What was the Constitutional Act of 1791?

The Constitutional Act of 1791 (31 George III, c. 31) was a British statute that divided the colony of Quebec into Upper Canada (largely English-speaking, today's Ontario) and Lower Canada (largely French-speaking, today's Quebec). The Act received royal assent on June 19, 1791 and came into force on December 26, 1791. Each new colony received its own elected Legislative Assembly, appointed Legislative Council, Executive Council, and Lieutenant Governor, with the overall colonies under a single Governor General resident in Quebec City.

The Act was driven by the influx of about 10,000 United Empire Loyalists into the western part of the colony of Quebec after 1783. The Loyalists wanted British civil law, English-speaking institutions, and an elected assembly, while the French Canadians of the Lower St. Lawrence wanted to retain the Quebec Act of 1774's protections of French civil law, the Catholic Church, and the seigneurial system. Splitting the colony allowed both communities to have institutions appropriate to their majorities.

The Act introduced representative government to British North America for the first time. The Lower Canada Legislative Assembly first met on December 17, 1792 with 50 members; the Upper Canada Legislative Assembly first met on September 17, 1792 at Newark (now Niagara-on-the-Lake) with 16 members. Major political figures of early Lower Canada included James Monk, Pierre-Stanislas Bédard, and Louis-Joseph Papineau (after 1809). Major figures of early Upper Canada included Lieutenant-Governor John Graves Simcoe (1791 to 1796), William Jarvis, and John Beverley Robinson.

The Act had several important provisions. It established the boundaries between the two Canadas (the Ottawa River and the western boundary of the 1763 Province of Quebec). It created Crown Reserves and Clergy Reserves of one-seventh of all granted land each, set aside to support government and the Anglican Church. The Clergy Reserves became a major source of political grievance in Upper Canada and contributed to the 1837 to 1838 rebellions. The Act also formally established the British Westminster model of government in British North America, including a representative assembly, an appointed upper house, and a Lieutenant-Governor's role similar to the British Crown's. The Constitutional Act remained in force until replaced by the Act of Union of 1840 after the Rebellions and Lord Durham's Report. It is considered the foundation of Canadian parliamentary democracy.