ground that his religion was a handicap to his party; but his supporters in the House denied that the Ultramontanes could be any more hostile to a Protestant than to a Catholic liberal, and insisted on his retaining his post.

The activities of the majority in the new legislature soon justified its Ultramontane backers. In the first session three significant acts were passed. One was designed to prevent a second Guibord appeal to the courts. It declared the right of the ecclesiastical authorities to designate the place in the cemetery where each person was to be buried, and provided that, if according to the canonical rules and in the opinion of the bishop any deceased person could not be buried in consecrated ground with liturgical prayers, he should receive civil burial in ground adjoining the cemetery. A second law gave civil confirmation to the action of Bishop Bourget in dividing the parish of Montreal, a marginal note, later explained away as an inexact expression of a compiler, declared that "decrees of our Holy Father the Pope are binding." Most important was the establishment of

Catholic education was given to a committee consisting of the bishops and an equal number of appointed laymen, the bishops, however, alone enjoying the right to be represented by proxy. Control of Protestant schools was confided as fully and freely to a Protestant committee. It was urged that it was desirable to remove education from politics, and that the freedom given the Protestant minority was a proof of liberality and tolerance; but the fact remained that the measure was a concession to the element which opposed state control over education and other matters declared to be within the church's sphere.

The next concerted action was the issuing of a joint pastoral on the political situation. The council of bishops had on several occasions issued advice on political issues to clergy and laity; the second council, of 1858, urged the clergy to be neutral in political issues where religion was not involved; the third, in 1863, condemned secret societies and the plague of evil newspapers; the fourth, in 1868, criticized the assertion that religion had nothing to do with

politics; and the fifth, in 1873, attacked, but in brief and vague terms, that false serpent, Catholic liberalism, and asserted that the church was independent of the state and superior to it. Now in September, 1875, Archbishop Taschereau was induced to join the other bishops of the province in issuing a joint letter, designed, as the latter stated, "to shut the mouths of those who, to sanction their false doctrines, find pretexts for escaping the teachings of their own bishop by invoking the authority of other bishops which unfortunately they abuse, deceiving the good people."

education upon a wholly denominational basis, and the restriction of state control by making the superintendent a civil servant instead of a cabinet member, as formerly. Control of

The joint pastoral of September, 1875, was mainly a warning against Catholic

liberalism, that subtle error, that serpent that crept into Eden, that most bitter and most dangerous enemy of the church. The letter ran:

Distrust above all that liberalism which wishes to cover itself with the fine name of "catholic" in order to accomplish more surely its criminal mission. You will recognize it easily from the description which the Sovereign Pontiff has often given of it: 1, the endeavor to subordinate the Church to the State; 2, incessant attempts to break the bonds which unite the children of the Church with one another and with their clergy; 3, the monstrous alliance of truth with error, under the pretext of reconciling all things and avoiding conflicts; 4, finally, the illusion, or at times the hypocrisy, which conceals a boundless pride under the mask of religion and of fine assurances of submission to the Church. . . . No one, therefore, may in future with good conscience be permitted to remain a Catholic Liberal.

As to the activity of the clergy in politics, they had the same rights as other private citizens, and further, as representing the church might and should intervene in moral issues or questions affecting the liberty or independence of the church. An individual candidate may be a menace, or a whole party may be so considered not only because of its own program and antecedents, but because of the program and private antecedents of its leaders and its journals. In such case the church must speak, the priest "may declare with authority that to vote in such a way is a sin, and exposes the doer to the censures of the Church." If any priest errs in applying these principles, the remedy lies in the tribunals of the church, not, as had been hinted, in haling the priest before the civil courts. A circular to the clergy, accompanying the pastoral, warned the priests not to intervene too freely and to consult their bishop before acting in unusual circumstances. If accused of undue influence before a civil court, they should deny its competence, but if condemned, should suffer persecution in patience. In a pastoral letter of February, 1876, Bishop Bourget explained how the layman could carry out this advice: let each say in his heart, "I hear my Curé,

my Curé hears the Bishop, the Bishop hears the Pope, and the Pope hears our Lord Jesus Christ."

His

The pastoral was taken as a fresh declaration of war on the Liberal party. True, no party was specifically named, but, as Mgr. Laflèche declared, "it would not be strictly true to say that the letter did not condemn the Liberal party." The clerical press, and when by-elections afforded an opportunity, the majority of the clergy, dotted the i's and crossed the t's. In January, 1876, two federal by-elections were held in Quebec constituencies. In Charlevoix, M. Tremblay, a good Catholic all his life, was the Liberal candidate. opponent was Hector Langevin, who had been tarred by the Pacific scandal, but was still an aspirant for Cartier's mantle. Langevin announced that he presented himself after consulting the clergy of the district and with their full and hearty support, though M. Tremblay was able to produce two dissenting curés. Priest after priest denounced Liberalism, invoked the horrors of the French Revolution and the Paris Commune, pictured the contest as one between the pope and Garibaldi, and warned his hearers of how they would feel on their death-bed, or still worse, if carried away by sudden death, if they had voted for a party condemned by the church. Some curés stated explicitly that to vote for the Liberals was to commit a mortal sin, and such phrases as "subtle serpent," "false Christs," "yawning abyss," heightened many a discourse. In Chambly one curé, M. Lussier, after consulting Mgr. Bourget, declared that declared that no Catholic could be a moderate Liberal: moderate meant liar. The crusade had its effect, and in both constituencies the Liberal candidates were decisively defeated.

