1871 Ontario general election

Significant changes to the rules of engagement

As attorney general Sandfield Macdonald delivered in 1868 An Act respecting Elections of Members of the Legislative Assembly*,* the province's first statute that comprehensively consolidated and codified elections law. The statute instituted the key requirement to hold balloting for general elections on the same day throughout the province. It also considerably broadened the franchise.

He also delivered, at the eve the election call, the Controverted Elections Act of 1871, which consolidated an array of challenges to election conducts under corrupt practices, and depoliticised the adjudication process by transferring the power to adjudicate such challenges from parliamentary committees to the Court of Queen's Bench (predecessor of Ontario's superior court). This new regime end up playing a big role in ending his government.

While not a formal change to any legislation, both majors party held candidate nomination conventions with increased formality and managed the process with much firmer hands. The result of local nomination conventions of both parties received greater formal coverage in the press. Accordingly, while there remained no formal requirements for formal registration or declaration of candidates' partisan affiliations and no restrictions on usage, the identity of the two main parties' candidate were easier to discern than in the 1867 election. However, they also provided informal support to selected candidates not endorsed by them for various strategic reasons. Furthermore, certain candidates campaigned with labels of past affiliations but were not aligned with the party while other candidates downplay the party they are affiliated with.

This was the last election where sitting members of the federal parliament were not prevented from nomination or election. Before the federal election in the following year however, the Parliament of Canada would legislate the elimination of dual mandates by disallowing nominations of sitting provincial legislators in federal election contests. This pending would impact both parties by removing six members elected in this election from the legislature, including the incumbent Liberal Premier and Treasurer, and two Conservative former cabinet members.

Results in summary

The results, as reported in formal records compiled in years by the Legislative Assembly and made available to the public (and in more recent years also reproduced by Elections Ontario) were as follows.

|- ! colspan=2 rowspan=2 | Partisan Affiliation ! rowspan=2 | Party leader ! colspan=4 | Seats ! colspan=4 | Votes |- ! style=width:2.5em | Candi- dates !! style=width:2.5em | 1867 !! style=width:2.5em | 1871 !! style=width:2.5em | ± ! style=width:5em |Votes !! style=width:5em | ± !! style=width:3em | % !! style=width:3em | ± (%) | 76 || 41 || 43 || 2 | 68,366 || 9,323 || 52.30% || 3.54

| 73 || 41 || 38 || 3 || 59,926 || 20,185 || 45.85% || 4.44

| (label only) || 1 || – || 1 || n/a || 1,116 || n/a || 0.85% || n/a | || 9 || – || – || – || 1,303 || n/a || 1.00% || n/a |- ! colspan="3" style="text-align:left;" | Total | 159 || 82 ! " colspan="2"| 82 ! " colspan="2"| 130,711 ! " colspan="2"| 100.00% |- | 130,711 | 28,612 | 62.93

Delayed of transition of power

Main article: 2nd Parliament of Ontario, John Sandfield Macdonald ministry#Defeat, Blake ministry#Formation

Following the election, the incumbent Conservatives refused to concede and clung on to power for nine months until December 19, 1871. It claimed to commend the confidence of new parliament, but avoided testing that confidence by delaying the convocation of the new parliament seven times. While its reasoning were less then credible, the government was able to resisted calls for its resignation by leaning on uncertainties provided through a combination of factors.

Partisan allegiance not all certain

The room to dispute the overall election outcome stemmed from the uncertainty of political affiliation for the some of the elected members, and from the fact that elected members' claimed political party affiliations were not the exclusive determining factor, and in some cases not even the main determining factor for their partisan allegiance. Afterall, the incumbent Conservative government was led by a former Liberal chosen by the national party leader in part to help legitimize the party's claim as a coalition.

In the months following the election, the press focused their analysis not on the elected members' professed partisan affiliations, but classified members as "ministerialists" committed to sustain the incumbent ministry versus those opposing the government. Known partisan affiliation were considered along with other factors such as family ties and previous behaviour, with the allegiances of certain members subject to extensive commentary and speculation. Unlike modern day election coverage, only a small number of outlets provided their summary tally of the likely strength of the two sides. The following are a few samples of reported tally. The early tallies reported 81 seats as the election for Algoma was held later on in May that year. The last tally reported in December that year took into account of seven vacancies caused by resignations and invalidations.

