Canal and subsequent settlement along its route. Alongside French-Canadians, thousands of Irish laboured in difficult conditions and terrain. Hundreds, if not thousands, died from malaria . The Great Irish Hunger 1845–1849 , had

7750-494: The 1840s and were hired as labourers to build the Victoria Bridge , living in a tent city at the foot of the bridge. Here, workers unearthed a mass grave of 6,000 Irish immigrants who had died at nearby Windmill Point in the typhus outbreak of 1847–48. The Irish Commemorative Stone or "Black Rock", as it is commonly known, was erected by bridge workers to commemorate the tragedy. The Irish would go on to settle permanently in

7905-560: The 1840s. Blight infection caused 100,000 deaths outside Ireland and influenced much of the unrest that culminated in European Revolutions of 1848 . Longer-term reasons for the massive impact of this particular famine included the system of absentee landlordism and single-crop dependence. Initial limited but constructive government actions to alleviate famine distress were ended by a new Whig administration in London, which pursued

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8060-556: The 1860s sectarian violence was rampant in Saint John resulting in some of the worst urban riots in Canadian history. The city was shaped by Irish ghettos at York Point, and suppression of poor, Irish-speaking peoples rights lead to decades of turmoil. The division would continue to shape Saint John in years to come. The Orange Order , with its two main tenets, anti-Catholicism and loyalty to Britain, flourished in Ontario. Largely coincident with Protestant Irish settlement, its role pervaded

8215-631: The 1890s. Immigrants from earlier decades may well have experienced greater economic difficulties, but in general the Irish in Ontario in the 1890s enjoyed levels of wealth commensurate with the rest of the populace. By 1901 Ontario Irish Catholics and Scottish Presbyterians were among the most likely to own homes, while Anglicans did only moderately well, despite their traditional association with Canada's elite. French-speaking Catholics in Ontario achieved wealth and status less readily than Protestants and Irish Catholics. Although differences in attainment existed between people of different religious denominations,

8370-462: The 2020s have been controversially framed as amendments to the Constitution Act 1867 . These are Quebec statutes purporting to add sections 90Q and 128Q and a Saskatchewan statute purporting to add section 90S. Because the Senate and House of Commons did not authorise these amendments, they would only have effect if they are amendments to provincial constitutions under the section 45 amending procedure. Constitutional scholars are divided on

8525-491: The 40 years that followed the union, successive British governments grappled with the problems of governing a country which had, as Benjamin Disraeli stated in 1844, "a starving population, an absentee aristocracy, an alien established Protestant church , and in addition, the weakest executive in the world". One historian calculated that, between 1801 and 1845, there had been 114 commissions and 61 special committees inquiring into

8680-557: The Bank of England announced plans to raise a loan of £14 million to relieve the Irish crisis, and also for unfunded tax cuts. This led to the Panic of 1847 , in which gold was withdrawn from circulation, so reducing the amount of bank notes that the Bank could legally circulate. By 17 April 1847 the bullion reserve of the Bank of England had diminished from £15 million in January to some £9 million, and it

8835-494: The Constitution of Canada includes a number of pre-confederation acts and unwritten components as well. The Canadian constitution also includes the fundamental principles of federalism, democracy, constitutionalism and the rule of law, and respect for minorities. See list of Canadian constitutional documents for details. The first semblance of a constitution for Canada was the Royal Proclamation of 1763 . The act renamed

8990-818: The Constitution: The existence of unwritten constitutional components was reaffirmed in 1998 by the Supreme Court in Reference re Secession of Quebec . The Constitution is more than a written text. It embraces the entire global system of rules and principles which govern the exercise of constitutional authority. A superficial reading of selected provisions of the written constitutional enactment, without more, may be misleading. In practice, there have been three sources of unwritten constitutional law: Unlike in most federations, Canadian provinces do not have written provincial constitutions. Provincial constitutions are instead

9145-578: The Dominion of Canada as a federation of provinces. Initially, on July 1, 1867, four provinces entered into confederation as "One dominion under the name of Canada": Canada West (former Upper Canada , now Ontario ), Canada East (former Lower Canada , now Quebec ), Nova Scotia , and New Brunswick . Title to the Northwest Territories was transferred by the Hudson's Bay Company in 1870, out of which

9300-571: The Inspectors of Constabulary and Stipendiary Magistrates were charged with making constant reports from their districts, and there was no "immediate pressure on the market". On 8 December 1845, Daniel O'Connell, head of the Repeal Association , proposed several remedies to the pending disaster. One of the first things he suggested was the introduction of Tenant-Right as practised in Ulster, giving

9455-826: The Irish government. With the downturn of Ireland's economy in 2010, many Irish people came to Canada looking for work, or to pre-arranged employment. There are many communities in Ontario that are named after places and last names of Ireland, including Ballinafad , Ballyduff , Ballymote , Cavan , Connaught , Connellys , Dalton , Donnybrook , Dublin , Dundalk , Dunnville , Enniskillen , Erinsville , Galway , Hagarty , Irish Lake , Kearney , Keenansville , Kennedys , Killaloe , Killarney , Limerick , Listowel , Lucan , Maguire , Malone , McGarry , Moffat , Mullifarry , Munster , Navan , New Dublin , O'Connell , Oranmore , Quinn Settlement , Ripley , Shamrock , Tara , South Monaghan , Waterford and Westport . Saint John has often been called "Canada's Irish City". In

