study-notes

Will I ever manage to finish this and science in time while having a bunch of assignments and tests? Tune in to find out! Yeah, I’m going to try to write short.

Three of Canada’s First Nations

Before any European colonization of North America occurred, there were First Nations people.
We’ll be talking about the Mi’kmaq, Haudenosaunee, and Anishinabe societies.
Mi’kmaq government was organized around seven districts. Each had several local leaders (Saqamaws) chosen and advised by Elders that met every year at a district council.
- Every year, each district chose a Saqamaw to represent them in the Grand Council. Then everyone advised each other on where to do things and managed relations with other First Nations.
- They moved to the coast in the summer and to the forest in winter to make the best use of the resources of the land.
- The Mi’kmaq and four other First Nations formed the Wabakaki Confederacy.
An ogimauh is a leader of Anishinabe society.
- Anishinabe society had clans (dodems) with different responsibilities. They worked together to provide balance.
- The Midewin were men and women who had special gifts as spiritual leaders and healers.
- People had great respect for them and members of Midewin where chosen carefully.
- They go through eight levels of secret training.
- They used medicine, interpreted dreams and visions, and passed on sacred teachings and songs.
- The Council of the Three Fires allied the Anishinabe with two others.
Dekanawidah (the Peacemaker), brought the Great Law of Peace to the Haudenosaunee.
- The law created a confederacy of five and eventually six nations that were different.
- But they all agreed on the law in which every member nation had an equal voice and status.
- Decisions of the confederacy were made by a council of fifty chiefs (Hoyaneh). They were men, but were chosen, replaced, and advised by clan mothers.
- The Haudenosaunee traced their family through their mothers. The clan system also did and united the Nations as a family of relatives.
- Wampum were shell beads woven into belts or strings and kept records of important treaties and other agreements.
- The Peacemaker used a white pine to symbolize the commitment of the Haudenosaunee to peace.
- The tree represents the Great Law of peace, the branches represent the protection of those nations under the law, the white roots which spread in the four cardinal directions represent peace and strength since anyone can follow the roots to the Council of the League of Peace, the eagle warns of danger due to far sight, and the weapon below the tree shows that they cast all weapons of war into the depths of the earth.
The Mi’kmaq were in the now maritimes, the Anishinabe above the Great Lakes, and the Haudenosaunee in what’s now America.

European Explorers

In the 1300s, trade routes between Europe and Asia were disrupted, so the price of goods increased.
- But then, technology such as faster ships, compasses, astrolabes started being invented/improved.
- Sailors originally went east to trade, so Christopher Columbus believed that going west would lead to Asia. He arrived in South America instead, where he stole and plundered Aztec and Incan gold and made Spain rich.
Imperialism is taking over the land of other places, to expand one’s empire.
In 1497, an English expedition led by Italian sailor and merchant Giovanni Caboto landed in Newfoundland and claimed it for Britain. He returned with lots of fish.
- The Europeans then had regular contact with the Mi’kmaq and weighed the advantages of trading.
The Mi’kmaq traded old beaver fur to Europeans in exchange for metal tools such as knives, axes, pots, and kettles.
- The Europeans liked the fur because the long outer hair fell off, leaving the fuzzy underfur exposed. European hatmakers used this to make felt.
The Beothuk people lived in Newfoundland and also encountered the Europeans. A friendly trading relationship however, was not established. They eventually became extinct.
- It’s thought that the Beothuk took fishing equipment from the Europeans to encourage them to leave from their traditional fishing areas. This eventually led to conflict.
In 1524, Henri II, King of France, sponsored an expedition led by the Italian navigator Giovanni da Verrazano to explore the coast of North America.
Ten years later in 1524, the king sponsored another expedition led by Jacques Cartier to find a passage to Asia through North America and to find precious items.
- He also found First Nations, but didn’t trade with them.
He had a second voyage in 1536, where his crew had a difficult winter and got scurvy. The First Nations found out and gave a cure: a tea rich in vitamin C made form the needles of a white cedar tree.
- He then seized five people from there and took them to France to show to the king. However, they all died since they didn’t have immunity to European diseases.
In 1603, Samuel de Champlain explored the St. Lawrence river and Tadoussac. In 1604, he returned to establish the first French colony in North America: Port-Royal in Acadia.
- During 1608, he travelled the St. Lawrence and established a settlement at Quebec.
Ethnocentrism is considering one’s religion superior to others. Champlain displays this by calling the First Nations savages and saying that they have no true faith.
Samuel de Champlain established Quebec and Montreal as places where trading is done because it had better possibilities as a fur trade center than Acadia on the east coast.
There were many other expeditions to North America that mapped more land.

