In Duty Bound: Men, Women, and the State in Upper Canada, 1783–1841 by J.K. Johnson (review)

J.K. Johnson draws upon his unrivalled archival knowledge to explore the relationships between people and government in Upper Canada. Underlying the study is the issue of how far the colony’s outline administrative rituals constituted the basis of a modern state. Bruce Curtis points to the 1840s and 1850s as the key era for state formation in Canada. Johnson, in his pleasantly laid-back style, reckons that Curtis ‘has got it largely right’ (p. 9). State formation, he concludes, faced ‘an uphill battle in Upper Canada’ (p. 246). The most impressive physical manifestation of authority, Kingston penitentiary, only dated from 1835. Bureaucratic procedures were probably introduced to satisfy London’s demands for statistics rather than to serve the population. Even so, impressive numbers interacted with the pioneer structures. Johnson estimates that 75,000 people applied for land, although outcomes could be haphazard. One petitioner was rejected for insulting officialdom, another because he was ‘only eighteen and small’ (p. 20). The colony assembled a limited but expensive public service, probably well outnumbered by disappointed office-seekers: John A. Macdonald applied, unsuccessfully, for a judgeship in 1841. Upper Canada also supported several hundred pensioners. Not all were ex-employees: women appear in some numbers, especially widows assertively claiming entitlement. Others tapped into public funds for short periods, working on roads and canals, or through provision of services, such as surveying. ‘Few people ever wanted to be entirely self-sufficient and no one ever really was’ (p. 242). In addition, dozens petitioned for temporary help to meet difficulties associated with immigration, fire, or sickness. By the mid-1830s, Upper Canada began to recognise the concept of poverty – theoretically impossible in a land of colonial abundance – and looked to Britain’s New Poor Law for solutions. The authorities seemed less alarmed by the threat of disorder, although Johnson perceives signs that the state was steadily ‘tightening its grip on law breakers’ (p. 213). Overall, however, there was either a low level of violence or the state was concerned mainly with protecting property. In one major area – education – state intervention was minimal, as was taxpayer funding. School trustees were left to their own devices in a form of de facto local autonomy: the explorer Simon Fraser took his turn in Cornwall. Teachers had to be British subjects ‘of good moral character’ (p. 136), but training was not required: pay was poor and turnover awesome. Johnson provides 31 tables, but this is quantification with a human face. He concedes that one sample ‘is a bit on the small side’ (p. 30) and dismisses the search for accurate crime figures as ‘a mug’s game’ (p. 168). Finally, despite his exhaustive investigations, Johnson humbly acknowledges that he is perhaps merely skimming the surface. There remains, he concludes, a fundamental unanswered question: ‘What was it really like to live in Upper Canada?’ (p. 256).