Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Hincks, Francis
HINCKS, Sir FRANCIS (1807–1885), Canadian statesman, born at Cork in 1807, was youngest son of Thomas Dix Hincks [q. v.] He received a classical education under his father at Fermoy and Belfast. In his seventeenth year he began commercial life as clerk in a firm of Belfast shipowners. After emigrating to Canada in 1831 he opened a warehouse at Toronto in premises belonging to William Baldwin, father of Robert Baldwin, the future prime minister of Canada, and soon obtained a high reputation as a man of business. From the first, he interested himself in Canadian politics, and during the rebellion of 1837 earnestly espoused the liberal cause. In 1838 he successfully started the ‘Examiner’ newspaper, with the motto ‘Responsible Government and the Voluntary Principle.’ In March 1841 he was elected for the county of Oxford to the first parliament held after the union of the two Canadian provinces, and in the ensuing year became inspector-general of public accounts in the Baldwin-Lafontaine ministry.
Hincks took a prominent part in parliament, and helped to pass the Municipal Act of 1 Jan. 1842, which transferred the administration of local affairs from quarter-sessions to local councils elected by popular vote. Soon after the arrival in May 1843 of Sir Charles Metcalfe as governor-general, who refused to regard himself as in any way subject to the Canadian parliament, the Baldwin-Lafontaine ministry resigned. In November 1844 parliament was dissolved. Hincks was defeated at Oxford, and a conservative majority was returned to the new parliament.
In 1844 Hincks started the ‘Montreal Pilot,’ which became the leading opposition journal. The chief point in agitation was the secularisation of the clergy reserves, which the conservative ministry refused to undertake. In 1846 the government voted a sum of 10,000l. to compensate the loyalists in Upper Canada who had suffered in the rebellion. A demand for similar compensation at once came from Lower Canada. After much agitation, a sum of about 10,000l. was voted. This only amounted to one twenty-fifth of the claims, and owing to Hincks and his friends the demand for a Rebellion Losses Bill for Lower Canada became a cardinal article of the liberal programme.
In June 1847 James Bruce, eighth earl of Elgin [q. v.], became governor. The legislature was dissolved in December. The new elections resulted in a large liberal majority, and in the second Baldwin-Lafontaine cabinet Hincks resumed his old place of inspector-general. On 18 Jan. 1849 the government introduced the celebrated Rebellion Losses Bill, proposing a loan of 100,000l., to be applied to the indemnification of those persons in Lower Canada who had received no benefit from the act of 1846. The debt was to be charged on the consolidated revenues of the two provinces, a great injustice to Upper Canada. Only those persons actually found guilty of rebellion by a court of law were excluded from any share in the compensation money. The loyalists of Upper Canada resolved to stop the passage of the bill at all costs. Its final acceptance by Lord Elgin, after a long and bitter struggle, was the signal for a popular outbreak in Montreal. Hincks's private residence was destroyed by the mob. The bill, however, was maintained by the imperial government.
In October 1851, on the retirement of Robert Baldwin, Hincks assumed the office of premier. His chief French colleague was Augustin Morin, and this ministry is usually known as the Hincks-Morin administration. The repeal of the English corn laws and other imperial legislation had given a great impetus to the exportation of Canadian cereals. Hincks energetically sought to satisfy the consequent demand for an extended railway system in Canada. During the autumn session of 1852, for instance, no less than twenty-eight railway bills were passed. State lands were set aside for future railway lines. The Municipal Loan Fund Act was passed to enable municipalities to borrow money for the development of local resources. Hincks strongly favoured the scheme of an intercolonial railway, but it came to nothing, although in 1852 he visited England in order to press its importance on the imperial government, and to obtain the guarantee of an imperial loan. Hincks, however, gave every aid to carrying out the Grand Trunk Line of Upper Canada. In 1854 he and Lord Elgin negotiated at Washington the reciprocity treaty between Canada and the United States, which removed all restrictions in trade between the two countries so far as unmanufactured products of the soil, the forest, the mine, and the sea were concerned. But the treaty was only temporary, and on its lapse in 1865 was not renewed. The Hincks-Morin ministry also passed the Parliamentary Representation Act, which raised the number of members of the lower house from 84 to 130, 65 for each province. It also rearranged the electoral districts on a fairer basis. As premier, Hincks, who has been styled the Colbert of Canada, greatly developed the economic resources of the colony. But his schemes increased the public indebtedness, and there followed a long series of annual deficits in the revenue.
