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Eight:
Louis Riel
Patriot
without a Country
A
Government of Canada hanged
Louis Riel 103 years ago,
but many Canadians will
still not let him die. The
man who during a turbulent
life was founder of a province,
member of the Parliament
of Canada, an outlaw, an
exile, and a victim of the
hangman has remained the
storm centre of Canadian
politics. He continues to
capture imaginations and
controversies in a way no
other Canadian figure has
done.
The
transformation of the founder
of Manitoba from a regional
agitator and national traitor
to a major Western Canadian
hero in our popular mind
has taken much of a century.
For a long while, Canadian
historians because of partisanship
or for other reasons ignored
the details of his life.
Even the Makers of Canada
collection of biographies
published in 1905-1908 did
not include him. Today,
as the Winnipeg historian J.M. Bumsted points out,
"he is the only major Canadian
whose papers have been collected
and published with the full
panoply of scholarly apparatus
developed for figures like
Thomas Jefferson, George
Washington, Benjamin Franklin
and John Adams...." To Canada’s
Native people, Riel has
come to symbolize their
aspiration for a fuller
share in our national life,
"What Canadians do not understand
is that Louis Riel is a
Father of Canadian Confederation....
He intuitively sensed the
future for Canada and wanted
to guarantee a place for
Métis people in that future.
The fact that he was betrayed
and martyred for his efforts
only guarantees the fact
that today he is hailed
by his people as a freedom
fighter of the highest order...,"
says Louis Bruyere. This
sketch will make a case
that Riel’s statues should
stand not only near the
legislature buildings in
Winnipeg and Regina, as
they now do, but in prominent
places in all four western
and northern capitals, and
in Ottawa itself.
At
the age of 14, the young
Louis, who was in fact of
seven-eighths white ancestry,
followed his father’s footsteps
to Montreal to study for
the priesthood. The Catholic
Bishop of St. Boniface,
Alexandre Taché, was so
impressed by his academic
ability and religious ardour
during his elementary schooling
that he had persuaded the
wife of a later Lieutenant
Governor of Québec to pay
what the Riel family could
not afford.
During
the next decade at the Sulpician
seminary, Louis proved a
serious and indeed brilliant
student. His father’s death
hit him so hard that afterwards
he avoided other students,
faltered and missed classes.
In the final year of the
seminary he abandoned his
religious studies and spent
a little over a year in
Montreal working for a brief
time as a student-at-law.
In 1867 he went to St. Paul,
Minnesota, before he finally
decided to return to Red
River a year later.
His
first act of leadership
occurred in the fall of
1869 well before the vast
Rupert’s Land was formally
transferred from the Hudson’s
Bay Company to the government
of Canada. William McDougall,
Prime Minister John A. Macdonald’s
Minister of Public Works,
had ordered a survey to
be done on the mile-square
system of the Americans
to accommodate new settlers
from Ontario. The Quebec
land system, already working
well for the Métis in Red
River, had provided each
settler with a small river
frontage and, in recognition
of the water shortage problem,
with a "hay privilege" as
well, going back from the
river for two miles. Understandably,
the Métis were greatly disturbed
when McDougall’s agent,
Colonel John S. Dennis,
began his American system
and doubtless illegal surveys
in their community. When
a survey crew began work
on the hay pasture of André Nault, a French Canadian,
Riel in company with a group
of unarmed Métis appeared
on the scene and declared
that the territory south
of the Assiniboine belonged
to the people of Red River
and not to Canada, and that
the Métis would not allow
the survey to proceed any
further. His argument was
that the Canadian government
"had no right to make surveys
on the Territory without
the express permission of
the people of the Settlement."
That ended the surveying
for the time being and established
Riel at only 25 years of
age as the new Métis leader
of Red River.
Within
days of the Nault incident,
William McDougall was appointed
by Sir John as the Lieutenant
Governor of Rupert’s Land.
The Prime Minister’s ignorance
of the West was again evident;
the Red River Métis seethed.
The governor-designate soon
reached Minnesota by train
and proceeded north to Pembina.