Early European Colonies

A colony is a region of land dominated by another empire by sending colonists to establish control.
Mercantilism is a regulated economic system in which a colony supplies the original country with cheap, raw resources. The country then creates and sells expensive goods using those resources to make money.
Monopolies were arranged with charters and set up in North America to get resources.
- A monopoly is a company that’s the only company allowed to get a specific resource.
France claimed a large area around the Great Lakes and called it New France.
- New France’s population in 1700 was 15,000 colonists and 65,000 in 1760.
- Most of the colonists in New France were catholic and spoke French.
- At first, monopolies in the fur trade were established and flourished. But the colony didn’t and kept relying on France for survival.
- They made many relations with First Nations through the fur trade.
In 1663, France abandoned the strategy of using merchant monopolies and instead took direct control of New France as if it was a province of France.
- It encouraged settlers to go to New France and promote agriculture and industries to meet their own needs.
- The fur trade was the primary economic activity of New France and supplied beaver furs to France to be made into hats.
- The king of France had power over the governor, intendant, bishop, and council of New France. They had power over the colonists.
- In 1663, the king of France established the Sovereign Council to rule New France in accordance with his decisions and included:
  - A governor who represented the king and controlled military, defense, and external relations.
  - An intendant who was the chief administrator and worked to keep the colony in good order to make it less dependent on France. He also looked for ways to exploit the colony for France
  - The Bishop of Quebec represented the Catholic Church and played an important role. The Church provided guidance, schools, hospitals, and orphanages. Members of the Catholic clergy also governed the colony.
Habitants were farmers who lived on seigneuries which were large plots of land owned by seigneurs (landlords). They received the seigneuries from the king of France and kept it by making sure that habitants farmed the land.
Coureur de Bois (runner of the woods) are men that engage in the fur trade with First Nations by “running into the forest”. This eventually became illegal, but still continued.
Missionaries of the Jesuits (a Catholic religious order) converted the First Nations to Catholicism. They were able to document First Nations languages and their ways of life.
Britain claimed the area at the coast under the Maritimes and the US and those were the Thirteen Colonies.
- The Thirteen Colonies’ population was 250,000 in 1700 and 2,500,000 in 1760.
- Most of the people in the Thirteen Colonies were Protestant.
- Each colony had a separate government. They had a governor either directly appointed by Britain or by chartered companies or landholders.
- Elected assemblies also played a role in most governments of the Thirteen Colonies.
- The Thirteen colonies used the land intensely to produce agricultural products for Britain and its colonies.
- They saw the First Nations as obstacles and pushed them off the land.
- The Monarch and Parliament were controlled by Britain’s government. They control the colony’s governor and council. They control and are advised by the elected assembly. And in turn, they control and are advised by the colonists.
Around 1700, the area around Hudson’s Bay was claimed by Britain and called Rupert’s Land.
- Rupert’s Land didn’t have much of a European population and was mainly Protestant, but religion didn’t play a large role.
- Rupert’s Land was the monopoly fur trade territory of the HBC (Hudson’s Bay Company), granted to the company in 1670. It had a governor who was the chief officer of the company.
- The HBC traded in furs and counted on traders coming directly to its forts.
Since the First Nations had no immunity, European diseases caused epidemics among the First Nations.

