The Society of Jesuits, revived abroad between 1811 and 1814 and readmitted into Canada in 1842 began to press ffor repossession of the confiscated estates. The political leader of Quebec at the time, Mercier, a former Jesuit student, secured for them from the Quebec legislature in 1887 an act of incorporation. The next year he set aside $400,000.00 as compensation for their confiscated estates to be paid to whichever beneficiary the Pope might indicate.

Orangemen, who had long struggled in vain for legal recognition through an act of incorporation were furious over the Jesuit act of incorporation and angrier still over the payment of money. They reached their boiling point at the introduction of papal authority into Canada's affairs. The Grand Master of Canada, Nathaniel Clarke Wallace M.P., tore apart the Jesuit Estates Bill in a speech before the Grand Lodge of Canada meeting in Winnipeg, Manitoba. He pointed out that it was a dangerous precedent to have a foreign power allowed a final say over Canadian government policy.

Conservative leaders did not sense, as they should have done, the mood of the Orange leadership and indeed of the rank and file members. They were furious with the Conservative leadership. In parliament Lieutenant-Colonel O'Brien, an Orangeman, moved an amendment that the House of Commons should request the Governor General to disallow the action of the Quebec legislature. He was supported by only twelve other members, including Clarke Wallace, but the number proved to be unlucky for the government. "The Noble Thirteen" were toasted and cheered everywhere that they went.

The Orange Conservative M.P.'s who had failed to support them had stirred up hornet's nests of voter dissatisfaction in their own constituencies. One Orange Conservative, William McCulla M.P. for Peel County, had the following censure given to him for failing to vote with his fellow Orangemen:

"To Brother McCulla, explaining that we "view the altar", and emphatically condemn the action of the Dominion Government in not disallowing the Jesuit Estates Act....not raising your voice against it, but voting for the same, and placing party before country to the detriment of the Protestant religion and the equal right and liberties which you as a member of the Orange Order are sworn to support....Too many members of the society use the Association merely as a stepping-stone to influence and position, thereby traducing the sacred principles of the order....use your best endeavours to have the same brought before the Privy Council on its merits....we pledge ourselves in future to support only those...."

Orangemen had spoken. For the first time in the young history of Canada they had finally flexed their political muscle on the national scene and used their voting power to bring not only their own Orange members of parliament into line but to force the government to act. The government of Canada brought in an Orange Incorporation Bill and this time it passed through the House of Commons and received Royal Assent. Some fifty years after the first tries at incorporating the Association it was finally realized. The election of 1891 was a bitter one with many Orangemen refusing to vote for those members who had not voted against the Jesuit Estates Bill whether they were Orange members or not. McCulla's loss of the Orange vote cost him his seat in this election and the Conservative majority in the House of Commons was greatly reduced. Clarke Wallace, the Grand Master of Canada, retained his seat in the election. A commemmorative medal was struck by the 'Toronto Globe' newspaper to honour the 'Noble Thirteen' and today the Orange Lodge in Niagara Falls is known as Noble Thirteen L.O.L. in their memory.

The Gavazzi Affair

During the spring of 1853 a noted Italian patriot, Alessandro Gavazzi, an ex-monk of the Order of St. Paul visited North America. He came fresh from a successful tour of England where he was hailed as a hero in the cause of Italian liberty and his reputarion as a speaker preceded him across the ocean. During a tour of the United States he gave a series of lectures devoted to the errors of Romanism. He arrived in Quebec in June of 1853 and on the 6th he gave a lecture in the Free Church on St. Ursule Street on the subject of the Inquisition.

A large audience was on hand and after an hour of speaking he was interrupted by shouts from the audience. The shouting was a signal for those outside the church. Stones came crashing through the windows of the church and a crowd armed with clubs forced themselves into the building. They forced their way to the front and attacked Gavazzi. Gavazzi was not however one who believed in turning the other cheek. He had fought in Italy and had been forced to defend himself many times. Armed with a stool he knocked down sixteen of his attackers before he was thrown from the pulpit onto the heads of the crowd gathered beneath it. Regaining his feet he fought his way to one of the doors. At this point the military intervened and pulled him free with only minor bruises to show for his ordeal.

The mob then stationed themselves in front of the Parliament buildings and shouted for George Brown, the editor of the 'Toronto Globe' and a champion of Protestantism. Brown was not in the building however and he escaped harm. Three days later Gavazzi was to deliver a lecture at Zion Church, Haymarket Square, in Montreal. A large number of police were present to prevent a reoccurence similar to the one in Quebec three nights earlier. Another body of police were stationed in the middle of the square and a small number of troops was in readiness nearby in case of trouble.