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9610-497: The Irish identity, transforming the Irish presence in the city into one of influence and power. From 1840 to 1860 sectarian violence was rampant in Saint John, New Brunswick resulting in some of the worst urban riots in Canadian history. Orange Order parades ended in rioting with Catholics, many Irish-speaking, fighting against increased marginalization trapped in Irish ghettos at York Point and North End areas such as Portland Point. Nativist Protestants had secured their dominance over

9765-500: The Orange Order organized speeches by the fiercely anti-Catholic and anti-Irish former priest Alessandro Gavazzi , resulting in a violent confrontation between the Irish and the Scots. St. Patrick's Day processions in Toronto were often disrupted by tensions, that boiled over to the extent that the parade was cancelled permanently by the mayor in 1878 and not re-instituted until 110 years later in 1988. The Jubilee Riots of 1875 jarred Toronto in

9920-548: The Pale (i.e., before the union with Great Britain in 1801) had adopted in periods of distress. Contemporaneously, as found in letters from the period and in particular later oral memory, the name for the event is in Irish : An Drochshaol , though with the earlier spelling standard of the era , which was Gaelic script , it is found written as in Droċ-Ṡaoġal. In the modern era, this name, while loosely translated as "the hard-time",

10075-415: The Supreme Court, must be adopted by unanimous consent of all the provinces in accordance with section 41. In the case of an amendment related to provincial boundaries or the use of an official language within a province alone, the amendment must be passed by the legislatures affected by the amendment (section 43). In the case of an amendment that affects the federal government only, the amendment does not need

10230-811: The US or the Canadian West. The reverse is true of those with Irish descent who migrated to Ontario from the Maritimes and Newfoundland seeking work, mostly since World War II. In 1877, a breakthrough in Irish Canadian Protestant-Catholic relations occurred in London, Ontario . This was the founding of the Irish Benevolent Society , a brotherhood of Irishmen and women of both Catholic and Protestant faiths. The society promoted Irish Canadian culture, but it

10385-548: The United States in the nineteenth century and before were Irish speakers , with many knowing no other language on arrival. The great majority of Irish Catholics arrived in Grosse Isle , an island in Quebec in the St. Lawrence River , which housed the immigration reception station. Thousands died or arrived sick and were treated in the hospital (equipped for less than one hundred patients) in

10540-399: The Ward ) at the fringes of urban development, at least for the first few decades after the famine and in the case of Trefann Court , a holdout against public housing and urban renewal, up to the 1970s. This was also the case in other Canadian cities with significant Irish Catholic populations such as Montreal, Ottawa and Saint John. Likewise the new labour historians believe that the rise of

10695-466: The amount of rent they could obtain. Tenants could be evicted for reasons such as non-payment of rents (which were high), or a landlord's decision to raise sheep instead of grain crops . Cottiers paid their rent by working for the landlord while the spalpeens (itinerant labourers) paid for short-term leases through temporary day work. A majority of Catholics, who constituted 80% of the Irish population, lived in conditions of poverty and insecurity. At

10850-467: The annual St. Patrick's Day parade or during various religious processions, which culminated in the Jubilee Riots of 1875. These tensions had increased following the organized but failed Fenian Raids at points along the American border, which arose suspicions by Protestants of Catholics' sympathies toward the Fenian cause. The Irish population essentially defined the Catholic population in Toronto until 1890, when German and French Catholics were welcomed to

11005-420: The approval of the provinces (section 44). The same applies to amendments affecting the provincial government alone (section 45). Canada's constitution has roots going back to the thirteenth century, including England's Magna Carta and the first English Parliament of 1275 . Canada's constitution is composed of several individual statutes. There are three general methods by which a statute becomes entrenched in

11160-492: The arrival of Phytophthora infestans , commonly known as "blight", only two main potato plant diseases had been discovered. One was called "dry rot" or "taint", and the other was a virus known popularly as "curl". Phytophthora infestans is an oomycete (a variety of parasitic, non-photosynthetic organisms closely related to brown algae , and not a fungus). In 1851, the Census of Ireland Commissioners recorded 24 failures of

11315-451: The campaign for independence. Additionally, the famine indirectly resulted in tens of thousands of households being evicted , exacerbated by a provision forbidding access to workhouse aid while in possession of more than one-quarter acre of land. The famine was a defining moment in the history of Ireland, which was part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 1801 to 1922 . The famine and its effects permanently changed

11470-460: The census compared to 1,905,155 identifying as secular or non-religious (43%). 1,228,640 (28%) identified as Roman Catholic and 1,190,000 (27%) identified as belonging to a Protestant denomination. The first recorded Irish presence in the area of present-day Canada dates from 1536, when Irish fishermen from Cork traveled to Newfoundland. After the permanent settlement in Newfoundland by Irish in