As early as 1848 it had become evident that the Canadian liberal party was disunited. Hincks and his friends having secured responsible government showed some hesitation in applying themselves to the two most important articles of their programme—the secularisation of the clergy reserves and the abolition of the seigneurial tenures of Lower Canada. The more advanced section of the liberal party, consisting of younger men known as ‘Clear Grits,’ and headed by George Brown, editor of the ‘Toronto Globe,’ soon began to express dissatisfaction with the premier, which was formulated in a series of public letters which Brown addressed to Hincks before the general election of 1851. Hincks had shown every consideration for the religious sentiments of his Lower Canadian Roman catholic allies, and Brown accused him of fostering Roman catholic aggression. In dealing with the clergy reserves Hincks sought in correspondence with the English colonial office to obtain the repeal of the act which vested their disposal in the imperial parliament, and suggested a cautious measure which, while satisfying the Upper Canada liberals, should not alarm the Roman catholic inhabitants of the lower province. Hincks's failure to obtain the repeal of the Imperial Act and a strong expression in one of Lord Elgin's despatches about the leaders of the agitation greatly increased his unpopularity with the ‘Clear Grits.’ Meanwhile he declined to recognise a convention of extremists meeting in his own constituency of Oxford, who demanded that he as their representative should solely act by their instructions.
On 9 June 1853 a religious faction-fight, known as the Gavazzi riot, took place at Montreal. Owing to an accident the soldiery fired on the crowd, by which five persons were killed and forty wounded. The government were accused of having shown a grossly unfair preference for the Roman catholics, and Hincks was universally denounced by the Orangemen. In 1853 the imperial parliament surrendered their right of disposing of the clergy reserves, but when the Canadian legislature met on 13 June 1854 no mention was made in the queen's speech of intended action on this question or on that of the seigneurial tenures of Lower Canada. Hincks explained that he did not feel justified in legislating on such topics in an expiring house, which had been expressly declared to be an inadequate representation of the people. An amendment censuring the ministry was carried, Lord Elgin dissolved parliament, and in the ensuing elections, although Hincks retained his seat, many of his supporters were beaten by the ‘Clear Grits,’ and in the first debate in the new parliament the ministers found themselves in a minority and resigned. The new government under Sir Allan McNab, mainly formed of conservatives, was supported by Hincks and many followers, and the secularisation of the clergy reserves and the abolition of the seigneurial tenures of Lower Canada were carried out.
A few months after his resignation Hincks sailed for England. From 1855 to 1862 he was governor of Barbadoes and the Windward Islands, being the first colonial statesman appointed to a colonial governorship. From 1862 to 1869 he was governor of British Guiana. In 1862 he was created a companion of the Bath, and in 1869 a knight commander of the order of St. Michael and St. George. On the completion of his service in British Guiana Hincks received a pension, returned to Canada, and became finance minister in Sir John Macdonald's cabinet. In 1873 he resigned. During the ensuing year he became president of the City Bank of Montreal, and its failure involved him in a legal prosecution, in which he was acquitted of all blame. In 1878 he was a member of the committee appointed to settle the boundaries between Ontario and the United States territory. Later on he became editor of the ‘Journal of Commerce’ at Montreal, where he died on 18 Aug. 1885.
Hincks wrote:
- ‘Canada: its Financial Position and Resources,’ Lond., 1849, 8vo.
- ‘Reply to the Speech of the Hon. J. Howe on the Union of the North American Provinces, &c.,’ Lond., 1855, 8vo.
- ‘Religious Endowments in Canada. The Clergy Reserve and Rectory Questions. A Chapter in Canadian History,’ Lond., 1869, 8vo.
- ‘The Political History of Canada between 1840 and 1855 …,’ Montreal, 1877, 8vo.
- ‘The Boundaries formerly in dispute between Great Britain and the United States …,’ Montreal, 1885, 8vo.
[Histories of Canada by Dent, Withrow, Bryce, and Garneau; H. J. Morgan's Sketches of Celebrated Canadians; G. M. Rose's Cyclopædia of Canadian Biography; Appleton's American Biography; Canadian Parliamentary Reports for the period; Hincks's works.]