On August 10, 1792, the capture of the Tuileries by the insurgent people led to the fall of the monarchy in France. This event marks a radicalization of the Revolution which results in the proclamation of the Republic, the execution of the king and, later, the establishment of the revolutionary government.
The August 10 event has a global impact, exacerbating tensions between France and the European monarchies, while inspiring various innovative actions. Canada is not immune to this shock wave that many receive quite positively.
If Canadians had been moderately receptive to the three letters sent to them by the American Continental Congress from 1774 to 1776, inviting them to form their own body of representatives, the situation changed during the 1780s. A group of young intellectuals influenced by the European Lights was formed around the printer of Congress addresses, Fleury Mesplet (1734-1794), and his new newspaper, the Gazette from Montreal.
This “Circle of Enlightenment” wants to fight against prejudice and tyranny, while advocating equal rights and fair political representation. From 1789, the Montreal periodical supported the French revolutionary advances, a support that was also found, to a lesser extent, in the Gazette de Québec, which nevertheless published a Patriotic Piece praising the principles upheld by the Revolution (January 28, 1790).
Mézière, a Canadian Republican
Thus, not everyone thinks like the Bishop of Quebec, Jean-François Hubert (1739-1797), who harshly condemns revolutionary ideas, or like Lord Philippe Aubert de Gaspé (1786-1871), who blames a posteriori in his Memoirs of the Canadian “Democrats”.
A young man named Henry-Antoine Mézière (1771-1846) stands out in particular for his progressive positions. Collaborator of the Gazette Montreal since 1788, he defended “enlightened” ideas there, gradually turning to republicanism. In May 1793, he decided to leave for the United States to meet Edmond-Charles Genêt, ambassador of the French Republic to the United States, who had come to seek help from the Americans and, potentially, to raise the Canadians against the British Empire in order to weaken this monarchy which is fighting against its country.
Mézière wishes to approach the French emissary in order to submit to him a memoir he has written: Observations on the Present State of Canada and the Political Dispositions of its People. The Canadian democrat affirms that his people admire the new Republic and that they are ripe for revolution: “I swear that the Canadians love the French; that the death of the tyrant Capet has only upset the priests and the government who fear the transplanting of a guillotine into Canada. He believed – somewhat candidly – that the Canadians “will have no reluctance to shake off the yoke of their dazed tyrant” and asked France to launch an appeal to precipitate the insurrection.
The French representative acceded to this request and published, in the autumn of 1793, a brochure entitled The Free French to their brothers the Canadians, an authentic call to revolution on the shores of the St. Lawrence. The text insists on the advantages of such an action which would bring freedom for Canada, democracy, the abolition of privileges and titles of nobility, the liberalization of trade and freedom of worship.
The pamphlet circulated in Quebec during the winter of 1793-1794, where it was well received by the Democrats and part of the population. His good reception worried Monsignor Hubert who asked the priests to fight revolutionary ideas from the pulpit, while the Governor General, Lord Dorchester, imposed the denunciation and condemnation of the “seditious”.
It must be said that following the distribution of Genet’s pamphlet, political unrest broke out in Canada, in the form of riots in Quebec and Montreal against British despotism and the law on the militia (spring 1794). A democratic, even revolutionary tendency, defending French republican ideas, then existed in Canada, which was not just a flash in the pan since troubles occurred again in 1796, following the military victories won by the French Republic. , in an anti-seigneurial spirit.
The “enlightened” ideas of Mesplet and the radical ideas of Mézière find their continuity in certain members of the Canadian Party (founded at the beginning of the 19e century) and especially among the Republican patriots of 1837-1838. The declaration of independence of Lower Canada, written in February 1838 by Robert Nelson (1793-1873), resonates particularly with the ideas put forward by Genêt in his address to the Canadians.
In short, it is interesting to note how, from the 1780s, there existed a community of democratic thinkers in Montreal, whose ideas agreed with those of the French revolutionaries. Some of them even defend radical republican ideas, without cutting themselves off from the Canadian population.
Although they were opposed by the British colonial authorities and the clergy, and they remained in the minority, these ideas fueled various revolts in the 1790s, before inspiring the democrats of the 19e century. Like what the life of ideas was very active in Canada at the time of the “Atlantic revolutions” and that not everyone was steeped in conservatism.