11625-676: The cities. The Catholic Irish and Protestant (Orange) Irish were often in conflict from the 1840s. In Ontario, the Irish fought with the French for control of the Catholic Church, with the Irish successful. In that instance, the Irish sided with the Protestants to oppose the demand for French-language Catholic schools. Thomas D'Arcy McGee , an Irish-Montreal journalist, became a Father of Confederation in 1867. An Irish Republican in his early years, he would moderate his view in later years and become

11780-541: The city by the Irish, but the Irish were still 90% of the Catholic population. However, various powerful initiatives such as the foundation of St. Michael's College in 1852 (where Marshall McLuhan held the chair of English until his death in 1980), three hospitals, and the most significant charitable organizations in the city (the Society of St. Vincent de Paul ) and House of Providence created by Irish Catholic groups strengthened

11935-571: The city's Catholics experienced major social, ideological, and economic changes that allowed them to integrate into Toronto society and shake off their second-class status. The Irish Catholics (in contrast to the French) strongly supported Canada's role in the First World War. They broke out of the ghetto and lived in all of Toronto's neighbourhoods. Starting as unskilled labourers, they used high levels of education to move up and were well represented among

12090-535: The city's political systems at the peak of the famine, which saw the New Brunswick city's demographics completely changed with waves of immigration. In three years alone, 1844 to 1847, 30,000 Irish came to Partridge Island , a quarantine station in the city's harbour. An economic boom and growth in the years after their arrival allowed many Irish men to obtain steady employment on the rapidly expanding railroad network, settlements developed or expanded along or close to

12245-559: The close-knit working-class neighbourhoods of Pointe-Saint-Charles , Verdun , Saint-Henri , Griffintown and Goose Village, Montreal . With the help of Quebec's Catholic Church, they would establish their own churches, schools, and hospitals. St. Patrick's Basilica was founded in 1847 and served Montreal's English-speaking Catholics for over a century. Loyola College was founded by the Jesuits to serve Montreal's mostly Irish English-speaking Catholic community in 1896. Saint Mary's Hospital

12400-540: The commission stated that "the superior prosperity and tranquillity of Ulster, compared with the rest of Ireland, were due to tenant right". Landlords in Ireland often used their powers without compunction , and tenants lived in dread of them. Woodham-Smith writes that, in these circumstances, "industry and enterprise were extinguished and a peasantry created which was one of the most destitute in Europe". Immense population growth , from about 2 million in 1700 to 8 million by

12555-673: The complicated history of the period. The potato blight returned to Europe in 1879 but, by this time, the Land War (one of the largest agrarian movements to take place in 19th-century Europe) had begun in Ireland. The movement, organized by the Land League , continued the political campaign for the Three Fs which was issued in 1850 by the Tenant Right League during the Great Famine. When

12710-632: The conditions that led to the famine. However, it was asserted that, since the Acts of Union 1800 , the British Parliament was partly to blame. This point was raised in The Illustrated London News on 13 February 1847: "There was no law it would not pass at their request, and no abuse it would not defend for them." On 24 March, The Times reported that Britain had permitted in Ireland "a mass of poverty, disaffection, and degradation without

12865-701: The conflict. In August 1969, some 150 Irish Canadians in Toronto announced that they intended to send money, which could be used to buy guns if necessary, to the Catholic women and children of the Bogside in Derry . After the outbreak of the conflict, the Irish Republican Clubs were established in America and Canada to support the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) cause. Much of the IRA support in Canada

13020-444: The constitution in general significantly more difficult. Previously, the Canadian constitution could be formally amended by an act of the British parliament, or by informal agreement between the federal and provincial governments, or even simply by adoption as the custom of an oral convention or performance that shows precedential but unwritten tradition. Since the act, textual amendments must now conform to certain specified provisions in

13175-472: The cornmeal could be consumed, it had to be "very much" cooked again, or eating it could result in severe bowel complaints. Due to its yellow colour, and initial unpopularity, it became known as "Peel's brimstone". In October 1845, Peel moved to repeal the Corn Laws — tariffs on grain which kept the price of bread high—but the issue split his party and he had insufficient support from his own colleagues to push

13330-477: The country , causing the country's population to fall by 20–25% (in some towns, populations fell as much as 67%) between 1841 and 1871. Between 1845 and 1855, at least 2.1 million people left Ireland, primarily on packet ships but also on steamboats and barques —one of the greatest exoduses from a single island in history. The proximate cause of the famine was the infection of potato crops by blight ( Phytophthora infestans ) throughout Europe during

13485-655: The country . Sociologist Steve Bruce described the support networks in Canada as "the main source of support for loyalism outside the United Kingdom . . . Ontario is to Ulster Protestants what Boston is to Irish Catholics ." After the Troubles began, various Canadian loyalist organisations sprang to life to provide the 'besieged' Protestants with the resources to arm themselves. Between 1979 and 1986, loyalist paramilitaries received 100 machine guns and many rifles, grenade launchers, magnum revolvers, and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition from Canadian sources. These weapons were