There he received a note
signed by Riel as secretary
of the National Committee
of the Métis of Red River
ordering him not to enter
the territory of the North-West
without "special permission"
of the Committee. McDougall
impetuously drove two miles
north to a local Hudson’s
Bay post, but quickly obeyed
an order delivered by Ambroise Lépine, a giant of 6’3"
in height, on behalf of
Riel’s Committee to return
to the American side of
the international boundary.
In
fact, McDougall’s mission
was one of mismanaged conquest
meeting Métis resistance,
not rebellion or insurrection.
Until Queen Victoria consented
to the transfer, which was
not finally done until June,
1870, the only legal authority
for the region was that
of the Hudson’s Bay Company,
but it had, in Howard’s
words, "signed away its
authority and its embittered
agents had virtually ceased
to govern.... The new government
which McDougall was attempting
to impose and against which
the Métis ‘rebelled’ did
not exist either, and the
‘Governor’ had no more right
in the country than any
private citizen. He was
not even entitled, at the
moment, to the courtesies
due a visiting dignitary,
because he was no longer
a member of the Canadian
Cabinet."
On
the same day that McDougall
was ordered out of Rupert’s
Land, Riel formally succeeded
John Bruce as leader of
the New Nation and with
120 followers seized Fort
Garry. He did this to obtain
control of its muskets and
cannon, explaining to the
protesting Hudson’s Bay
Company officials, who were
confined to quarters, that
he wanted to prevent bloodshed
and guard the fort against
danger.
Riel
then turned his attention
to establishing both order
and democracy. The English-speaking
parishes were invited to
elect twelve representatives
to meet with his equal-sized
council of French-speaking
Métis. Both groups cooperated.
The first convention met
in mid-November, 1869. It
produced a bill of rights
which in effect demanded
full provincial status.
Its specifics included the
right to elect a legislature,
a free homestead law, treaties
with Indians, use of French
and English as official
languages, respect for all
rights present before the
transfer of sovereignty,
and fair representation
in the Parliament of Canada.
None of the people in the
heterogeneous community
could argue that their interests
were not protected.
In
the meantime, McDougall
remained fuming with his
wagons and entourage near Pembina. The prime minister
in Ottawa soon learned from
Queen Victoria that she
hoped the Métis would present
their grievances to her
governor general in the
new country. Macdonald,
for once prudent about the
West, advised caution to McDougall, but the self-professed
democrat without any authority
from anyone drafted out
of his own imagination a
proclamation dated December
1, 1869, announcing in the
Queen’s name the completion
of the transfer to Canadian
sovereignty and himself
the governor of the North
West Territory of Canada
- "an act," in the words
of W.L. Morton, "at once
rash and completely illegal."
Copies
of the proclamation quickly
appeared on walls at Fort
Garry at McDougall’s direction.
Knowing from his spies in
McDougall’s party that Queen
Victoria had made no such
proclamation, Riel immediately
denounced it as fraudulent.
In one of the most comical
scenes in our entire national
history, McDougall on the
same day as he issued his
bogus proclamation took
a party of seven men north
a few miles over the border
and in a snowy gale read
it to the stars and north
wind before rushing back
to Pembina. The gesture,
as Howard wrote, "convulsed
America, horrified Ottawa
and mined him forever in
the West." He compounded
matters the next day by
issuing yet another illegal
order authorizing the surveyor
Col. J.S. Dennis, "Lieutenant
and Conservator of the Peace"
in Rupert’s Land, to organize
and arm a force sufficient
to disperse the armed men
in the settlement "unlawfully
assembled and disturbing
the public peace." Dennis,
invited in effect to begin
a civil war, managed to
occupy lower Fort Garry,
twenty miles north of Winnipeg,
but his campaign soon collapsed
and Riel’s government continued.
The Prime Minister later
repudiated everything the
pair had done and wrote
in a self-revealing note
to a friend, "The two together
have done their utmost to
destroy our chance of an
amicable settlement with
these wild people."
Riel
doubtless knew from the
start that his little colony
could not maintain independence
from both Canada and a hovering
United States with unconcealed
continental ambitions. On
December 8, 1869 after successfully
arresting 45 armed Canadians
who had occupied the home
of Dr. John Schultz in Red
River, Riel opted to negotiate
with Ottawa rather than
Washington despite various
inducements offered by the
Americans to do so. His
declaration of that day
said many things, but the
effect of it was that the
Provisional Government established
in Rupert’s Land the previous
month was the only lawful
authority in the region
and it now "wished to enter
into such negotiations with
the Canadian Government
as may be favourable for
the good government and
prosperity of this people."