During the lecture a mob of Roman Catholic Irish tried to force their way into the church but they were stopped by the police and by the crowd inside. A few minutes later they returned and tried again but were again driven back. One of them fired a pistol while retreating and he was immediately shot by a Gavazzi supporter.

Several other shots followed and the lecture was quickly closed and the audience started home. During their travel home shots were fired at them and many of them were wounded by stones thrown at them. Two women were knocked down and almost trampled to death. Charles Wilson, the mayor of the city, ordered the troops who had come out into the open to fire upon the crowd. Five men were killed and dozens of men, women and children were wounded, their only crime having been that they had attended a lecture by Gavazzi. Wilson was not only a Roman Catholic but was a member of the Montreal St. Patrick's Society and Protestants were furious over his actions. Wilson was never held accountable for his actions in ordering the murder of five people.

William Lyon Mackenzie....The Election of 1836

In the Upper Canada elections of 1836 William Lyon Mackenzie ran as a Reform Party candidate in Peel County against Colonel William Thomson the Tory candidate. During this campaign the Orangemen of that county took an active role in opposing Mackenzie. It wasn't that they liked the Family Compact but that they looked on Mackenzie and his republican ideas with suspicion. The Reformers resented the actions of the Orangemen in this campaign and Doctor John Rolph later wrote of this campaign:

"Orange influence is more easily felt than proved. It is not unlike that oppressive condition of the atmosphere, which is felt in all its uneasy effects, but is otherwise intangible, undiscernible and beyond detection....to put your finger upon it, is the difficulty....To declare, therefore, that the late elections were not pervaded by an Orange influence, so universally experienced, because not specifically and personally proven, is not more unreasonable or untrue than to deny the prevalence of a peculiar condition of atmosphere in the cholera seasons of 1832 and 1834, because the chemist could not exhibit it in his laboratories."

The methods used by the Orangemen to secure Colonel Thomson's election wouldn't be tolerated today, but political standards of those days can't be judged by those of today. It was then considered natural that an election should involve wide-spread drunkenness and good old fashioned brawls. Clubs were wielded by both sides and bribery and intimidation were used by both sides. Mackenzie's meetings were often broken up by loyalists armed with whatever weapons proved handy. After a speech in Brampton he had to be taken away by a Doctor Patullo, hurried on by a shower of rotten eggs. At Cole's Corners [Churchville] there was a riot described by Mackenzie's correspondents as an 'orange outrage'. They described the incident as follows:

"Harry Cole, the Orange Bully, brought with him a club in his hand, and a boy bearing his rifle loaded with ball. An orange brute climbed the platform with his shillelagh, crying, No Popery -- No Surrender! and tried to throw Mackenzie down upon the knives, whips and clubs of his enraged and infuriated banditti. Colonel Thomson publicly applauded the Orangemen for their 'loyal and soldierly conduct', and Charles Magrath 'praised his brother orangemen for their spirit' in cutting and slashing a number of 'quiet and respectable unarmed men'".

He further stated that John Stewart Jr. "got the ill will of the orange devils in an especial degree" for saving Mackenzie from their fury. "Three of them, George Sparling, master of a lodge, Peter Cook and David Orr, chased him until he got across the Credit, with dreadful threatenings...Mr H. Patterson, storekeeper, Streetsville, was very busy in applauding the Orangemen...Some of the orangemen brought their guns and FIXED BAYONETS to the meeting -- and they had a waggon load of clubs covered with hay, and two women sitting on it to prevent suspicion."

Another Reform writer from Streetsville wrote of the affair:

"The justices of rascality here concocted their scheme partly the day before the meeting, and partly that morning. I stood by when three worshipfuls, three storekeepers, an M.P., and others, talked over the matter. B. said he had arranged everything according to the Colonel's directions -- he had seen Harry Cole, and advised that Mackenzie should be put out of the way, though he sould not like to be accessory to it..."

These clippings are all taken from Radical and Reform newspapers which were bound to be highly biased towards Mackenzie and against the Orangemen. Actions which offended the Reformers because they were beaten would no doubt have been cheered on by them just as strongly if the situation had been reversed. As it was victory lay with the Orangemen and Mackenzie was defeated. It should be noted that in those days elections were not held by a secret ballot. Then a man had to go before government officials, neighbours and political opponents and publicly state which candidate he was voting for. It can be seen how one side could use intimidation or violence to either sway a person's vote or to prevent him from voting altogether. It is easy to understand knowing this why in many early Canadian election campaigns the main expenses were for whisky and axe handles.