The Fur Trade

The fur trade consisted of multiple phases.
- Phase one was when cod fisheries were set up by Europeans and early trading began with First Nations.
- Phase two was when New France dominated the fur trade. New France made many alliances and enemies, and Catholic and Jesuit missionaries went to convert First Nations. Coureurs de bois also emerged, and trapping and hunting of the fur trade began to reduce animal populations.
- In phase three, Britain granted a monopoly to the HBC for Rupert’s Land in the fur trade. The voyageurs, who took canoe trips to trade, and were official, unlike Coureuers de bois, emerged, and Metis people have their origins in this phase (cross-cultural marriages between Europeans and First Nations).
- During the fourth phase, New France became a British colony, and the fur trade came under the British mercantile system. The NWC (North West Company) formed from the French fur trade and competed with the HBC, going further west. Pemmican was a food that worked well for long trips in the fur trade, so it developed a trade. Metis people became important to the fur trade as interpreters, guides, traders, carters, and provisioners because they were both European and First Nation.
- The fifth phase involved the HBC and NWC merging under the name of HBC because there were many fights, shootings, and hostage-takings due to the competition, so Britain encouraged them to merge. The HBC then began to lose control of its monopoly after losing a court case against independent Metis traders, and the trade began to decline in the west.
The Metis put themselves in the middle of the fur trade at Red River, which was between all the “action”.
The Hudson’s Bay still exists today: The Bay.

War and British Conquest

The Mi’kmaq were originally in Acadia, and have established a trading partnership with the French. So they were allowed to also live there, so settlements were established. They called themselves Acadians when marriages between both people occurred.
In 1713, Britain won the War of Spanish Succession, and the Treaty of Utrecht was negotiated where Acadia is now under Britain’s control.
- The Acadians were told to leave within a year, but most stayed. In 1730, they were required to take an “oath of neutrality”. The oath required the Acadians to stay neutral if a war broke out between France and Britain.
In 1755, a war seemed likely, so the British required a new “oath of allegiance”. Now, the Acadians had to fight for Britain in a war against France.
- When they refused, the Great Deportation was where 11,000 Acadians were deported (to send out of a country) to the Thirteen Colonies, England, or France. Some went to New France or with the Mi’kmaq.
- They were deported because they had a strategic position (a physical location that’s important for military reasons), they were Catholic and spoke French, Acadian settlers outnumbered British settlers in Acadia two to one, and they accepted the oath of neutrality, but not the oath of allegiance.
In 1754, fighting broke out between Britain and France to control the Ohio Valley (along the western border of the Thirteen Colonies). In 1756, the war went global, and Britain aimed to destroy the French navy and establish worldwide domination. Nine European countries had chosen sides. This was the Seven Years’ War.
In 1760, Britain seized Quebec, but didn’t completely win yet. The war ended in 1763, when France signed a treaty with Britain, the Treaty of Paris. Under the treaty, France gives up all its land in North America to Britain and Spain, except for Guadeloupe, Saint-Pierre, and Miquelon.
- In the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, the British were led by General Wolfe, and the French were led by the Marquis de Montcalm. The battle was where the British captured Quebec, the capital and military stronghold of New France.
The Royal Proclamation of 1763 was Britain’s attempt to establish lasting piece in North America. The province of Quebec was established with a British-style government, and an elected assembly was promised, but didn’t follow up for almost thirty years. Catholics were disallowed from holding government positions, French civil law (seigneurs and habitants) was abolished, Catholic Church tax was also abolished, settlers from the Thirteen Colonies were encouraged to move to Quebec, and a “proclamation line” separating the Thirteen Colonies from “Indian Territory” which prevented any settlements to occur without First Nations’ permission.
During the 1700s, the Thirteen Colonies rebelled against Britain, so Britain was concerned that Quebec will too. It returned some rights taken away in the Royal Proclamation with the Quebec Act of 1774. Catholics were allowed to practice their religion, Canadiens (Francophone Canadians) were allowed to hold government positions, French civil law was reinstated (still used today), and the boundaries of Quebec were expanded beyond the proclamation line, to claim for the colony the fur trade territories central to its economy, without consulting the First Nations.