In 60 days, Riel had driven
McDougall permanently out
of the West. The latter’s
lieutenant, Dennis, had
been unable to ignite a
civil war and Riel’s List
of Rights and Declarations
had provided the necessary
ingredients for the successful
resistance to a crude conquest
attempt. No one at Red River
had been robbed or attacked.
Ottawa, moreover, had decided
to send three commissioners
west to negotiate the terms
of entry into Confederation.
The
commissioners were led by
Donald Smith, manager of
the Hudson’s Bay Company’s
Montreal district and husband
of a Métis woman. Fully
a thousand people from the
Red River’s scattered settlements
of approximately twelve
thousand attended a mid-January
open field meeting to consider
Ottawa’s case. After two
days of five-hour meetings
in temperatures of 20 below
zero, Riel, as president
of the Provisional Government
of Rupert’s Land, moved
that a convention of forty
(half elected by the Scots
and English, half by the
French) consider Smith’s
proposals. The North-West
die was clearly already
cast in favour of Canada
and against the American
hopes for annexation of
the region, but it would
be a long while indeed before
Riel got much credit in
Central Canada, or among
its politicians and historians,
for choosing Canada.
At
the convention, Riel attempted
to include in a new bill
of rights a demand that
the region be admitted to
Canada as a full province
rather than a territory.
This was rejected by the
English-speaking delegates
who were supported by three
French-speaking ones. His
Provisional Government,
however, later made this
request at his insistence
and it is on this basis
that his place in history
as Manitoba’s founder was
established. Smith approved
the new bill of rights in
principle.
In
a particularly astute move,
Riel then won full legal
status for his Provisional
Government by persuading
the convention to reestablish
his government on the basis
that the delegates to Ottawa
would need official status.
Riel was elected president
of its assembly, or council,
elected on February 9, 1870.
Three delegates were chosen
to go to Ottawa.
The
ultimate cause of most of
Riel’s problems, the execution
of Thomas Scott by his government,
occurred only days after
his installation as president.
The basic facts are well
known. In hindsight, it
was really the only error
committed by the young and
inexperienced leader of
an infant nation. Yet, for
Riel thereafter, in W.L.
Morton’s words, "there was
to be no peace in the North-West
he loved. No peace anywhere
but the forlorn peace of
exile and the final peace
of the gibbet at Regina."
Few now recall that Riel
prevented 600 well-armed
and mounted Métis from destroying
an unmounted and lightly-armed
group of several hundred
settlers, mostly from Portage
La Prairie, who attempted
to free the remaining prisoners
from the earlier seizure
at Schultz’s home. As the
prospects of a confrontation
heightened, the remaining
24 prisoners signed peace
oaths and were released.
Most of the settlers from
Ontario then dispersed,
but about 50 who did not
were arrested and jailed
for two days, including
Major C.W. Boulton. Riel
wisely granted mercy to Boulton, the leader of the
short-lived uprising, after
the mother of John Sutherland,
one of two dead victims
of the affair, pleaded with
him to do so.
Thomas
Scott, hot-headed and aggressive,
was not a popular figure
in Red River. Donald Smith
himself called Scott "a
rash, thoughtless man whom
none cared to have anything
to do with." Scott, who
interpreted Riel’s clemency
in Boulton’s case as timidity,
deliberately antagonized
and insulted guards at every
opportunity. "The Métis
are a pack of cowards. They
will not dare to shoot me,"
he shouted defiantly. In
any case, Scott, who had
been arrested for being
part of Boulton’s uprising,
was convicted of insubordination
while in custody by an ad
hoc court-martial and shot
by a Métis firing squad
on March 1, 1870. He was
the only individual killed
by the Métis during the
10 anxious and dangerous
months they controlled Rupert’s
Land, and the execution
was doubtless carried out
partly to prevent others
from challenging the new
government. As Riel later
put it, "If there was a
single act of seventy, one
must not lose sight of the
long course of moderate
conduct which gives us the
right to say that we sought
to disarm, rather than fight,
the lawless strangers who
were making war against
us." Years later, just before
dying on a scaffold, he
told his priest, "I swear
as I am about to appear
before God that the shooting
of Scott was not a crime.
