Honoré Mercier (October 15,
1840 – October 30, 1894) was a lawyer, journalist and politician in
Quebec
, Canada
. He
was the
Premier of Quebec from
January 27, 1887 to December 21, 1891, as leader of the
Parti National or
Quebec Liberal Party
(PLQ).
Early Background
Mercier
was born in St-Athanase,
Lower Canada, studied at the Jesuit
College Sainte-Marie in Montreal
and was
called to the Bar of Quebec in April
1865. As the age of 22, Mercier became the editor of
Le
Courrier de St-Hyacinthe newspaper. He opposed the
Confederation project as early as
1864, believing that it would be detrimental to
French Canadians.
Mercier was
Lomer Gouin's father-in-law
and is an ancestor of
Thomas Mulcair,
the current member of Parliament for the Montreal riding of
Outremont.
Member of Parliament
In 1871, he was instrumental in creating the short-lived
Parti
National. Mercier successfully ran as a
Liberal candidate in the
1872 election. He became
Member of the
House of
Commons for the district of
Rouville. He did not run for
re-election in the
1874
election.
In the 1878 election, Mercier was
candidate in the district of St.
Hyacinthe
. He was defeated by the
Louis Tellier, his
Conservative
opponent.
Provincial Politics
In 1879, Mercier was appointed
Solicitor General of Canada in
the
Cabinet of
Premier Henri-Gustave Joly de
Lotbinière and served in that position for less than a year. He
won a
by-election and became Member of
the
Legislative
Assembly for the district of
Saint-Hyacinthe.
He was re-elected in the
1881 and
1886 elections and won another
by-election in 1887.
He left an impact on a later leader by the name of Henri
Bourassa
Party Leader
He became the leader of the PLQ in 1883. A practising lawyer, from
1885 to 1887 he was President of the
Bar
of Montreal. He strongly opposed the execution of
Louis Riel in 1885; this event helped him win
popular support, and the
Quebec Conservative Party lost
support because its federal counterparts had ordered Riel's
execution.
Seizing the opportunity to build a coalition with dissident
Conservatives, Mercier revived the
Parti National name for
the
1886 Quebec provincial
election, and won a majority of seats. However, the coalition
consisted of mostly Liberals and only a few Conservatives, so the
"Liberal" name was soon reinstituted. The Conservatives, reduced to
a minority in the
Legislative Assembly, clung
to power for a few more months, but Mercier became Premier of
Quebec in 1887.
Premier of Quebec
As Premier of Quebec, Mercier initiated the idea of interprovincial
conferences in 1887. He was the first Quebec premier to defend the
principle of provincial autonomy within the confederation,
campaigning to abolish the federal government's claimed right to
veto provincial legislation. A couple of years after his death, the
British
Privy Council did so.
With his strong nationalist stance, Mercier was very much a
precursor of later nationalist premiers in future decades who
confronted the federal government and tried to win more power for
Quebec.
He
promoted contacts with francophones in
other parts of North America outside of Quebec including Western Canada and New England
. Those francophones had not yet been
assimilated into the English-Canadian or American culture to the
extent they would be in the future. Mercier promoted reform,
economic development, Catholicism, and the French language. He won
popularity but also made enemies. He was returned to the
legislature as the Member for the district of
Bonaventure and
his party won the
1890
election with an increased majority.
Political downfall
On
December 16,
1891, he was dismissed by Lieutenant Governor
Auguste-Réal Angers after a report
concluded that his government had diverted public funds. He lost
the
1892 election, and
gave up the party leadership to
Félix-Gabriel Marchand. He was
brought to trial later that year and found not guilty when a second
report concluded differently on the matter. However, his health had
greatly deteriorated and his political career was over.
He died in
1894 at the age of 54, and was interred in the Notre Dame des
Neiges Cemetery
in Montreal, Quebec.
Legacy
The following landmarks were named to honour Honoré Mercier:
Elections as party leader
He won a majority of seats in the
1886 election and became
premier in 1887 after the
minority
government fell, won the
1890 election and was
dismissed from office in 1891 and lost the
1892 election.
See also
External links
with the South Shore;
, Quebec
neighbourhood in Montreal
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