13640-438: The crisis deepened. The new Whig administration, influenced by the doctrine of laissez-faire , believed that the market would provide the food needed. They refused to interfere with the movement of food to England, and then halted the previous government's food and relief works, leaving many hundreds of thousands of people without access to work, money, or food. Russell's ministry introduced a new programme of public works that by

13795-612: The desired change would require an amendment to any documents that form part of the Constitution of Canada, it would require the consent of the Senate and House of Commons under section 43. This was done, for example, by the Constitution Amendment, 1998 , when Newfoundland asked the federal government to amend the Terms of Union of Newfoundland to allow it to end denominational quotas for religion classes. A small number of statutes within provincial constitutions cannot be amended by

13950-471: The difference between Irish Catholics and Irish Protestants in urban Canada was relatively insignificant. Ciani (2008) concludes that support of World War I fostered an identity among Irish Catholics as loyal citizens and helped integrate them into the social fabric of the nation. Rev. Michael Fallon, the Catholic bishop of London, sided with the Protestants against the French Catholics. His primary motive

14105-538: The earlier period were largely tradesmen, and many stayed in Saint John, becoming the backbone of its builders. But when the Great Famine raged between 1845 and 1852, huge waves of refugees arrived at these shores. It is estimated that between 1845 and 1847, some 30,000 arrived, more people than were living in the city at the time. In 1847, dubbed "Black 47", one of the worst years of the Famine, some 16,000 immigrants, most of them from Ireland, arrived at Partridge Island ,

14260-483: The end of December 1846 employed some half a million but proved impossible to administer. Charles Trevelyan , who was in charge of the administration of government relief, limited the Government's food aid programme, claiming that food would be readily imported into Ireland once people had more money to spend after wages were being paid on new public-works projects. In a private correspondence, Trevelyan explained how

14415-464: The end of this period, the population of the provinces of Canada was 2.4 million. Besides Upper Canada (Ontario), Lower Canada (Quebec), the Maritime colonies of Nova Scotia , Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick , especially Saint John , were arrival points. Not all remained; many out-migrated to the United States or to Western Canada in the decades that followed. Few returned to Ireland. During

14570-436: The expansion of the cottier system ; they supported an extremely cheap workforce, but at the cost of lower living standards. For the labourer, "a potato wage" shaped the expanding agrarian economy. The potato was also used extensively as a fodder crop for livestock immediately prior to the famine. Approximately 33% of production, amounting to 5,000,000 short tons (4,500,000  t ), was typically used in this way. Prior to

14725-464: The famine could bring benefit to the English; As he wrote to Edward Twisleton : "We must not complain of what we really want to obtain. If small farmers go, and their landlords are reduced to sell portions of their estates to persons who will invest capital we shall at last arrive at something like a satisfactory settlement of the country". In January 1847, the government abandoned its policy of noninterference, realising that it had failed, and turned to

14880-487: The federal legislature. The general formula set out in section 38(1), known as the "7/50 formula", requires: (a) assent from both the House of Commons and the Senate; (b) the approval of two-thirds of the provincial legislatures (at least seven provinces) representing at least 50 per cent of the population of the provinces (effectively, this would include at least Quebec or Ontario, as they are the most populous provinces). This formula specifically applies to amendments related to

15035-479: The first deaths from starvation were recorded. Seed potatoes were scarce in 1847. Few had been sown, so, despite average yields, hunger continued. 1848 yields were only two-thirds of normal. Since over three million Irish people were totally dependent on potatoes for food, hunger and famine were widespread. The Corporation of Dublin sent a memorial to the Queen, "praying her" to call Parliament together early (Parliament

15190-448: The first widely circulated tracts on the famine, The Last Conquest of Ireland (Perhaps) , published in 1861. It proposed that British actions during the famine and their treatment of the Irish were a deliberate effort at genocide. It contained a sentence that has since become famous: "The Almighty, indeed, sent the potato blight, but the English created the Famine." Mitchel was charged with sedition because of his writings, but this charge

15345-405: The former Premiers Daniel Johnson and Jean Charest , Georges Dor (born Georges-Henri Dore), and former Prime Ministers Louis St. Laurent and Brian Mulroney . The Irish constitute the second largest ethnic group in the province after French Canadians . From the times of early European settlement in the 17th and 18th centuries, the Irish had been coming to Ontario, in small numbers and in

15500-608: The founding members of the Irish Confederation to campaign for a Repeal of the Act of Union, and called for the export of grain to be stopped and the ports closed. The following year, he helped organise the short-lived Young Irelander Rebellion of 1848 in County Tipperary . When Ireland experienced food shortages in 1782–1783, ports were closed to exporting food, with the intention of keeping locally grown food in Ireland to feed

15655-444: The government from creating unconstitutional laws. Instead of the usual parliamentary procedure, which includes the monarch's formal royal assent for enacting legislation, amendments to any of the acts that collectively form the constitution must be done in accordance with Part V of the Constitution Act, 1982 , which provides for five different amending formulae. Amendments can be brought forward under section 46(1) by any province or