It was a political necessity....
I commanded the shooting,
believing it necessary to
save the lives of hundreds
of others."
Unfortunately
for Riel, his nemesis John
Schultz had already escaped
and would travel from town
to town in Ontario haranguing
anyone who would listen
about the blood-thirsty
Riel and the Métis. The
Ontario government later
offered a $5000 reward for
the capture of its hero’s
murderer, even though the
act had occurred outside
both Ontario and the Dominion.
"Scott and Riel," in Howard’s
words, "ceased to exist
as men. They became symbols
solely: Scott the Protestant,
Riel the Catholic.... That
was the picture: young,
progressive, dedicated Protestantism
destroyed by entrenched,
superstitious, corrupt Catholicism.
It was a good sharp picture
and it made for a foul and
vulgar fight, whose repercussions
echoed ominously throughout
the next fifteen years."
Scott’s
execution also prevented
the granting of an amnesty
by Macdonald’s government
for any "illegal" acts committed
by anyone in Red River in
1869-70. The prime minister
had in fact issued an amnesty
proclamation, but it did
not arrive until four days
after Scott’s death, and
the prime minister took
the view that it did not
apply to those involved
with Scott. The lack of
an amnesty clearly prevented
Riel from becoming either
the first premier of Manitoba
in 1870 or a leading member
of Parliament from the province.
Its consequences doubtless
contributed to his subsequent
mental breakdowns.
Two
of the three delegates en
route to Ottawa were briefly
imprisoned by Ontario authorities
for alleged complicity in
Scott’s murder. Macdonald
would even protest that
he never recognized Riel’s
Provisional Government,
something flatly contradicted
by both the record and the
fact of the negotiations
with its delegates. "The
Right Honourable John A.
Macdonald lied (excuse the
word) like a trooper," an
exasperated Archbishop Taché
wrote subsequently.
On
May 2nd, 1870 a bill called
the Manitoba Bill, embodying
most of the features of
the Métis "List of Rights,"
was introduced and quickly
passed. The historian G.F.G.
Stanley recognized Riel
as "the father of the province
of Manitoba," conceding
that the federal government
would not willingly have
granted provincial status
to "the infant half-breed
colony at the time of the
transfer of the Territories
to Canada, had it not been
for Riel’s protest.’’
The
legislative assembly of
Rupert’s Land heard the
delegation’s report when
it returned from Ottawa
and unanimously voted to
accept the Manitoba Act
and to enter Canada on the
terms proposed. An ominous
beginning occurred when
Ottawa, once again grossly
mismanaging events in the
West, permitted Colonel
Garnet Wolseley and his
Red River Expedition of
1200 mostly Ontario and
British troops to reach
the new province before
the new lieutenant governor,
Adams Archibald, could arrive.
Riel rejected the advice
of those who wanted to fight,
and insisted on welcoming
Wolseley in peace. But his
scouts subsequently indicated
that the approaching expedition
intended to deal with the
rebels and Riel felt obliged
to leave his new province
for the U.S. for his own
safety.
Wolseley
paid off his exhausted troops
after their incredibly arduous
journey and publicly denounced
the Métis as "banditti and
cowards," despite Ottawa’s
clear order that the Provisional
Government should remain
in place until its governor
arrived. The conduct of
some of his men and those,
like Schultz, who had slunk
back into Red River, towards
anyone involved in Scott’s
death was as outrageous
as it should have been predictable
in Ottawa. Two suspects
were murdered. Another was
bayoneted and left for dead.
Riel’s mother was terrorized
at her home. Archibald,
an honourable and fair administrator,
received little help from
Ottawa and reported to Macdonald
a year later that many of
the Métis "actually have
been so beaten and outraged
that they feel as if they
were living in a state of
slavery."
Macdonald’s
mishandlings of Manitoba
continued virtually unabated.
Only five of his first 85
appointments in the new
province went to Métis.
Archbishop Taché went to
Ottawa to see about the
amnesty for Riel and Ambroise
Lépine. The prime minister
produced $1000 in cash and
indicated that he might
be able to speed the amnesty
up if both would leave the
country for a year. Taché
eventually did persuade
both to leave with their
families.
