Once a month, The duty launches to history buffs the challenge of deciphering a theme topical from a comparison with a historical event or figure.
The seigneurial regime is a cultural referent from which Quebecers can reflect on social change. Last November, the Montreal Economic Institute thus proposed to “free ourselves from the seigniorial model”. He then denounced the obstacle imposed by the Union of Agricultural Producers (UPA) for access to the small land property desired by the next generation of farmers. This negative perception of the seigniorial model differs significantly from that preponderant conveyed in the Quebec imagination since the end of the 18th century.and century.
In the land tenure system of seigneuries that ran through Quebec history until its abolition in 1854, the seigneur was granted land that he had to reclaim free of charge in small parcels — called censives — to individuals who requested it. the censitaires. The latter, however, had to pay the censive, a modest but symbolic annual tax, in recognition of the eminent property of the lord over the censive. The censitaire nevertheless retains useful ownership of his lot. He can therefore exploit it as he pleases, pass it on by inheritance, break it up and even sell it. That said, the tax, like the rent – a kind of rent due to the lord – is not depreciable.
The censitaire is certainly not an owner in the current sense of the term, but neither is he a simple tenant. Under the Ancien Régime, no property was perfect or complete!
Before the abolition
This status of the censitaire and the obligation of the seigneur to grant free censives have historically contributed to defining a positive vision of the seigneurial system. In fact, the first writings on the seigneurial regime were written at a time, the century following the Conquest, during which its existence was constantly questioned. Thus, various authors, starting with the jurist François-Joseph Cugnet, tried to make it known to the conquerors while defending the idea that it had made small property easily accessible.
The comparison was soon made with the tenure introduced by the British. Although free and common socage applied outside the seigniorial zone beginning in 1792 led to the establishment of real owners, many decried the increase in land speculation and the inaccessibility of “free” land.
The ideas of the influential Louis-Joseph Papineau, himself a seigneur, constitute a good example of a positive vision of the seigneury in the 19and century. In 1848, the latter sent a request to the Governor General of Canada for the Association of Canadian Township Settlements, of which he was vice-president. In this one, it is affirmed, after having evoked the saturation of the old soil and the exodus of young men, that the “class […] virtuous and well-to-do cultivators” was historically formed within the seigneuries. It then proposes to give land in certain townships.
Even the architects of the abolition of the seigneurial regime affirmed that the institution had been useful and could have continued to be so, had it not been for the abuses of various lords since the Conquest. The Seigniorial Court constituted to settle disputed points was generally of this opinion.
The seigneurs were nevertheless the real winners of the abolition of the regime, which was not completed until the early 1970s. In fact, if it was finally decided to abolish the seigneury, it was less for a problem of access to land than because of issues related to seigniorial rights blocking the initiatives of certain industrialists.
The act abolishing the seigniorial regime was a thousand miles from a revolution: compensation for lost lucrative rights and, above all, recognition of useful property on seigniorial land not granted. The lords found themselves duly possessors of vast lands, and were thus in an excellent position to guide the development of the territory in several regions of Quebec.
Until 1974, the immense island of Anticosti was part of this reality and, even today, the “seigneurie de Beaupré” remains the property of the Séminaire de Québec, which exploits its 1600 square kilometers of forest land in perfect private ownership. . The institution founded by François de Laval in 1663 recently developed an impressive wind farm there.
After the abolition
The benevolence towards the seigneurs observed during the abolition reflects the rather positive relationship of Quebecers to the seigneurial system, a relationship that continued to be observed in several forms.
For example, the issues of colonization and emigration have periodically brought back the memory of the seigneurial regime in the public space. This is the case in the pages of the Gazette campaigns, in 1872, where a certain “JB M.” suggested that the government act “as a donor of land” so that the new settlers could benefit from the “happy advantages of seigniorial tenure”. At this time when northern Quebec still largely needed to be “developed”, Benjamin Sulte went so far as to appeal to seigniorial tenure to renew “the miracles of the pioneers of yesteryear”.
Historians have drawn on the documents produced in the political melting pot of the 19and century and often formulated an idealized image of the seigniorial regime and the relations between the seigneurs and the tenants. They also echoed the words of Philippe Aubert de Gaspéqui, whipped by the recent abolition of the seigneury, had made himself the transmitter of memories of the good old days of the seigneurs in The Former Canadians (1863) and Memoirs (1866).
In 1873, Edmé Rameau de Saint-Père affirmed that “the seigniorial institution [canadienne] offered more advantages than the new systems”. In particular, he said that ” [l]the dealer did not have to make any disbursements [et que] the lord could not become a land speculator”. For his part, Lionel Groulx wanted to recall the grandeur and originality of French-Canadian civilization by evoking some glorious aspects of its history. He underlined the existence of cordial relations between lords and censitaires and the light character of seigniorial dues.
In 1934, Catholic Action recalled that the pioneer family of Jean Guyon, settled in Beauport 300 years earlier, embodied “the inhabitant king of the earth”, that they constituted “the counterpart by nature of any socialism or communism whatsoever” and had to serve as example for “the moderns of today”. In 1941, Victor Morin, vice-president of the National Syndicate for the Redemption of Seigniorial Rents (SNRRS), wrote that the seigniorial system was the “modernized offshoot” of French feudalism and that “the condition of the Canadian censitaire was infinitely more favorable than that of his medieval cousin from France”. The historian Marcel Trudel will relay the ideas of Morin, in 1956, in a brochure on the seigniorial system which still circulates abundantly.
The political sphere may have constituted an exception to the positive discourse on lordship. Quebec parliamentarians, notably T.-D. Bouchard, discussed the seigneurial regime in the 1920s and 1930s as an anachronistic legacy, then led to the redemption of the annuities constituted – between 1940 and 1950.
Nevertheless, others echoed a tradition of otherwise positive thought. This is the case of Henri Bourassa, who did not hesitate to evoke the advantages of the old feudal tenure in a conference in 1924. Worried about the abuses of capitalism, Bourassa was sorry for the loss of a form of property ” burdened with social responsibilities” and made up of “a fair balance of burdens and privileges”. The founder of To have to will also receive a check for $10,141 from the SNRRS, in 1942, for his part of the seigneury of La Petite Nation.
An era of rupture?
Whether one claimed seigneury or railed against its memory, its abolition left its mark, as Gabrielle Roy recalled in The Farmers’ Newsletter (1941). She criticized “this giant who was master of the land” and to whom we paid “an old age pension” for nearly a hundred years… By evoking this “long and troublesome history of feudalism” and this regime “very boring for the inhabitants », the future author of Second-hand happiness stood out from the commentators of his time and announced a historiographical break that would take several decades to come.
More than 40 years after the revival in history of the seigniorial regime, the collective memory, like school textbooks, has not completely emerged from the paradigm of the seigniorial-colonizer and of reciprocal rights and duties. The seigniory remains, it seems, a centerpiece in the “great adventure” of New France, as abundantly attested by the referents in toponymy.
However, some clues lead us to believe that a reversal may be taking place. On the one hand, the critical reflections that we are witnessing with regard to the (re)population of America, the colonial fact and the relationship with the Aboriginal peoples contribute to inserting the seigniorial institution into a narrative aimed at deconstructing the mechanisms of domination. and exclusion of the Other on which the current democratic and capitalist society is based. On the other hand, the reproachful evocation of the “seigneurial model” in the reflection at the beginning of this text is perhaps an additional sign that the times are no longer for the idealization of this good old seigneurial regime.
To propose a text or to make comments and suggestions, write to Dave Noël at [email protected].