15810-585: The grievances listed in the United States Declaration of Independence ). Significantly, the Quebec Act also replaced French criminal law with the English common law system; but the French civil law system was retained for non-criminal matters. The Treaty of Paris of 1783 ended the American War of Independence and sent a wave of British loyalist refugees northward to Quebec and Nova Scotia. In 1784,

15965-524: The hands of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and Chief Secretary for Ireland , who were appointed by the British government. Ireland sent 105 members of parliament to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom , and Irish representative peers elected 28 of their own number to sit for life in the House of Lords . Between 1832 and 1859, 70% of Irish representatives were landowners or the sons of landowners. In

16120-768: The hungry. Irish food prices promptly dropped. Some merchants lobbied against the export ban, but the government in the 1780s overrode their protests. Historian F. S. L. Lyons characterised the initial response of the British government to the early, less severe phase of the famine as "prompt and relatively successful". Confronted by widespread crop failure in November 1845, the Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel, purchased £100,000 worth of maize and cornmeal secretly from America with Baring Brothers initially acting as his agents. The government hoped that they would not "stifle private enterprise" and that their actions would not act as

16275-545: The immigration and quarantine station at the mouth of Saint John Harbour. From 1840 to 1860 sectarian violence was rampant in Saint John resulting in some of the worst urban riots in Canadian history. Tensions between the Irish Protestants and Irish Catholics were widespread in Canada in the 19th century, with many episodes of violence and anger, especially in Atlantic Canada and Ontario. In New Brunswick, from 1840 to

16430-522: The island's demographic, political, and cultural landscape, producing an estimated 2 million refugees and spurring a century-long population decline . For both the native Irish and those in the resulting diaspora, the famine entered folk memory . The strained relations between many Irish people and the then ruling British government worsened further because of the famine, heightening ethnic and sectarian tensions and boosting nationalism and republicanism both in Ireland and among Irish emigrants around

16585-459: The landlord a fair rent for his land, but giving the tenant compensation for any money he might have laid out on the land in permanent improvements. O'Connell noted actions taken by the Belgian legislature during the same season, as they had also been hit by blight: shutting their ports against the export of provisions and opening them to imports. He suggested that, if Ireland had a domestic Parliament,

16740-542: The landlord to qualify for public outdoor relief. Of this Law, Mitchel wrote that "it is the able-bodied idler only who is to be fed—if he attempted to till but one rood of ground, he dies". This simple method of ejectment was called "passing paupers through the workhouse"—a man went in, a pauper came out. These factors combined to drive thousands of people off the land: 90,000 in 1849, and 104,000 in 1850. The Incumbered Estates (Ireland) Act 1849 ( 12 & 13 Vict. c. 77) allowed landlord estates to be auctioned off upon

16895-546: The late 18th and early 19th century, overwhelmingly from counties Waterford and Wexford , increased immigration of the Irish elsewhere in Canada began in the decades following the War of 1812 and formed a significant part of The Great Migration of Canada . Between 1825 and 1845, 60% of all immigrants to Canada were Irish; in 1831 alone, some 34,000 arrived in Montreal. Between 1830 and 1850, 624,000 Irish arrived; in contextual terms, at

17050-537: The legislature, and another governing procedure in the legislature. Two provinces have explicitly listed such acts as being part of their provincial constitution; see Constitution of Quebec and Constitution Act (British Columbia) . However, these acts do not, generally, supersede other legislation and do not require special procedures to amend, and so they function as regular statutes rather than constitutional statutes. A small number of non-constitutional provincial laws do supersede all other provincial legislation, as

17205-480: The lower middle class. Most dramatically, they intermarried with Protestants at an unprecedented rate. With Canadian Confederation in 1867, Catholics were granted a separate school board. Through the late 19th and early 20th century, Irish immigration to Ontario continued but a slower pace, much of it family reunification. Out-migration of Irish in Ontario (along with others) occurred during this period following economic downturns, available new land and mining booms in

17360-591: The measure through. He resigned the premiership in December, but the opposition was unable to form a government and he was re-appointed. In March, Peel set up a programme of public works in Ireland, but the famine situation worsened during 1846, and the repeal of the Corn Laws in that year did little to help the starving Irish; the measure split the Conservative Party, leading to the fall of Peel's ministry. On 25 June,

17515-513: The northeasterly portion of the former French province of New France as Province of Quebec, roughly coextensive with the southern third of contemporary Quebec. The proclamation, which established an appointed colonial government, was the constitution of Quebec until 1774 when the British parliament passed the Quebec Act , which expanded the province's boundaries to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers (one of

17670-400: The one million migrants, mainly of British and Irish origin, who arrived in Canada in the mid-19th century benefited from the availability of land and absence of social barriers to mobility. This enabled them to think and feel like citizens of the new country in a way denied them back in the old country. Akenson (1984) argued that the Canadian experience of Irish immigrants is not comparable to

17825-404: The people of any other country in Europe have to sustain". The Commission stated that bad relations between landlord and tenant were principally responsible for this suffering. Landlords were described in evidence before the commission as "land sharks", "bloodsuckers", and "the most oppressive species of tyrant that ever lent assistance to the destruction of a country". As any improvement made on