Riel
returned briefly to Manitoba
in the fall of 1872 to be
nominated for Parliament,
but withdrew in favour of
George Etienne Cattier who
had been defeated 10 days
earlier in Montreal East.
After Cartier died a year
later, Riel ran in the Provencher
district as an independent
candidate and won by a landslide
in the general election
of 1874. Still no amnesty
had been granted.
When
Riel appeared at the House
of Commons in Ottawa to
claim his seat in late 1874,
the new Manitoba attorney
general, Henry Clarke, had
already indicted him for
Scott’s murder. The question
of how a Manitoba court
could assert that it had
jurisdiction over an incident
happening before the province
itself was created was essentially
ignored. Mackenzie Bowell,
the Grand Master of the
Orange Lodge and future
Conservative prime minister,
moved for and won Riel’s
expulsion from the House.
But the new Liberal government
of Alexander Mackenzie,
put into office in the "Pacific
Scandal" election of 1874
by voters seeking to punish
Macdonald, proclaimed an
amnesty for Riel in April,
1875. Unfortunately for
Riel, it was made conditional
upon his exile for five
years under an extraordinary
Manitoba court order made
against him a few months
earlier. In effect the Manitoba
court finding of "outlaw"
against him amounted to
a bizarre finding of guilt
for the murder of Scott
in Riel’s absence. The order
in the circumstances thus
probably had no basis in
law certainly none in justice
-- and should have been
ignored by Mackenzie.
Following
the federal election in
1878, Riel’s arch-enemy
John A. Macdonald was returned
to power. In the interval
after his expulsion from
the House, Riel travelled
widely in America and clearly
suffered several bouts of
mental illness. Much of
the time he was penniless.
In 1876, he was committed
to a mental hospital near
Quebec City for a period
even though he was still
banished from Canada. Even
Howard his biographer and
admirer was convinced that
he showed "symptoms of paranoid
schizophrenia." The Riel
of 1884-85 was clearly not
the perfectly rational leader
of 1869-70, but bearing
in mind what he had been
through since, whose mind
could have resisted better?
When
he returned to the West
in 1878, he found that the
steamboats and Red River
carts had gone overnight
with the arrival of the
railway. The buffalo were
gone; the local Métis were
discouraged, and felt threatened
by the westward advance
of an agricultural civilization.
"These impulsive half-breeds..
.must be kept down by a
strong hand until they are
swamped by the influx of
settlers," John A. Macdonald
had written to Sir John
Rose in 1870. The process
had begun.
Riel
worried about his people,
but resolved to move on
to the freedom and older
ways of Montana. He became
a wood chopper, a trader
and mediator between Indians
or Métis and white Americans.
In 1881, he married 21-year-old
Marguerite Monet, the daughter
of a buffalo hunter, to
whom he was unfailingly
considerate until his death.
A son, Jean, was soon born
and then Marie Angelique.
Riel became an American
citizen and was active in
Republican politics. He
also taught Blackfoot Indian
boys at a mission school
at St. Peters.
In
early June 1884, Gabriel
Dumont and other Métis from
what is now northern Saskatchewan
came to invite Riel to take
charge of their campaign
to seek redress from Ottawa
for their grievances. Riel,
who had long maintained
a wish to help his people,
agreed to go without any
payment until September.
He and his family loaded
a cart and departed. Riel
evidently told a Montana
priest, before crossing
into Canada: "I see a gallows
on top of that hill, and
I am swinging from it."
The party pushed on to Batoche,
a Métis settlement 40 miles
southwest of Prince Albert.
Riel’s
speeches in the North-West
were moderate, making such
reasonable requests as free
title for the Métis on existing
land, provincial status
for the region, and representation
in the federal Parliament.
In December, a petition
drafted under the guidance
of Riel was sent to Ottawa,
proposing in addition to
the above items, responsible
government, provincial control
of natural resources, and
the building of a railway
to Hudson’s Bay to provide
access to Europe for prairie
products.
Macdonald,
who had been for some time
Minister of the Interior
as well as Prime Minister,
again demonstrated his lack
of interest in the North-West
by essentially ignoring
the numerous memorials and
petitions received from
the region. After Riel arrived
in the North-West, Macdonald’s
only response was to increase
the number of Mounted Police
in the Batoche district.
