ent evidence,
hasty conclusions, and executive devotion."[249] As a general rule, it
is a difficult matter to convict a Government of actual, direct
interference with the freedom of election. But in the case of the
general election of 1836, there is unfortunately no room for doubt. That
patents were issued in great numbers by the Commissioner of Crown Lands,
and despatched by the hands of trusted agents of the Government to the
polling-places, to be used by the voters, is as well established as is
the fact of the election itself. Nay, the fact is admitted by Sir
Francis Head in the supplemental chapter to his "Narrative," as well as
by the Committee appointed by the Assembly to investigate the matter,
and the attempts to explain it away are of the weakest kind. The number
of patents issued was so great as to require a special staff of extra
clerks to get them ready by the time they were wanted. In some cases the
patents covered only a quarter of an acre of wild, uncultivated land,
upon which no buildings had been erected. Many of them were issued
between the date of the dissolution of Parliament and the close of the
election a month later,[250] and in some instances they were issued
after the actual opening of the poll. They were distributed openly at
the places where the elections were held, to persons who had not applied
for them, and who, at least in some instances, received them without
paying the usual fees, merely that they might thereby be enabled to
vote. Whether the issue of the patents affected the result of the
election in any single instance is altogether beside the question. It
would be absurd to pretend, in the face of such tactics as these, that
there was any real freedom of choice offered to the people in the matter
of Parliamentary representation. Freedom of election was paralyzed.
Reform voters were literally overwhelmed, and their franchise rendered
of no avail. All this was done with the cognizance and assent of the
Lieutenant-Governor, who thereby wilfully violated the instructions
which he had received from the Home Office.[251]

The result of an election contest conducted on these lines was such as
to fully realize the expectations of Sir Francis and his advisers. Not
only were all the old Tory members returned--and this, in several cases,
without any opposition--but a number of new adherents of that side found
seats. Hagerman was returned for Kingston by acclamation, McLean was
returned for Storm