§ SIR JOHN WALSHsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether he will have any objection to lay upon the table of the House the Despatches recently received from the Governor General of Canada, and the other Governors Of our North American Colonies, relative to the recent Ministerial Changes and the project of a Federal Union of those Colonies; and whether it is his intention, before the close of the Session, to make any statement, or to afford any information to the House on the important legislative crisis which appears to be impending in the constitution of those Colonies?
§ MR. CARDWELLsaid, in reply, that a new Government having been formed in Canada by a union between the two parties into which the Assembly was 1709 divided, the intention of the new Government to mature, during the recess, measures for an important purpose, namely, for settling the constitutional difficulties which had prevailed in the Upper and Lower Provinces, by what they called the federative principle, applied to Canada itself, with a provision for the future reception into the Union of the maritime provinces of the North Western territory. He understood it was their intention, after maturing those measures, to communicate with the Home Government on the subject; but as those measures had not yet been framed, it was manifestly not in his (Mr. Cardwell's) power to give any information on the subject.