Sir Edmund
Head, the lieutenant-governor, so far as to acquiesce in the appointment
of Judge Carter as chief-justice, and the elevation of Mr. Wilmot to the
bench. This was a fair ground of attack, because it was clear that if
the executive council of New Brunswick was under the orders of the home
government, representative institutions and responsible government did
not exist.

Thus the Street-Partelow government fell, and with it disappeared, at
once and forever, the old Conservative regime which had existed in the
province from its foundation, and which, unavoidably no doubt, had
presided over the early political life of the colony, but the undue
continuance of which was wholly incompatible with the full development
of representative institutions and responsible government. It was a
great triumph for the cause of Liberalism that the Conservatives of that
period were not only defeated, but swept altogether out of existence.
After that a government of men who called themselves Conservatives might
go into power, but the old state of affairs, under which the
lieutenant-governor could exercise almost despotic powers, had departed
forever, and could no more be revived than the heptarchy. All that a
Conservative government could do after that was to fall into line with
the policy of the men they had displaced, and proceed, less rapidly
perhaps, but none the less surely, along the path of political progress.

The new government which was formed as the result of this vote had for
its premier the Hon. Charles Fisher, who took the office of
attorney-general; Mr. Tilley became provincial secretary; Mr. James
Brown, a few weeks later, received the office of surveyor-general; J. M.
Johnson, one of the members for Northumberland, became solicitor-general;
and William J. Ritchie, Albert J. Smith and William H. Steeves were
members of the government without office.

The bill to give effect to the reciprocity treaty passed its third
reading on November 2d, only five members voting against it. On motion
of the Hon. Mr. Ritchie, one of the members of the new government, it
was resolved that it was desirable and expedient that the
surveyor-general, who was a political officer, should hold a seat in the
House of Assembly, and that the government should carry out the wishes
of the House in this respect. Before the House again met the wishes of
the House had been complied with, and Mr. Brown, of Charlotte, became
surveyor-general.

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