BC Joins Canada

The British North America Act that had created Canada in 1867 was extended to BC. The Act was intended to ensure a strong central government. Only matters considered of local significance were left to the provinces, including health and education services, maintenance of law and order, development of physical infrastructure, and management and sales of public Crown lands. BC received 3 seats in the Senate and 6 in the House of Commons, the small numbers being diminished further by the distance, both real and psychological, that then and thereafter separated the far west province from the capital at Ottawa. As a rule, BC's representatives did not distinguish themselves at the federal level or rise to national prominence. Shortly after entry into Confederation, elections were held for members of Parliament and for the 25 members of the new provincial legislature. The Canadian governor general, acting on behalf of the British Crown, appointed a lieutenant governor for BC. It was his obligation to request one of the elected MLAs to form a government and so become premier. The concept of responsible government was formally acknowledged when the first premier, John Foster McCreight, resigned after losing a non-confidence vote in the legislature. McCreight was replaced by Amor de Cosmos, a long-time political activist, and then by a sequence of men selected not as leaders of parties, which did not yet exist in BC, but as heads of loose, shifting coalitions of like-minded persons. The legislature's representative character was restricted in 1874 with the removal of the franchise from Chinese and aboriginal people, but was extended 2 years later, so far as male British subjects were concerned, by removing property holding as a requirement for voting. Overall the provincial government was a fairly passive affair, apart from dispensing patronage and encouraging resource exploitation. A system of free non-denominational elementary schooling was enacted in 1872, but little else was done in the way of social services.

The relative ease with which political structures became responsible and representative, from the perspective of white males, obscured the fragile demographic and economic bases of the new province. Alongside 25,000 or more aboriginal persons, 1,500 Chinese and about 500 blacks were just 8,000 whites. Not surprisingly, given the character of the gold rush, 3 out of every 4 non-aboriginal adults were men. Even though the availability of land gave newcomers a reason to stay, many soon discovered that multiple occupations were necessary in order to survive economically. Gold and coal were mined and some lumbering went on, but for many their principal interest lay in waiting for the railway with its promise of prosperity. The impact of entry into Confederation fell on aboriginal peoples, perhaps more than on any other group. As governor, Douglas had expressly prohibited the pre-emption of aboriginal settlements, but in practice the situation became chaotic once the gold rush erupted. Waves of European disease, and in particular a devastating smallpox epidemic in 1862-63, led to sharp numerical decline even as social Darwinian notions of "survival of the fittest" convinced many newcomers that indigenous populations were in any case destined to disappear. Under the terms of the BNA Act, responsibility for aboriginal peoples was transferred to the Dominion government when BC joined Canada. According to the terms of union, they would be treated as generously as had previously been the case. In practice it was the interests of newcomers that won out. Aboriginal peoples were increasingly confined to small, remote reserves even as no more treaties were signed, or indeed even contemplated. The sole exception was Treaty No. 8, one of several numbered treaties negotiated by the federal government on the prairies; it was signed in 1899 and included the northeast region of BC.

Construction of the promised rail line was repeatedly postponed for political and financial reasons. In 1878 Prime Minister John A. Macdonald launched a new National Policy intended to encourage economic development through higher tariffs, immigration and a transcontinental railway. The National Policy echoed the imperialist sentiment of the day in viewing the role of the periphery, be it colonies or western Canada, as strengthening the economy of the centre through providing raw materials to be returned as manufactures. Not only did value added in the form of jobs and industrial growth rightfully accrue to the centre (Ontario and Quebec), but the imposition of differential freight rates and tariffs on manufactured imports ensured that the periphery would not develop independent of the centre. While detrimental to BC over the long term, the National Policy did get rail construction underway. The Montreal syndicate that won the right to build the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) received considerable government assistance including large land grants. Much of the labour was provided by Chinese, over 15,000 of whom entered the country through Victoria for that purpose. The syndicate sought to maximize profits by putting the western terminus in a location where the best land could still be had, and so chose Burrard Inlet. With the arrival of the first scheduled passenger train on 4 July 1886, the small lumbering community at Gastown was almost overnight transformed into the new city of Vancouver. Britain now lay just over 2 weeks away, and very soon the CPR extended its reach west to Asia by steamship. In little more than a decade Vancouver replaced Victoria as the province's principal commercial centre and port through which goods moved to world markets. Stops along the new rail line also quickly developed into communities, as at Kamloops and Revelstoke.