17980-491: The petition of creditors. Estates with debts were then auctioned off at low prices. Wealthy British speculators purchased the lands and "took a harsh view" of the tenant farmers who continued renting. The rents were raised, and tenants evicted to create large cattle grazing pastures. Between 1849 and 1854, some 50,000 families were evicted. Canadian Constitution [REDACTED] Canada portal The Constitution of Canada ( French : Constitution du Canada )

18135-406: The political climate, in which the Irish famine occurred. The "middleman system" for managing landed property was introduced in the 18th century. Rent collection was left in the hands of the landlords' agents, or middlemen. This assured the landlord of a regular income and relieved them of direct responsibility while leaving tenants open to exploitation by the middlemen. The ability of middlemen

18290-533: The political, social and community as well as religious lives of its followers. Spatially, Orange lodges were founded as Irish Protestant settlement spread north and west from its original focus on the Lake Ontario plain. Although the number of active members, and thus their influence, may have been overestimated, the Orange influence was considerable and comparable to the Catholic influence in Quebec. In Montreal in 1853,

18445-502: The ports would be thrown open and the abundant crops raised in Ireland would be kept for the people of Ireland, as the Dublin parliament had done during the food shortages of the 1780s. O'Connell maintained that only an Irish parliament would provide both food and employment for the people. He said that repeal of the Act of Union was a necessity and Ireland's only hope. Mitchel later wrote one of

18600-467: The potato blight returned to Ireland in the 1879 famine , the League boycotted "notorious landlords" and its members physically blocked the evictions of farmers; the consequent reduction in homelessness and house demolition resulted in a drastic reduction in the number of deaths. Ireland was brought into the United Kingdom in January 1801 following the passage of the Acts of Union . Executive power lay in

18755-601: The potato crop going back to 1728, of varying severity. General crop failures, through disease or frost, were recorded in 1739, 1740, 1770, 1800, and 1807. In 1821 and 1822, the potato crop failed in Munster and Connaught . In 1830 and 1831, counties Mayo , Donegal , and Galway suffered likewise. In 1832, 1833, 1834, and 1836, dry rot and curl caused serious losses, and in 1835 the potato failed in Ulster. Widespread failures throughout Ireland occurred in 1836, 1837, 1839, 1841, and 1844. According to Woodham-Smith, "the unreliability of

18910-668: The potato was an accepted fact in Ireland". Experts are still unsure of how and when blight arrived in Europe; it almost certainly was not present prior to 1842, and probably arrived in 1844. The origin of the pathogen has been traced to the Toluca Valley in Mexico, whence it spread within North America and then to Europe. The 1845–1846 blight was caused by the HERB-1 strain of the blight. In 1844, Irish newspapers carried reports concerning

19065-465: The primary document of Canadian Confederation . With the patriation of the Constitution in 1982, this Act was renamed Constitution Act, 1867 . In recent years, the 1867 document has mainly served as the basis on which the division of powers between the provinces and the federal government is analyzed. Endorsed by all provincial governments except that of Quebec, this was the formal Act of Parliament that effected Canada's full legislative independence from

19220-551: The proportionate representation in Parliament, powers, selection, and composition of the Senate, the Supreme Court and the addition of provinces or territories. The other amendment formulae are for particular cases as provided by the act. An amendment related to the Office of the King , the use of either official language (subject to section 43), the amending formula itself, or the composition of

19375-533: The province of Manitoba (the first to be established by the Parliament of Canada) was created. British Columbia joined Confederation in 1871, followed by Prince Edward Island in 1873. The Yukon Territory was created by Parliament in 1898, followed by Alberta and Saskatchewan in 1905 (all out of parts of the Northwest Territories). Newfoundland , Britain's oldest colony in the Americas and by then also

19530-404: The road program near the Irish settlements, and departing settlers afterward outnumbered new arrivals. By 1870, only the successful settlers, most of whom were farmers who raised grazing animals, remained. In the 1840s the major challenge for the Catholic Church was keeping the loyalty of the very poor Catholic arrivals during marches. The fear was that Protestants might use their material needs as

19685-543: The same time, ships with the starving also docked at Partridge Island, New Brunswick in similarly desperate circumstances. A large number of the families that survived continued on to settle in Canada West (now Ontario) and provided a cheap labor pool and colonization of land in a rapidly expanding economy in the decades after their arrival. In comparison with the Irish who went to the United States or Britain, many Irish arrivals in Canada settled in rural areas, in addition to

19840-577: The scale of destruction become apparent. Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel wrote to Sir James Graham in mid-October that he found the reports "very alarming", but allayed his fears by claiming that there was "always a tendency to exaggeration in Irish news". Crop loss in 1845 has been estimated at anywhere from one-third to one-half of cultivated acreage. The Mansion House Committee in Dublin , to which hundreds of letters were directed from all over Ireland, claimed on 19 November 1845 to have ascertained beyond

