Rebellion of 1837 Essay

How significant was the rebellion of 1837 in achieving responsible government in Upper and Lower Canada?

                The Rebellion of 1837 is a great example of how our government learns from mistakes and builds upon them. The French-Canadians wanted to have a French-Canadian government and not have a British government which is understandable. The basis of why the French-Canadians rebelled was to rid Canada of British rule, so the French-Canadians came together and rebelled against it.

                During summer of 1837, Lower Canada broke into protests. The British tried to suppress it which made it only worse. French-Canadian militias came together to rise against the British. While this was happening in Lower Canada, Upper Canada was actually abiding the laws and proving to agree with them due to the amount of immigrants from Britain. It seemed quite successful in Upper Canada.

                The Upper Canadian Governors were referred to as the Family Compact because they weren’t elected by the people, but by the Lower Canadian government. Rebels from northern United States also lent a hand in setting things straight by bringing back the rebellion in late 1837. The consequences were worse this time around with more people put in jails, more hung and over fifty people sent to Australia.

                The main causes of the rebellion were the citizens over time becoming more aware of how corrupt the system really was in Canada. So tension built and the citizens rebelled against the idea of Upper Canada and Lower Canada having two separate groups that control the entire country. Another thing that gave the advantage to the British was since Upper Canada had less people, and having most of them be British, their needs were met more than Lower Canada with around 10 times more people and the majority of them being French-Canadian.

                In Conclusion, the rebellion of 1837 was a building block of today’s government. We learned that the citizens of Canada won’t sit back and let the government push them around. They also listen to the people’s needs more than then. Before they didn’t care all too much about the population, just themselves. Now, the people within the country matter to the government more. They will always be improving.