The policy of clerical intervention reached its climax in the pastoral of 1875 and in the elections of that and the following year. Many were intimidated by the reign of terror that prevailed, but others were roused to a resistance which compelled a halt.

The Ultramontane campaign had not been without its effect on the Protestant minority in Quebec. Its leaders were divided between acquiescing in

a situation in which they themselves were accorded full liberty, and protesting against the inroads on the liberty of their fellow-citizens. In December, 1875, Huntington took occasion in a byelection speech in Argenteuil to denounce the English-speaking Protestants for giving Ultramontanism its chance by their blind support of the Conservative party, and to call upon them to support the French liberals in the common cause of freedom. Holton at once raised the question in Parliament, denouncing this "offensive attack" and asking whether it had the sanction of the cabinet, of which Huntington was a member. Mackenzie replied by expressing his regret at Huntington's remarks, and his disapproval of raising religious issues in politics; Huntington, while making it clear that he spoke only as a private citizen of his province, declared that the opinions he had expressed were his opinions still. On the other side of politics, Sir A. T. Galt took the same stand as Huntington in speeches and pamphlets unfolding the dangers of Ultramontanism; but his fellow-Conservative, Thomas White, insisted that Protestants, who had been fairly treated themselves, should not interfere in the family quarrels of the majority, and Macdonald characteristically urged that the best policy was "to use the priests for the next election, but be ready to fight them in the Dominion Parliament," and insisted that, though their arrogance was hard to bear, it could be borne when it was remembered that "Ultramontanism depends on the life of two old men, the Pope and Bishop Bourget." Prudence prevailed in both political camps so far as the Englishspeaking Protestants were concerned, and the French Catholics were left to work out their own salvation.

The seriousness of the situation faced by Quebec Liberals may well be gaged by a valedictory address of one of the foremost journalists of the day. M. L. O. David, editor of the "Bien Public," was a man not only of standing and ability, but of unquestioned moderation in all affairs, and friendly to the church, of which he was a faithful son; he had been one of the minority which seceded from L'Institut Canadien in 1858, and

had taken an active part in endeavoring to live down the Rouge tradition by the establishment of the Parti National. Yet he found his journal banned in parish after parish, and in May, 1876, announced his retirement. "The later pastorals of the Bishop of Montreal," he declared, "and the interpretation which has been upon them by a number of priests, and certain facts which I need not mention, have finally convinced me that the profession of politics has become intolerable in this country to any one who has more independence of character than of person. In the name of religion, we have seen destruction fall upon the political careers of sincere and earnest men whose religious convictions have never been questioned. The clergy cannot pretend that they have reason to fear the Liberals on account of their past, for they had absolved them of their past in 1872. The Reform party having done nothing since then against the clergy and religion, the religious war now being waged against it is unjustifiable. . . . The pastoral letters of the Bishop of Montreal, which were nothing more than articles of the "Nouveau Monde" converted into mandements, are incomprehensible. They have stirred prejudices, encouraged bad faith, and excited a certain number of priests who needed to be restrained. There are parishes where since then the pulpit has become nothing but a tribune for the most violent political harangues. It would appear that there is no longer but one crime in the world, but one mortal sin, that of voting for a Reform candidate, of receiving a Reform journal which questions the infallibility of Sir John and Mr. Langevin. . . . A Catholic people will support such abuses long, they will even shut their eyes not to see them in order that their faith may not suffer; but as abuses rapidly accumulate when they are not controlled, the day arrives when they become intolerable, and then indifference toward religion and hatred toward the priest produce revolution."

Mr. Laurier, writing to a friend in December, 1875, in regard to rumors of his approaching accession to the cabinet, makes equally clear the tension of the situation:

My name has been put forward, but I never made a step towards it. To speak the truth, I do not desire an appointment to an official position at present. But the press, which in this province is in the hands of young men, calls loud for me. The men of more mature age desire to have Cauchon in. The fact is, that Cauchon has all the qualities of the position, but he is so thoroughly unprincipled and so deeply stained with the jobberies of the old régime that his appointment would perhaps be more an injury than a benefit to our cause. As to myself personally, I have the bones and sinew of the Liberal party. They push me ahead, and would have me to take a more active part in politics than I have done hitherto. I, however, feel very reluctant to do it. I am at present quiet and happy. The moment I accept office, I will go into it actively and earnestly, and from that moment my quietness and happiness will be gone. It will be a war with the clergy, a war of every day, of every moment. . . . Political strifes are bitter enough in your province, but you have no idea of what it is with us. Whenever

I shall be in office, I intend to go seriously into it, and I will be denounced as AntiChrist. You may laugh at that, but it is no laughing matter to us.