19995-400: The service of New France , as missionaries, soldiers, geographers and fur trappers. After the creation of British North America in 1763, Protestant Irish, both Irish Anglicans and Ulster-Scottish Presbyterians, had been migrating over the decades to Upper Canada , some as United Empire Loyalists or directly from Ulster . In the years after the War of 1812 , increasing numbers of Irish,

20150-413: The shadow of a doubt that "considerably more than one-third of the entire of the potato crop ... has been already destroyed". In 1846, three-quarters of the harvest was lost to blight. By December, a third of a million destitute people were employed in public works. According to Cormac Ó Gráda , the first attack of potato blight caused considerable hardship in rural Ireland from the autumn of 1846, when

20305-419: The state of Ireland, and that "without exception their findings prophesied disaster; Ireland was on the verge of starvation, her population rapidly increasing, three-quarters of her labourers unemployed, housing conditions appalling and the standard of living unbelievably low". Lectures printed in 1847 by John Hughes , Bishop of New York , are a contemporary exploration into the antecedent causes, particularly

20460-412: The summer of 1847; in fact, many ships that reached Grosse-Île had lost the bulk of their passengers and crew, and much more died in quarantine on or near the island. From Grosse-Île, most survivors were sent to Quebec City and Montreal, where the existing Irish community grew. The orphaned children were adopted into Quebec families and accordingly became Québécois , both linguistically and culturally. At

20615-405: The time of the Great Famine, led to increased division of holdings and a consequent reduction in their average size. By 1845, 24% of all Irish tenant farms were of 0.4–2 hectares (1–5 acres) in size, while 40% were of 2–6 hectares (5–15 acres). Holdings were so small that no crop other than potatoes would suffice to feed a family. Shortly before the famine, the British government reported that poverty

20770-457: The time. As the Irish became more prosperous and newer groups arrived on Canada's shores, tensions subsided through the remainder the latter part of the 19th century. In the years between 1815, when vast industrial changes began to disrupt the old life-styles in Europe, and Canadian Confederation in 1867, when immigration of that era passed its peak, more than 150,000 immigrants from Ireland flooded into Saint John, New Brunswick . Those who came in

20925-649: The top of the social hierarchy was the Ascendancy class , composed of English and Anglo-Irish families who owned most of the land and held more or less unchecked power over their tenants. Some of their estates were vast; for example, the Earl of Lucan owned more than 60,000 acres (240 km ). Many of these landowners lived in England and functioned as absentee landlords . The rent revenue—collected from impoverished tenants who were paid minimal wages to raise crops and livestock for export —was mostly sent to England. In 1800,

21080-508: The two provinces were divided: Nova Scotia was split into Nova Scotia, Cape Breton Island (rejoined to Nova Scotia in 1820), Prince Edward Island, and New Brunswick, while Quebec was split into Lower Canada (southern Quebec) and Upper Canada (southern through lower northern Ontario). The winter of 1837–38 saw rebellion in both Canadas, contributing to their re-union as the Province of Canada in 1841. The British North America Act, 1867 established

21235-544: The validity of an amendment to a provincial constitution framed as an addition to part of the Constitution of Canada. In 1983, Peter Greyson, an art student, entered Ottawa's National Archives (known today as Library and Archives Canada ) and poured red paint mixed with glue over a copy of the proclamation of the 1982 constitutional amendment. He said he was displeased with the federal government's decision to allow United States missile testing in Canada and had wanted to "graphically illustrate to Canadians" how wrong he believed

21390-472: The world. The Canadian constitution includes core written documents and provisions that are constitutionally entrenched , take precedence over all other laws and place substantive limits on government action; these include the Constitution Act, 1867 (formerly the British North America Act, 1867) and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms . The Constitution Act , 1867 provides for

21545-419: The world. English documentary maker John Percival said that the famine "became part of the long story of betrayal and exploitation which led to the growing movement in Ireland for independence." Scholar Kirby Miller makes the same point. Debate exists regarding nomenclature for the event, whether to use the term "Famine", "Potato Famine" or "Great Hunger", the last of which some believe most accurately captures

21700-402: The written portion of the Canadian constitution. This was an Act of the British parliament, originally called the British North America Act, 1867 . It outlined Canada's system of government, which combines Britain's Westminster model of parliamentary government with the division of sovereignty ( federalism ). Although it is the first of 20 British North America Acts , it is the most famous as

21855-477: The years between 1815, when vast industrial changes began to disrupt the old life-styles in Europe, and Canadian Confederation in 1867, when immigration of that era passed its peak, more than 150,000 immigrants from Ireland arrived to Saint John. Those who came in the earlier period were largely tradesmen, and many stayed in Saint John, becoming the backbone of its builders. But when the Great Famine raged between 1845 and 1852, huge waves of Famine refugees arrived. It

22010-483: Was achieved in 1982 when the British parliament, with the request and assent of the Canadian parliament, passed the Canada Act 1982 , which included in its schedules the Constitution Act, 1982 . The United Kingdom thus renounced any remaining responsibility for, or jurisdiction over, Canada. In a formal ceremony on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Queen Elizabeth II proclaimed the Constitution Act, 1982 into law on April 17, 1982. The Constitution Act, 1982 , includes