Trade Unionism and the Orange Order

The Orange Order has a long association with the Canadian trade union movement. The first editors of the 'Orange Sentinel', E.F. Clarke and John Hewitt were prominent trade unionists. The Orange Order in Toronto during the late 19th Century was predominantly trade unionist. Gregory Kealey in his "Essays in Canadian Working Class History" elaborates: "Contrary to earlier impressions, membership was not limited to successful artisand. The lodges were filled with labourers, street and railway workers, grooms, teamsters and others from the lower levels of Toronto working class life." Several lodges were distinctly trade unionist. Workers often associated in after-hours in the same pubs. Similarly, many lodges were gatherings of those who shared the same work bench. Boyne L.O.L. 173 contained many street railway workers. Enniskillen Purple Star was composed to a large degree of brewery workers and teamsters, machinists, building trades, and labourers from the Toronto Gas Works. Most of the workers in this lodge lived in the neighbourhood bounded by Parliament Street, Queen Street East, River Street, and Spruce Street.

Dian L.O.L. 2054 was the Orange Lodge of many of the workers of the Toronto Transit Commission. Their transportation night was an affair that many T.T.C. workers attended, both management and labour. It would be hard to imagine that there were not many discussions on labour problems and other issues dealing with the T.T.C. that took place within the lodge. There were often as many lodge Masters from the working class as from any other group. However, each lodge had a different social make-up. Armstrong L.O.L. 137 had a majority of working class members, as well as many socially prominent members who did not take an active role. Each lodge had its own traditions. The differences made a home for everyone in the lodge. They also fostered constructive rivalry which found expression in the annual parade. As the lodges gave expression to friendly rivalries, they also supplied the opportunity for strength in numbers. The concentration of workers from a single working place implied that the lodges could be used as forums for job-related controversies. Boyne L.O.L. 173, for example was the scene of many heated discussions during the street railway strike of 1886 as their minute books for that year shows.

This view of the Order as a promoter of trade unionism was supported by another source. In a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Labour Day broadcast in the 1970's, then Ontario labour minister, Frank Drea characterized old Toronto as probably one of the greatest lodge towns in North America. Worker's associations, he said, "spread out from the Orange Lodges....and the movement inherited some of their respectability." Perhaps this explains why prominent Orangemen like Robert Hardy Small, who would be elected Grand Master of Canada in 1947, and Earl Rowe, leader of the Ontario Conservative Party, supported the cause of trade unionism in the Ontario provincial elections of 1937. In the public mind the cause of labour was identified with the American C.I.O. and Communism. Earl Rowe, Conservative leader and Master of Newton Robinson L.O.L. 209 refused to take a stand against the C.I.O. and repeatedly asserted that: "the issue was not law and order but the right of free association." Rowe was actively supported by Cecil Frost, provincial Tory organizer and also an Orangeman. The Orange Order in Ontario and the Conservative Party leadership thought as one on this issue. They consistently supported the right of the working man to the union of his choice.

Several prominent Orangemen took a strong stand for organized labour, one of them being H.C. Hocken, a Grand Master of Canada. In his youth Hocken had worked as a typesetter at the 'Toronto Globe' and had led a strike at that paper. Leslie Saunders, another Grand Master of Canada and Imperial Grand President started his working career in Northern Ontario working for the railroad [O.N.R.]. He was president of his union local and once ran as a labour candidate in municipal elections in his home town of North Bay.

Perhaps the two most prominent Orange trade unionists in 19th century Ontario were Robert Glockling and John B. Armstrong. Glockling was the Master of L.O.L. 657 and was elected president of the Trades and Labour Council in 1889. He also served as president of the International Brotherhood of Bookbinders in 1904. Armstrong was a printer in the Toronto Typographical Union and was the ringleader of a city-wide nine day strike by that union against Toronto newspapers that began on March 25, 1872. He was one of 22 union printers arrested on a charge of conspiracty. He served twice as president of the T.T.U. and served as president of the International Typographical Union in 1878-1879. Like Glockling, he also served as president of the Toronto Trades and Labour council, his term being in 1882. He constantly promoted equal pay for women and ran in the 1894 Ontario elections in Toronto as an Independent Labour candidate.

     Thanks to Alex Rough for this material