Even the commanding NWMP
officer at Fort Carlton,
L.N.F. Crozier, urged Macdonald
to survey the Métis land
in the manner they preferred;
had he done it, the North-West
Rebellion might not have
occurred. "Old Tomorrow,"
as the Western Indians had
first named the prime minister,
finally opted instead to
appoint a commission to
investigate Métis complaints;
but the Métis had long since
lost faith in his word and
the North-West Rebellion
broke out in late March
of 1885.
The
gross insensitivity of Macdonald
and his government was clearly
the major cause of the uprising.
Not a few Canadian historians
have recognized that the
Métis rebellion, coming
at precisely the right time,
saved the federal government
from political limbo and
the CPR from bankruptcy.
To Donald McLean, a Saskatchewan
authority of the Métis,
this was not a "fortunate
coincidence" but a careful
"design."
The
CPR certainly received further
public funding because of
the role it played in crushing
the Métis rebellion, and
its transcontinental line
was completed nine days
before the execution of
Louis Riel in Regina. William
Van Home, the CPR general
manager, later was quoted
as saying that "the CPR
should erect a monument
to Riel."
Riel’s
decision to establish a
provisional government under
the protection of the Métis
cavalry was in retrospect
both a tragedy and an act
of folly. Rupert’s Land
in 1869 lacked a government;
the North-West Territories
in 1885 had both a government
and an almost-completed
railway capable of delivering
Canadian troops in a matter
of days, not months. Nonetheless,
Riel called a mass meeting,
formed a council and called
his people to arms against
the oncoming police. The
support he had enjoyed among
the Catholic clergy and
whites vanished immediately.
The tragic last stand of
the Métis people was underway,
although Riel and Dumont
both knew in their hearts
from the outset that they
could not win a full-scale
war.
The
war for Western Canada’s
future was mercifully brief.
Approximately three thousand
troops were soon in the
Territories and moving against
fewer than 500 Métis soldiers.
At Fish Creek, outnumbered
six to one and later ten
to one, Dumont’s soldiers
held off 400 white troops
until they withdrew and
were immobilized for two
full weeks. Three battles
had taken place and three
times the Métis-Indian alliance
had won; but only 200 sharpshooters
remained as the North-West
Field Force neared the final
encounter at Batoche. After
a four-day battle, the Métis
gave up, thus ending two
months of combat. Riel surrendered
to Middleton; Dumont fled
to Montana.
Riel’s
conviction in Regina of
high treason, for which
at the time death was the
only penalty, raises many
questions. Did a territorial
magistrate’s court have
jurisdiction to hear one
of the most important trials
in Canadian history? Could
Riel as an American citizen
be properly convicted in
the particular circumstances
under a British treason
statute of 1352? Should
the presiding judge, Hugh
Richardson, as a member
of the anti-Catholic Orange
Order and a part-time magistrate
serving only at the pleasure
of the federal government,
not have disqualified himself
from the case? Why was the
trial held in Regina and
not in Winnipeg? Why were
the six jurors selected
all English-speaking Protestants
who were thus obliged to
depend on interpreters for
much of the testimony? Why
did Judge Richardson select
the names of the 36 prospective
jurors?
In
his personal address in
English to the jury, Riel
spoke of conditions of the
Prairie Métis and their
various unanswered petitions
to Ottawa, indicating that
he felt God wanted him to
make a better world for
his people. He wished to
be judged both sane and
not guilty, he argued, because
"I have acted reasonably
and in self-defence while
the government my accuser,
being irresponsible, and
consequently insane, cannot
but have acted wrongly."
Riel’s team of defence lawyers
from Quebec attempted from
the outset to prove him
insane in order to save
his life. But the accused’s
stirring speech to the jury
was so lucid overall that
it undid him because the
jurors could simply not
accept that anyone insane
could deliver such an address.
Riel’s
chief counsel, Charles Fitzpatrick,
who later became chief justice
of Canada, addressed the
jury for two hours. He stressed
that Riel had abandoned
his security in the U.S.
without asking for any payment
in order to help his people
in the North-West Territories
and to seek redress from
a stone-deaf government
two thousand miles away.
