Durham (Province of Canada electoral district)

Durham was an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly of the Parliament of the Province of Canada, in Canada West, on the north shore of Lake Ontario. It was created in 1841, upon the establishment of the Province of Canada by the union of Upper Canada and Lower Canada. Durham was represented by one member in the Legislative Assembly. It was abolished in 1867, upon the creation of Canada and the province of Ontario.

This article is about the pre-Confederation electoral district. For one of the successor federal electoral districts, see Durham East. For for another successor federal electoral district, see Durham West. For for one of the successor provincial electoral districts, see Durham East (provincial electoral district). For for another successor provincial electoral district, see Durham West (provincial electoral district).
Durham
Canada West
Province of Canada electoral district
Defunct pre-Confederation electoral district
LegislatureLegislative Assembly of the Province of Canada
District created1841
District abolished1867
First contested1841
Last contested1863

Boundaries

Durham electoral district was based on Durham County, on the north shore of Lake Ontario, east of what is now Toronto. Oshawa and Port Hope were two of the main towns.

The Union Act, 1840 had merged the two provinces of Upper Canada and Lower Canada into the Province of Canada, with a single Parliament. The separate parliaments of Lower Canada and Upper Canada were abolished.[1] The Union Act provided that the pre-existing electoral boundaries of Upper Canada would continue to be used in the new Parliament, unless altered by the Union Act itself.[2]

The Upper Canada electoral district of Durham was not altered by the Act. It was therefore continued with the same boundaries in the new Parliament. Those boundaries had been set by a statute of Upper Canada in 1798, and modified by an additional statute in 1834:

That the townships of Hope, Clarke and Darlington, with all the tract of land hereafter to be laid out into townships, which lies to the southward of the small lakes above the Rice Lake, and the communication between them and between the eastern boundary of the township of Hope, and the western boundary of the township of Darlington, produced north, sixteen degrees west, until they intersect either of the said lakes, or the communication between them, shall constitute and form the County of Durham.[3]

In 1834, the townships of Verulam, Fenelon and Eldon were added to Durham County.[4]

Members of the Legislative Assembly

Durham was represented by one member in the Legislative Assembly.[2] The following were the members for Durham.

Parliament Years Member[5] Party[6]
1st Parliament
1841–1844		 1841–1844 John Tucker Williams Unionist; Reformer, then Independent

Abolition

The district was abolished on July 1, 1867, when the British North America Act, 1867 came into force, creating Canada and splitting the Province of Canada into Quebec and Ontario.[7] It was split into two electoral districts at both the federal level and the provincial level: Durham East and Durham West in the House of Commons of Canada,[8] Durham East and Durham West in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.[9]

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References
  1. Union Act, 1840, 3 & 4 Vict., c. 35, s. 2.
  2. Union Act, 1840, s. 16.
  3. An act for the Better Division of this Province, SUC 1798, c. 5, s. 20. Reprinted in The Statutes of Upper Canada to the Time of Union, Revised and Published by Authority, Vol. I - Public Acts (Toronto: Robert Stanton, Queen's Printer, 1843).
  4. An Act to attach certain Townships in the District of Newcastle to the Counties of Northumberland and Durham, respectively, SUC 1834, c. 15.
  5. J.O. Côté, Political Appointments and Elections in the Province of Canada, 1841 to 1860, (Quebec: St. Michel and Darveau, 1860), pp. 43-58.
  6. For party affiliations, see Paul G. Cornell, Alignment of Political Groups in Canada, 1841-67 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1962; reprinted in paperback 2015), pp. 93-111.
  7. British North America Act, 1867 (now the Constitution Act, 1867), s. 6.
  8. Constitution Act, 1867, s. 40, para. 2
  9. Constitution Act, 1867, s. 70.

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: An act for the Better Division of this Province, SUC 1798, c. 5.

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