right belonged to it, and that it was little better than a nullity. It
might meet and go through the form of passing such measures as it saw
fit, but if the measures so passed were not acceptable to the
Legislative and Executive Councils they were contumeliously vetoed when
they reached the Upper House. This brought the two deliberative branches
of the Legislature into direct and perpetual conflict. The Assembly,
however, in early years, was always largely made up of such men as Isaac
Swayze--subservient creatures of the Administration, who opposed their
influence to that of the tribunes of the people, and prevented any
collision between the two Houses from assuming a very serious
constitutional aspect. It was not till the third decade of the century
that the conflict assumed such a character as to threaten the
foundations of the constitution itself; and it was not till the fourth
decade that any actual attempt was made to subvert those foundations.

The Province was about fifteen years old before the inhabitants of Upper
Canada generally began to realize what an intolerable burden they had to
bear in this irresponsible Executive. Before that time some of the
better educated and more intelligent among them recognized its existence
as an evil with which they or their descendants would at some future
time be called upon to deal. But such persons were comparatively few in
number, and as the burden did not lie with special heaviness upon their
own backs, they did not feel called upon to involve themselves in what
might prove a ruinous quarrel with persons who would not tamely submit
to interference. As for the inhabitants generally, they were too busily
occupied in clearing their lands, in hewing out homes for themselves and
their families in the vast wilderness, and in reducing the soil to a
state fit for cultivation, to give themselves much concern about public
affairs. There was no newspaper press to stimulate them to enquiry. The
only sheet published in the Province which by any license of language
could be called a regular newspaper was _The Upper Canada Gazette_,
which was the official mouthpiece of the Administration. _The Canada
Constellation_, which was a quaint long folio, published at the old
capital, Niagara, had but a brief existence, and expired during the
very early years of the century. The _Upper Canada Guardian_, to be
hereafter referred to, did not come into being till 1807. Editorial
articles, except of