Relief from this intolerable situation came from various quarters. Appeal was made to the civil courts, and the courts set bounds to clerical intervention. Appeal was made to Rome, and the higher authorities of the church ordained restraint. The Liberals themselves, through Wilfrid Laurier, made a declaration of their principles which it was not possible for any reasonable opponent to attack or any weak-kneed friend to renounce.

The advisability of taking legal action to halt clerical intervention in elections had been discussed in Liberal quarters for some years. The suggestion had come from the action of an Irish court, in 1872, in declaring a Galway election void because of the undue influence exercised by the clergy in behalf of the successful candidate. The dominion law against undue influence in elections was based on the British statute. Yet the moderate men who were in control of the party's policy hesitated to take such a step. It would be charged that

Protestant preachers throughout Canada were stampeded and manipulated into a grossly biased and uninformed pulpit attack upon the Liberal party and its leader. But the Charlevoix outburst determined a courageous group to take up the challenge. Appeal was at first made to the archbishop, but afterward withdrawn, and in July, 1876, François Langelier, member of a leading Liberal family of Quebec, and professor of civil law in Laval, brought action in the civil court at Murray Bay. The fact of intervention and its effect in changing votes were clearly proved. Israel Tarte, who had been Langevin's election agent, conducted his case, browbeating witnesses in court and pillorying them afterward in his newspaper, "Le Canadien." The judge was A. B. Routhier, formerly Langevin's right-hand man in

a

politics, and the drafter of the Catholic Programme. He dismissed the petition, denying that British precedents applied in Canada under the differing relations of church and state, and taking high Ultramontane ground as to the immunity of the clergy from state question or control for their actions on a moral issue, such as voting must be when properly considered. The case was at once appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada, where the unanimous decision was rendered that undue influence had been exercised and the election was declared void. Mr. Justice Ritchie declared that the clergyman, like the layman, had free and full liberty to advise and persuade, but no right, in the pulpit or out, to threaten or compel a voter to do otherwise than as he freely willed. Mr. Justice Taschereau, brother of the archbishop, in delivering the main judgment of the court, brushed aside the claim of ecclesiastical immunity, found proof of "undue influence of the worst kind, inasmuch as these threats and these declarations fell from the lips of the priests speaking from the pulpit in the name of religion, and were addressed to persons ill-instructed and generally well disposed to follow the counsel of their curés." In a decision rendered shortly before this appeal, three judges of the Superior Court of Quebec, Messrs. Casault, McGuire, and McCord, annulled the election held in the provincial constituency of Bonaventure, where two curés had threatened to refuse the sacraments to Liberal voters, and disqualified the candidate on the ground that "these fraudulent manœuvers were practised with his knowledge and consent." Shortly after, the by-election of Chambly was voided.

The intervention of the law, external and formal in its working, could not go to the root of the matter. Of more enduring importance was the change of ecclesiastical policy, or, rather, the assertion of authority by the tolerant and far-seeing elements within the church as against those intolerant and short-sighted leaders who had been active for many years. The Archbishop of Quebec, realizing the danger of an open rupture and the introduction into Canada of a real anti-clerical movement,

such as the Ultramontane editors were always seeing in their nightmares. issued in May, 1876, a pastoral on the church in politics which took much more moderate ground. The pastoral set forth the high importance of the elector's task, warned against perjury. violence, and bribery, urged calm and careful inquiry into the merits of rival candidates and their ability to conserve the people's interests, spiritual as well as temporal, denied any intention in present circumstances of urging the electors to vote for this or that party, and suggested that all join in a solemn mass to insure guidance; this, and no more. True, the archbishop declared that his new pastoral neither revoked nor superseded the joint letter of 1875. but the outburst of indignation from certain other bishops, and their action in sending Mgr. Laflèche and Canon Lamarche hotfoot to Rome to protest, were illuminating.

It was, however, with Rome itself that the last word lay. It was to Rome that Bishop Langevin's demand for the dismissal of Judge Casault from his chair at Laval, because of his judgment in the Bonaventure election, was carried; Rome upheld the professor against the bishop. It was to Rome that Conservatives appealed in 1876 when they wished to learn whether in a Montreal election it was permissible to vote for a candidate who was a Free Mason, seeing that the other candidate was worse (that is, a Liberal), and Rome replied it was permissible. It was to Rome that the bitter and interminable disputes between Montreal and Quebec over the university question were appealed, and finally it was to Rome that in 1876 a group of Quebec Liberals, headed by Cauchon, appealed for inquiry and decision on the charges brought by their Ultramontane opponents. The fact that an appeal should be carried to Rome at all made it clear how far Ultramontanism had triumphed over the old Gallican spirit even among the Liberals, but if it was to decide in any case on the ecclesiastical issues involved, it was well that the views of both parties to the controversy should be before it.

At Rome Pius IX was still pontiff,