The United States Breaks Away

After 1763, Britain was deeply in debt because of the Seven Years’ War, and wanted to save money. They wanted to keep troops stationed in the Thirteen Colonies, so they increased taxes on them.
- The colonists refused to pay. They said Britain had no authority to tax them because they weren’t allowed to elect representatives to the British parliament. They came up with the slogan “No taxation without representation”.
- In 1776, the protests turned into a rebellion. George Washington took command of an army in the Thirteen Colonies to fight British rule. 1776 was when the United States declared itself independent of Britain, and began a war called the American war of independence, or the American Revolution.
  - The war deeply divided communities. People who supported the rebellion called themselves “Patriots”, and those who wanted to remain united to the British Empire called themselves “United Empire Loyalists”.
The loyalist migration was when thousands of refugee loyalists left America to a British colony such as Quebec or Nova Scotia.
- When the loyalist population in Quebec increased and asked for British-style laws and customs, Canadiens were worried that the changes from the Quebec Act being reversed.
- Originally, treaties had to be negotiated with First Nations for land, but settlers sometimes didn’t.
- Because of different petitions sent by the loyalists settling in Quebec and Nova Scotia, Britain divided Nova Scotia into additional islands and made New Brunswick, Cape Breton, and St. John Island.
- Britain also passed the Constitutional Act in 1791. It divided Quebec into Upper and Lower Canada, Established British civil and criminal law in Upper Canada, Lower Canada was the Quebec Act but with British criminal law, set aside lands for churches for both Protestants and Catholics, and established officials and a legislative council appointed by Britain in each colony, and an assembly elected by the colonists (Upper and Lower Canada had a “representative government”).
  - In a representative government, citizens elect representatives to an assembly and the assembly speaks for citizens. It “represents them”. In 1791, the elected assemblies didn’t have the authority to make decisions, and could only advise the British-appointed governors and legislative councils.
  - Upper Canada and Lower Canada’s position comes from the geography of the St. Lawrence River. Not the cardinal directions.
In 1789, France had a revolution. It violently dethroned its Monarch and became a republic (no monarchy). This made many European monarchs nervous since their people could also decide to rise up too.
- So they went to war against the French republic. Napoleon was a French general who defended the republic and conquered a large part of Europe, so the wars were named after him (Napoleonic Wars).
- As part of its war against France, Britain shut down trade between the US and France. The US retaliated by invading the nearest piece of British territory: British North America, now known as Canada.
- This was the War of 1812. The patriots expected the Canadians to join the cause, but they instead fought back.
  - After the war, Britain and the US agreed to establish a border. It’s still being used today.

The Great Migration and the Push for Democracy

Immigrating is going somewhere, and emigrating is leaving somewhere.
The Great Migration was when a huge wave of people immigrated to Canada.
- This happened because of poverty in Britain, famines, economic slowdowns, losing farms, and Britain encouraging emigration.
- The wave of new colonists resulted in many more farms being built. The Great Migration also resulted in many more British People in North America.
- The conditions on the ships heading to North America were very bad.
In a democracy, voters elect the people who have decision-making authority.
BNA (British North America) had a colonial government, so Britain had the power and control to make decisions.
Reformers were people in BNA who wanted a democratic government so that they can choose who to vote. This is done by lessening or completely removing Britain’s control by establishing a republic (no monarchy) like the US.
- In Upper and Lower Canada, only a small group of English people held control, so reformers had rebellions against this, since it isn’t democratic.
- Britain responded by fighting, burning cities, and arresting.
- But then Britain decided to investigate why the rebellions had taken place. They didn’t want to lose Canada like how they lost the Thirteen Colonies.
- They set up a royal commission (official investigation by the crown) to study the problems in Upper and Lower Canada. The leader of the commission was the governor, Lord Durham. He spent five months then made some recommendations:
  1. Unify Upper and Lower Canada and put people into “vigorous English rule”.
  2. Make a more democratic government by lessening the role of Britain in affairs.
  3. Assimilate the Canadiens since they “didn’t have a culture worthy of protection”.
    - So in 1841, Britain passed the Act of Union based on the recommendations of the Durham report. It combines Upper and Lower Canada into a single Province of Canada, creates a legislative council that the governor appointed, creates an assembly with an equal number of elected representatives (42) from Canada East and West, although East had a higher population, and made English the official language of Canada.
LaFontaine was a Canadien from Canada East and Baldwin was an English Canadian from Canada West, and both created a coalition (an alliance among groups).
- They were reformers who wanted a more democratic government without a complete break from Britain.
- They accomplished many things such as recognizing French as an official language, setting up universities, securing amnesty (a pardon) for the rebels of 1837-38, and eventually self-government in 1848.
- The Rebellion Losses Bill in 1849 was difficultly done by LaFontaine and Baldwin. It sought to compensate the property damage done during the Rebellions in Lower Canada. A similar bill had already compensated people in Upper Canada.
  - Conservative members of the assembly (who opposed reformers) said that the bill “rewarded traitors”, but the coalition held the majority of the seats and the bill passed.
  - It was then signed by the governor, Lord Elgin, and even though he personally opposed the bill, he respected the choice of the voters.