Would a sane man have declared
war on the British Empire
as Riel did? He ended by
urging a verdict of not
guilty by reason of insanity.
"I know that you shall not
weave the cord that shall
hang him and hang him high
in the face of all the world,
a poor confirmed lunatic;
a victim, gentlemen, of
oppression or the victim
of fanaticism."
The
judge’s charge to the jury
was anything but fair and
balanced on the evidence
heard, especially with respect
to the all-important insanity
issue, but neither the Manitoba
Queen’s Bench nor the Judicial
Committee of the Privy Council
in Britain would later order
a new trial. After retiring
for only an hour, the jury
returned with a guilty verdict
and a recommendation of
mercy.
Riel
thanked the jury for "clearing
me of the stain of insanity"
and spoke of being "hunted
like an elk for fifteen
years." He then asked for
a commission to decide whether
he was a murderer of Thomas
Scott. One of his jurors,
Edwin J. Brooks, answered
this question only five
decades later in a newspaper
interview: "We tried Louis
Riel for treason, but he
was hanged for the murder
of Thomas Scott." Richardson
sentenced him to be hanged,
showing in his remarks that
his view of the case was
identical with that of the
prosecutors. A few days
before the Riel trial, Richardson
had acquitted Riel’s white
assistant, Will Jackson,
of treason on grounds of
insanity.
A
flood of petitions and pleas
for clemency soon reached
Ottawa from many people
at home and abroad. Macdonald’s
resolve only hardened as
families, friends and the
political parties throughout
Canada split bitterly over
the issue. In an interview,
the 72-year-old Prime Minister
stamped his foot and said
what are possibly the most
insensitive words ever uttered
by a Canadian prime minister:
"He shall hang though every
dog in Quebec bark in his
favour." He also tried to
persuade a concerned governor
general that "this North-West
outbreak was a mere domestic
trouble, and ought not to
be elevated to the rank
of a rebellion.... It never
endangered the safety of
the state." This was indeed
an outrageous comment on
an incident that his government
had publicly characterized
as a major rebellion, whose
leader it prosecuted on
a charge of high treason.
The
governor general nonetheless
prevailed on him to appoint
a medical commission to
determine whether Riel was
still sane. If not, this
would provide his government
a sound reason to exercise
the royal prerogative of
mercy without disturbing
the court verdict.
The
prime minister shamelessly
manipulated the commission
in a gross abuse of his
office, admonishing one
commissioner to find Riel
sane and seriously distorting
the conclusion of the other
commissioner that Riel was
"not an accountable being."
Both Queen Victoria and
the President of the United
States, Grover Cleveland,
declined to interfere, the
first because an adamant
Macdonald indicated his
government would brook no
interference, the second
evidently because his secretary
of state and possibly the
British ambassador counselled
restraint. Clearly the decision
not to show the same mercy
to Riel as to the other
convicted rebellion prisoners
was based on political necessities.
Macdonald balanced his reelection
prospects in Ontario against
those in Quebec and decided
he could better afford to
lose a few seats in Quebec
than to have English Canada
turn against him.
Riel
died as he prayed, with
courage and dignity. Somehow
a final indignity was allowed
by the federal authorities
to its hired executioner,
Jack Henderson, a friend
of Thomas Scott and Riel’s
former prisoner. George
Stanley describes the last
moments of Riel in this
grim account: "Near the
enclosure behind which the
Métis tragedy was drawing
to a close, there stood
various groups of people,
talking and grumbling because
they could not see the hanging.
As the moment of the execution
approached, there was silence.
Then a dull heavy sound
as of a body falling. ‘The
God damned son of a bitch
is gone at last,’ said one
voice. ‘Yes,’ said another,
‘the son of a bitch is gone
for certain now.’ There
followed some heartless
laughter. But it was thin
and brittle."
Three
weeks later, Riel’s body
was taken secretly home
to St. Boniface from Regina.
After remaining in his mother’s
home for two nights while
hundreds of Métis filed
past, it was moved to the
cathedral in St. Boniface.
Archbishop Taché conducted
the requiem before a large
crowd and one of Western
Canada’s greatest sons was
buried nearby. On the brown
granite tombstone are the
words "Riel, 16 novembre
1885."
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