CANADA. The name given to a confed eration of all the British possessions in North America except Newfoundland.
The first explorations of this country, of which any authentic information exists, were by Jacques Cartier, between the years 1534 and 1554, thus giv ing to France, the first claim upon its territory. Great activity was shown' during these and the suc ceeding years on the part of Great Britain and France to acquire territorial jurisdiction on the newly discovered continent, and the division lines between their acquisitions were not very clearly marked. Those of France included Florida in the south and the lands watered by the St. Lawrence in the north, and to it all the name of "New France" was given. In 1603 an expedition for trading pur poses was fitted out under the command of Samuel Champlain, whose explorations up the river St. Lawrence and its tributary, the Richelieu River, brought him to the lake which still bears his name. The viceroyalty of New France was conferred in 1612 upon the Prince de Conde', who made a formal assignment of it in 1619 to Admiral Montmorency, who personally visited the country.
In 1628, under the rule of Cardinal Richelieu in France, the colony was ceded to "La Compagnie de Cecits Associes" (The Company of the One Hundred Associates), a trading company, but armed, like the Hudson Bay Company in later years, with full pow er for the administration of justice in the primitive forms practicable in new countries and with mixed populations.
This company had an unsuccessful career finan cially, and upon its disorganization, in 1663, Louis XIV. resumed territorial jurisdiction over the col ony, and in April of that year published an edict establishing a "Sovereign Council" for the ment of Canada, and this council was specially in structed to prepare laws and ordinances for the ad ministration of justice, framed as much as possible upon those then in force in France under the pro visions of the "Custom of Paris." For more than one hundred years all the legal busiuess of the province was determined by this council—in fact, until the conquest by the English in 1759. By the terms of the capitulation, it was stipulated and conceded that the ancient laws of land tenure should continue to subsist, but it was understood that the English criminal and com mercial law should be introduced and adopted. Under this stipulation the law of France, as it existed in 1759, was recognized as the civil law of Canada, and has always since formed the basis of that law—modified, of course, after the subsequent establishment of a representative government in the colony, by the statutory provisions of the colonial parliaments. This result was applicable, however, only to that section of the country which subse quently was called Lower Canada, now the province of Quebec. The portion of the colony since known
as the province of Upper Canada (now the province of Ontario) was then unsettled, and being subse quently colonized from Great Britain and her other dependencies, the whole body of law, civil as well as criminal, was based upon that in force in Eng land.
Under the provisions of a statute passed by the imperial parliament of Great Britain in 1774, called "The Quebec Act," a legislative council of twenty three members was established for the province, with power to enact laws. In 1791, Pitt introduced the bill into the English House of Commons which gave a constitution to Canada and divided it into the two provinces of Upper and Lower Canada. Since then (with the short interregnum from 1837 to 1841), regular parliaments have been held, at which the jurisprudence of the country and the establish ment of its courts have been determined by formal acts.
In 1867, the confederation of the different North American dependencies of Great Britain, under the name of the "Dominion of Canada," was consum mated by an act of the imperial parliament, at the instance and request of the different provinces, including Upper and Lower Canada (under the names of Ontario and Quebec), New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, to which have since been added Prince Edward Island, Manitoba, and British Columbia (all the provinces except Newfoundland). The act under which this confederation was established— Called The British North American Act (in effect July 1, 1868)—contains the provisions of a written constitution, under which the executive government and authority is declared to be vested in the cover eign of Great Britain, whose powers are deputed to a governor-general, nominated by the imperial gov ernment, but whose salary is paid by the Dominion. The form of government is modelled after that of Great Britain. The governor-general acts under the guidance of a council, nominally selected by himself, but which must be able to command the support of a majority in that branch of parliament which represents the suffrages of the electors. THE JUDICIAL is a supreme court with ultimate jurisdiction in matters affecting the Dominion and as a final court of appeal from the provincial courts. It consists of a chief justice and five puisne judges, and holds three sessions a year at Ottawa. The exchequer court can hold sessions at any town, and is a colonial court of admiralty and exercises admiralty jurisdiction throughout Canada and the waters thereof. Certain local judg es of admiralty are created with limited jurisdic tion, the appeal from whose decisions lies to the Court of Exchequer, or it may lie direct to the Su preme Court of Canada under certain conditions.