Confederation

Confederation had four key politicians who wanted it most:
- John A. Macdonald came from Canada West, born in Scotland. He wanted a nation that spread from “sea to sea”, that gave provinces powers, and kept ties with Britain. He then became the first prime minister of Canada.
- George-Etienne Cartier came from Canada East, born in Lower Canada. He supported political change, but didn’t want Canada to become a republic like the US. He also supported French and Catholicism being part of Canada.
- George Brown came from Canada West, born in Scotland. He founded the Globe newspaper in Toronto, which later became The Globe and Mail. He originally didn’t support Confederation and instead “rep by pop” (representation by population) so that the English get the majority. Furthermore, he often targeted Macdonald for criticism, but he later changed his mind and encouraged Confederation.
- Etienne-Paschal Tache was a patriote during the Rebellions of 1837 and 1838. He was also a passionate advocate for Confederation and protection for Canadiens. He helped forge and lead the alliance with John A. Macdonald known as the “Great Coalition” that became central to the success of Confederation.
Political deadlock is when equally powerful players can’t agree on a course of action.
Some people thought Confederation was bad for Canadiens, while some didn’t.
British colonies such as Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newoundland, and Prince Edward Island governed themselves. They thought that by joining Confederation, they would lose their independence.
There was also the risk of American annexation (take over), so the west needed to be expanded to first by BNA.
Britain also controlled BNA’s economy, and mercantilism is in place. However, in 1840, Britain took steps to end mercantilism. This means that Britain would buy less from BNA.
Until 1865, BNA had a special trading relationship with the US called the Reciprocity Treaty. Signed in 1854, BNA could sell its resources in the US at competitive prices. At its end, a tariff (a tax) was added to BNA products.
In 1857, Britain passed the Gradual Civilization Act, in which First Nations must give up their way of life to be a citizen and be able to vote.
- Until 1960 (about 100 years after Confederation), Canada’s government didn’t allow people with a legal status as Indian to vote. They must give up that status to vote.
Confederation involved having more protected regional rights, not a federal government that took away all power.
Confederation was established with the BNA Act, passed in 1867. It created the Dominion of Canada, formed the former colonies of Canada East and West, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick.
- Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland anticipated more disadvantages than advantage (especially increased taxation), and declined to join.
- The BNA Act gave the federal government the power to make laws for “peace, order, and good government” of Canada. It divided powers between federal and provincial.
- French and English were made the official languages of parliament, and public schools were guaranteed for English Protestants and French Catholics.
- Representation by population was established for Canada’s House of Commons. This gave Ontario the most seats.
- The BNA Act guaranteed the new government of Canada would pay for a railway linking the Maritimes with central Canada.
- The act established Confederation without consulting the First Nations, and they were made responsibilities of the government, along with items such as the postal service.
Colonies had well established British settlements, but territories had very few. Colonies had governments advised or elected by the colonists, but territories were governed by appointed British officials.
- Under confederation, colonies became provinces, while territories were simply transferred as an agreement between Britain and Canada. Canada controlled the territories directly.
BC (British Columbia) became a colony because of British settlement along the west coast following the voyages of British explorer George Vancouver from 1792 to 1795.
- The first colonists made their living mostly in the fur trade under HBC forts.
- The economy changed in 1859 when a gold rush began. The colony borrowed money to build roads and railways to centers of mining. It counted on the mined gold to pay back.
- The rush didn’t last long, so BC was in economic trouble since it couldn’t pay back.
- Canada encouraged BC to join confederation, and so it did.
The colony of PEI (Prince Edward Island) was in economic trouble in the early 1870s since it borrowed money to build a railway to try to make its economy stronger.
- The economy got worse as trading relationships ended, and many island farmers didn’t own their land, but instead people in Britain.
- In 1873, PEI joined Confederation to solve its economic problems, while Canada hoped it didn’t join the US.
- Canada agreed to pay for its railway and to provide money to buy the island’s farmland. A year-round ferry service between the island and the mainland was also promised.
In 1867 and 1869, Newfoundland rejected Confederation since Newfoundlanders felt optimistic about their economic future.
- During the 1930s, countries cut back on the colony’s successful trade because of the Great Depression. This hurts the colony’s economy, and it now couldn’t pay for important services.
- In 1934, Britain took direct control of Newfoundland until after WWII, where the war boosted the colony’s economy because of product demand.
- In 1945 after the war, some Newfoundlanders wanted to regain independence, but others worried about more hard times. Britain said it could no longer assist the colony, and it had to help itself. Meanwhile, the war put the colony in financial trouble.
- A vote was then made, and that resulted in Newfoundland joining Confederation.

