1986/01/01 by Lillian F. Gates · 1 citation
Social Sciences · #Canadian Identity and History #Reprint #Bibliography #History #Classics #Library science #Physics #Astronomy #Computer science
paper · pdf · doi:10.33137/pbsc.v25i1.17628
published in Papers of The Bibliographical Society of Canada 25(1) (The Bibliographical Society of Canada)
openalex publication_date 1986/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2025/11/06
On December II, 1837, William Lyon Mackenzie, fleeing from his political enemies in Upper Canada, crossed the Niagara River to take refuge in the United States.Years later, he was enabled to return by the passage of the Amnesty Act of 1849.What activities had filled Mackenzie's years in exile, what light do they throw upon him as a reformer, and how did they affect his post-rebellion career in Canada?To answer these questions, a full-scale study of the American years would be needed.This article makes a beginning but is limited to one topic: Mackenzie's Gazette,.published first from New York City, later from Rochester.The Gazette makes clearer Mackenzie's position as a Canadian reformer who wanted more than political changes.For him, the immediate practical methods of advancing the cause of social democracy were to restrict severely the note-issuing powers of the chartered banks and to prevent them using public funds for private profit.In the United States this was again the theme of his writings and the supposed inconsistency, unreasonableness, and apparent dishonesty his critics saw in his support of Van Buren yield when tested against what was for Mackenzie the fundamental question: Van Buren's stand on the Independent Treasury.Why did not Mackenzie choose to publish his Gazette in Buffalo, from which point it surely would have been easier to get copies into Canada than from New York?He did propose it to the Buffalo Committee of Thirteen on the very day the withdrawal from Navy Island was decided upon.lApparently this suggestion was not sympathetically received.Buffalo already had several struggling newspapers, some of which had given generous support to the Patriot cause, and Mackenzie had lost some of his prestige in that city.When the British forces had started cannonading in earnest, Mackenzie had left Navy Island to take Mrs.