22165-488: Was affirmed in each colony's Terms of Union , which now form part of Canada's Constitution. The remaining three provinces (Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta) were created by federal statute. Their constitutional structures are described in those statutes, which now form part of Canada's Constitution. All provinces have enacted legislation that establishes other rules for the structure of government. For example, every province (and territory) has an act governing elections to

22320-507: Was announced that the cost of famine relief would be transferred to local taxes in Ireland. The financial crisis temporarily improved, but the intended relief for Ireland did not materialise. In June 1847, the Poor Relief (Ireland) Act 1847 ( 10 & 11 Vict. c. 31) was passed which embodied the principle, popular in Britain, that Irish property must support Irish poverty. The landed proprietors in Ireland were held in Britain to have created

22475-481: Was at this time prorogued ), and to recommend the requisition of some public money for public works, especially railways in Ireland. The Town Council of Belfast met and made similar suggestions, but neither body asked for charity, according to John Mitchel , one of the leading Repealers. In early November 1845, a deputation from the citizens of Dublin, including the Duke of Leinster , Lord Cloncurry , Daniel O'Connell and

22630-643: Was based in Montreal, Toronto, and southern Ontario. Canadian IRA supporters raised money to secretly purchase weapons, most notably the detonators used in Canadian mining sites, for the IRA armed campaign . At the same time, Irish Canadians also provided a role for loyalist paramilitaries (mostly the Ulster Volunteer Force and the Ulster Defence Association ), owing to its considerable Ulster Protestant population in Ontario and Orange Lodges across

22785-402: Was dropped. He was convicted by a packed jury under the newly enacted Treason Felony Act and sentenced to 14 years transportation to Bermuda . According to Charles Gavan Duffy , The Nation insisted that the proper remedy, retaining in the country the food raised by her people until the people were fed, was one which the rest of Europe had adopted, and one which even the parliaments of

22940-410: Was forbidden for members to speak of Irish politics when meeting. Today, the society is still operating. Some writers have assumed that the Irish in 19th-century North America were impoverished. DiMatteo (1992), using evidence from probate records in 1892, shows this is untrue. Irish-born and Canadian-born Irish accumulated wealth in a similar way, and that being Irish was not an economic disadvantage by

23095-697: Was founded in the 1920s and continues to serve Montreal's present-day English-speaking population . The St. Patrick's Day Parade in Montreal is one of the oldest in North America, dating back to 1824. The Irish would also settle in large numbers in Quebec City and establish communities in rural Quebec, particularly in Pontiac , Gatineau and Papineau where there was an active timber industry. However, most would move on to larger North American cities. Today, many Québécois have some Irish ancestry. Examples from political leaders include Laurence Cannon , Claude Ryan ,

23250-447: Was measured by the rent income they could contrive to extract from tenants. Middlemen leased large tracts of land from the landlords on long leases with fixed rents and sublet to tenants, keeping any money raised in excess to the rent paid to the landlord. This system, coupled with minimal oversight of the middlemen, incentivised harsh exploitation of tenants. Middlemen would split a holding into smaller and smaller parcels so as to increase

23405-621: Was not uncommon for Catholic Irish to settle among and intermarry with the Catholic French-speakers. Considering that many other Canadians throughout Canada likewise have Irish roots, in addition to those who may simply identify as Canadian, the total number of Canadians with some Irish ancestry extrapolated would include a significant proportion of the Canadian population. Irish established communities in both urban and rural Quebec. Irish immigrants arrived in large numbers in Montreal during

23560-462: Was so widespread that one-third of all Irish small holdings could not support the tenant families after rent was paid; the families survived only by earnings as seasonal migrant labour in England and Scotland. Following the famine, reforms were implemented making it illegal to further divide land holdings. The 1841 census showed a population of just over eight million. Two-thirds of people depended on agriculture for their survival but rarely received

23715-485: Was still based on butter, milk, and grain products. The Irish economy grew between 1760 and 1815 due to infrastructure expansion and the Napoleonic Wars (1805–1815), which had increased the demand for food in Britain. Tillage increased to such an extent that there was only a small amount of land available to small farmers to feed themselves. The potato was adopted as a primary food source because of its quick growth in

23870-715: Was to advance the cause of Irish Catholics in Canada and abroad; he had significant support from the Vatican. He opposed the French Canadian Catholics, especially by opposing bilingual education. French Canadians did not participate in Fallon's efforts to support the war effort and became more marginalized in Ontario politics and society. During the Troubles (1969–1998) in Northern Ireland, although not as responsive as Irish Americans , Irish Canadians nevertheless responded to

24025-500: Was used as a scapegoat. After Confederation, Irish Catholics faced more hostility, especially from Protestant Irish in Ontario, which was under the political sway of the already entrenched anti-Catholic Orange Order . The anthem " The Maple Leaf Forever ", written and composed by Scottish immigrant and Orangeman Alexander Muir , reflects the pro-British Ulster loyalism outlook typical of the time with its disdainful view of Irish Republicanism . This only amplified with Fenian Raids of

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