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The federal union of the Canadian provinces had already been suggested in Britain and met with distinct support. This scheme therefore served as a basis for the discussions. The plan was coupled with a new division of the Canadian provinces. The central and western portions of Upper Canada were to constitute a separate province. Eastern Upper Canada, Montreal and the Eastern Townships of Lower Canada were likewise to be erected into a province, while the remainder of Lower Canada was to form a third province. The object of this rearrangement was to neutralize French influence. Montreal was the centre of the disaffected French. By flanking it with two large and rapidly increasing British settlements, French influence would be rendered nugatory. The French of Quebec and the eastern districts were comparatively peaceable and, separated from their more boisterous fellows, could be entrusted with their own government. Many advantages commended the union scheme to Lord Durham. ‘The plan appeared to offer a chance of putting an end to existing discussions, of overwhelming the enemies of British connexion in the Canadas by the unanimous loyalty of the Lower Provinces, of extinguishing the pretensions of French nationality, and at the same time of leaving each different community in possession of its own laws and of the power of managing its own local affairs.’ In addition it served to unite the colonies in self-defence and in the development of their rich resources, thus ‘raising up on the northern frontier of the United States a rival union of British colonies, which might ere long ... form a counter-balancing power on the American continent.’^[1]

Objections to this scheme soon developed. The consent of French Canada could not be secured to such a proposal of national suicide. New Brunswick had only recently successfully passed through a serious constitutional crisis and was in no wise inclined to enter on further political adventure. It became obvious that the federal scheme would have to be abandoned, and gradually the proposal of a legislative union of the two provinces contained in the report was elaborated.