Elections challenged and invalided

The election of elevens members were challenged under the newly adopted Controverted Elections Act of 1871. This prompted the incumbent ministry to delay the convening of parliament repeatedly over right months in the hopes that such challenges would results in its improved standing in the new parliament. Its standing was weakened rather than improved by the process however. While the election of members on both side of the aisle were challenged, the elections of five Conservatives but only one Liberal were invalidated. All six unseated members stood in the subsequent byelections and all but one were returned during in the resulting byelections. However, since writs for byelection could only be moved while the legislature was in session, these six seats were vacant when parliament finally met for a number of weeks.

Double return

Liberal leader Edward Blake was re-elected in Bruce South and also in Durham West (where he was the MP), but would only be able to cast one vote in each division (vote) to take place in parliament. This effectively reduced the opposition Liberal rank by one until a replacement could be elected through a byelection. At that time, resignations could only take effect when the parliament was in session.

Government defeat

Parliament was called into session on Friday December 7th, 1871. An additional Liberal member resigned on the fourth sitting day. By the time substantive debate regarding non-confidence on the government took place, eight seats were vacant, reducing the rank of the Conservatives by five and Liberals by three.

During the debate on the speech from the throne, the Sandfield Macdonald ministry suffered defeats in three recorded divisions on three consecutive days, respectively on December 13th, 14th, and 15th and each unmistakably expressed parliament's non-confidence on the ministry. The incumbent Conservative ministry initially refused to accept the recorded divisions as binding expression of non-confidence on the grounds that a tenth of the seats were vacant, but the government's position became untenable following the resignation of Provincial Treasurer Edmund Burke Wood on December 15 and defeats in two further recorded divisions on December 18, each by margin of close to 20 votes. Premier Macdonald announced the resignation of the ministry on December 19.

The transition of power mandated by this election was effected nine months after on December 20, 1971 with the formation of the province's first Liberal ministry led by Premier Edward Blake and featuring future Prime Minister Alexander Mackenzie as Treasurer. While Blake and Mackenzie remained in their provincial offices for only a year, the Liberal Party led the Ontario government for 33 more years after their departures.

Byelections for the eight vacancies noted, along with four ministerial byelections necessitated by the formation of the Blake ministry, were held in the following January. The two parties each gain a seat against the other, result in no change to their respective standings in parliament.

Synopsis of results

: = open seat : = turnout is above provincial average : = winning candidate was in previous Legislature : = incumbent had switched allegiance : = previously incumbent in another riding : = not incumbent; was previously elected to the Legislature : = incumbency arose from byelection gain : = other incumbents renominated : = previously an MP in the House of Commons of Canada : = multiple candidates

Analysis

Members elected by region and riding

Party designations are as follows:

Midwestern Ontario

Southwestern Ontario

Northern Ontario

Peel/Simcoe/Durham/Ontario

York/Toronto

Wentworth/Halton/Niagara

Ottawa Valley

Saint Lawrence Valley

Southeastern Ontario

Byelections

References

1. "1871 General Election".
2. (1871-12-20). "Mr Sandfield Macdonald's Position". The Morning Chronicle (Halifax, NS).
3. (1871-12-16). "Mr. Wood's Resignation: The Ministry Breaking Up". The Globe (1844-1936).
4. {{Cite canlaw. (1868)
5. {{Cite canlaw. ((1870-71))
6. {{Cite canlaw. (1872)
7. "1871 general election results". [[Elections Ontario]].
8. (March 1872). "Proclamations". Journals of the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Ontario.
9. (1871-12-20). "Mr Sandfield Macdonald's Position". Morning Chronicle (Halifax, NS).
10. . (1872). ["Journals of the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Ontario"](https://archive.org/details/journalsoflegis05ontauoft/page/n21/mode/2up). *Legislative Assembly of Ontario*.