The Metis Rise Up

In Rupert’s Land, there was the Red River Settlement; it was home to many people such as French and English-speaking Metis people.
The Red River Resistance occurred in 1869 because after the HBC sold Rupert’s Land to Canada for 300,000 pounds, land surveyors appeared to divide and mark land too early.
- People weren’t consulted when the land they lived on was sold.
Louis Riel was born in the Red River settlement as a Metis. He was very well-educated since he graduated knowing many languages as well as science.
- Louis Riel famously stopped surveyors from crossing his cousin’s farm in October.
- Riel and the Metis people then took control of Fort Garry, the major HBC trading post in the vicinity, peacefully.
- They then issued a provisional (temporary) government and issued the Declaration of the People of Rupert’s Land and the North-West. Louis Riel was chosen president.
After a group of people from Ontario tried to overthrow the provisional government, the group was arrested.
- They thought that only British Protestants should have power over other people.
- They then convicted, shot, and killed one of them named Thomas Scott.
  - Some people said it was justified, some didn’t.
  - Many people in Ontario didn’t like Riel and the Metis since the Death of Thomas Scott and the takeover of fort Garry leading to the provisional government.
The Manitoba Act brought the settlement of Red River as an officially bilingual province to Canada.
- It gave many rights to the people of Red River and people that wanted to settle there, but not everyone, so it was more of a compromise.
- In the South Branch communities, Metis people from Red River started over, established farms, and worked for the fur trade.
Canada set up the North West Mounted Police in 1873 for the territory, and they planned to build a railway across the west to BC.
- The South Branch Metis sent petitions starting in the early 1870s to stop this. But land surveyors (people that buy land to later sell it for more) have already started to arrive.
- In 1884, a leader from those communities named Gabriel Dumont went to seek the help of Louis Riel in Montana (where he has become a schoolteacher and started a family).
- The Metis heard that troops were coming to their area, so they set up a provisional government at Batoche.
- It turned out that there were no troops coming, but they did when they started the provisional government.
  - 600 troops arrived, the battle of Batoche lasted three days, and 100 Metis and Canadian people died.
  - Riel gave himself up and was charged with treason, found guilty, and executed.
    - He was said to be charged for treason because of the battle, and executed for the murder of Thomas Scott.
    - However, not even one person of the jury was Francophone.
The Canadian government then took steps to suppress the control of First Nations and Metis people.
When the Manitoba Act was negotiated, more than 50% of the population was Catholic and spoke French. By 1890, that changed to 15%.
- So the Manitoba School Act made Manitoba change from bilingual to English only, and made schools only English.

