AuroraBorealis said:
I am not sure there is a POD that will prevent the Quebec Act or something similiar. The years between the French surrender and the Act
Eleven years.
and then the US declaration of Independence is not very long.
Two years.
The Act itself is a response on the part of the British to the increasingly restive situation in the colonies themselves. Something along these lines if not this Act itself will almost certainly come into place as soon as the Colonies and Britain come to blows.
By then it would be too late. And if the British were so clearly prescient in heading off unrest in Quebec, why couldn't they do it for the other colonies? I do not find the Quebec Act at all inevitable, in most forms...
Quebec society itself is largely agrarian and highly conservative at this time.
The French elites and merchant classes having returned to France in the wake of the treaty of 1763, to be replaced by "les anglais". though not in very large numbers. The the English colonial population is a very small minority at this point.
Yes, so loyalty to Britain isn't likely to be very high, is it?
The Act itself, wih a few additions only codified into law what was actually "defacto" in practice anyway in that province. Key provisions of the initial proclamation of 1763 were never enacted or put into place by either Governor Murray or Carlton.
True, but that codification makes a big difference.
Also, one major thing the Quebec Act did was grant Quebec a huge area to expand into. That wasn't a codification of a preexisting condition. It was a bribe.
Both came to appreciate the political value of the RC church and its influence in maintaining Br. rule in the province. The Br. came to appreciate the value of the orderly French seignieurial society, used to authority, as an alternative to the increasingly restive American colonies in the wake of the Stamp Act in 1765. Thus any POD will have to occur largely in that very tiny window between 1763 and 1765. If you want a restive Quebec province.
I tend to disagree. While they might not be particularly ardent revolutionaries, without the Quebec Act I don't think we get RC officials recommending staying loyal, and I think you get a very good chance of Quebec, or a significant number of Quebecois, siding with the Revolutionaries.
Even so, Quebec will never join the US as state. The risk of assimilation would be immediate. If they rebel it will be to achieve their own independence, probably based on at least the borders of New France or to re-establish the connection with France itself.
From one extreme to another, eh? These are real possibilities, however recall that the USA was a confederacy in its infancy, and would not be threatening to the Quebecois in terms of assimilation. Heck, several delegates to the Continental Congress were not native English Speakers.
Quebec has managed to stay in Canada. It is not so outrageous to believe that she would consider it to her advantage to stay with the Union, if given proper guarantees.
Even if the Quebec Act is delayed, "les Canadiens" are not likely to revolt. At best, the Church and the seignieurs adopt the same position as the vast majority of the French population, the tenants of the siegnieuries, "les habitants". They were quite happy to see both of their old foes, the British army and American Colonial militias at each others throats instead of their's for a change. They will be neutral instead of openly supporting the British, at least from the point of view of keeping the American colonials out of the province.
So there are no Quebecois who will take up arms against the British? They will just all sit back and watch?
This despite the land already stripped from Quebec (and not returned or compensated for if there is no Quebec Act), and no guarantees that their religion or their laws will remain respected? The status quo may not have been so bad, but without a guarantee from Parliament, it seems somewhat tenuous.
I find it hard to believe, personally.
That will of course change as soon as the Americans are so foolish to engage in their foolhardy invasion of Quebec.
I don't see that happening if there is no Quebec Act. Instead, I think at least some Quebecois will rise up against the British. And instead of Arnold invading Quebec, I see Lafayette being sent in to organize the Quebecois revolutionaries.
Wouldn't take much; I recall hearing somewhere that only about a third of the Americans were actually pro-revolution.
Even 'les habitants" joined the pro-British camp at that point...at least from the perspective that they saw value in at least defending the province against the old enemy "les Bostonais", the New Englanders.
Agreed that an invasion would be a bad idea.
However, in your analysis you just don't seem to believe that the Quebec Act made any difference (which begs the question of why Parliament would then bother with it anyway, particularly when it further inflamed colonial passions to the South).
I think it might have made a real difference, with at least a faction of Quebecois siding with the Revolution. In which case an American Invasion is just plain unlikely.
So after 1775, it is virtually going to be impossible to get them to revolt.
Well, the Quebec Act was 1774, so I guess it isn't impossible
.
I think the Quebec Act was a very clever bribe. Without that bribe (and it is plausible that it wouldn't go through...Parliament wasn't its most clever for most of this time), I think it is possible we see some movement of Quebec towards the Revolutionaries. The Founding Fathers seemed to think there was a chance. They sent letters to Quebec inviting them to join the Continental Congress. The British Parliament seemed to think there was a chance; why else bother with the Quebec Act which would just further inflame the anger of the colonists to the South, unless they thought it would make a material difference and was worth the trade-off?
Thanks for your comments. I will think further upon them.