Western Expansion and the National Policy

To own land that First Nations live in, Canada had to negotiate numbered treaties.
- This was needed to do things like expand west and build the railway.
- Treaties were also used to assimilate the First Nations to be more “British” by forcing them to give up their cultural ways.
Canada made industrial residential schools for First Nations children as their promise for their education and a way to assimilate them into British society by separating them from their family and culture.
The government of Canada founded the NWMP (North West Mounted Police) in 1873 following a massacre of 36 Nakoda people by a group of American and Canadian traders over an argument about some horses in what’s now southern Alberta.
- They were founded because of fears that the Americans would work with the “Indians” to take control of the west.
- The NWMP developed a trust with First Nations that helped them keep peace in the west as the railway advanced and settlers arrived. They advised First Nations to conclude treaties with the government.
In 1873, John A. MacDonald lost a federal election after accepting the “Pacific Scandal”. But he then won the next one five years later by stating the three part plan known as the National Policy:
1. Promote Canadian industry by adding a tariff (tax) to American products so that people buy Canadian products instead.
2. Finish the national railway that connects the east with the west.
3. Settle the west by encouraging European immigrants to come to Canada by giving free land. They’d grow grain for export and would buy products from Canadian industries.
The government recruited many men from China to work on the CPR (Canadian Pacific Railway). By 1885, there were nearly 15,000 Chinese construction workers in BC.
- They tried to send their earnings home to China so that their loved ones and family members can come to Canada, however this was impossible since the Chinese workers were paid less than others.
- When the CPR was complete, many Chinese Canadians helped establish the lumber and cannery industries but faced discrimination.
- A law was introduced in 1885 to restrict Chinese immigration to Canada. First it was $50 ($2,500 now), but they kept coming, so the tax kept increasing.
- Between 1885 and 1920, more than 82,000 Chinese people paid the tax and immigrated to Canada.
John A. MacDonald wanted the west to be populated, since by 1890 only 2% of the population lived in the west.
- This changed when Wilfrid Laurier became prime minister. His Minister of the Interior (Clifford Sifton) began an advertisement campaign to attract immigrants.
- It targeted the US, Britain, and many parts of Europe, but not French-speaking populations such as France, Belgium, or Switzerland.
- This was because he (and many others) believed that “British was best”.
- However, people came from many places such as Ukraine, Russia and Poland. This gave Canada many cultures all the way to today.

Citizenship in an Evolving Society

In 1916, Manitoba, Alberta, and Saskatchewan became the first provinces in Canada that allowed women to vote. In 1918 women across all of Canada gained the right to vote in federal elections.
- Women of non-European descent took longer to get those rights. The right to vote opened the door to equality in other aspects such as university and work.
It was found by the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism that Francophones didn’t have the same equality as Anglophones.
- The Official Languages Act in 1969 set out to correct some of this. It made services provide to both English and French.
- First Nations and peoples of other heritage felt that biculturalism excluded too many other people.
In 1971, Canada became the first country in the world to adopt a policy of multiculturalism which sought to recognize and promote Canada’s diversity. It did this by recognizing all cultures and backgrounds.
- Canada passed the Multiculturalism act in 1988 to affirm Canada’s support for languages that contribute to the multicultural heritage of Canada.
- Canada also changed the constitution to be more inclusive.
Immigration was always encouraged in Canada ever since it became a country. However, there have been times when Canada’s immigration policy and treatment of immigrants displayed racial discrimination.
- But then, they changed to be better and not be as racially discriminatory.
After the invention of the radio, Canadians have been tuning into American culture radio stations.
- So the Canadian government created the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Company) in 1936 to have Canadian radio programs. This was done to “foster national spirit and interpret national citizenship”.
  - CBC is now government owned, supports television too, has separate English and French versions, and covers all of Canada.
Urbanization is the increase of the number of people living cities. Originally, Canadians mostly lived in rural areas. Later, it changed and there are now more people living in cities.
- This is because of trucks delivering food to cities instead of growing them yourself, factories mechanizing (making a machine do human work) more work, and farming becoming much easier with technology, so fewer people are farmers in rural areas.

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