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The Royal Proclamation attempted to protect the Native peoples from uncontrolled white settlement, and it established basic principles which have determined legal relations between Native people and the government ever since.
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The Quebec Act of 1774 was intended to reorganize the way these British territories were governed. It gave substantial concessions to the French and the Native people, but it infuriated the English colonists in the Thirteen Colonies
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In 1775 fighting broke out between colonists and the British.
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The British government was unable to fight both the Americans, and France. The British finally surrendered to the Americans in 1781.
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Over 30,000 Loyalists settled in Nova Scotia, many of them in the western part of Nova Scotia, which became a separate colony called New Brunswick in 1784.
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The Constitutional Act of 1791 recognized the differences between the two populations in Quebec and split Quebec into two colonies.
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This period of greatest emigration from Britain, the period from 1815-1850, was known as the Great Migration.
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The 1837 Rebellion forced the British government to look carefully at how the colonies were governed and to bring in reforms.
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In 1837, the rebels in Upper Canada planned an uprising when the regular British troops were sent to Montreal to put down the rebellion in Lower Canada.
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During this period from 1848 to 1855 responsible government was also granted to each of the Maritime colonies, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland.
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Politics after 1849 were very unstable, and politicians in both Canada East and Canada West were looking for a better solution.
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In 1849 Lord Elgin accepted the decision of the assembly over the Rebellion Losses Bill in the face of opposition from the Chateau Clique, and so established the principle of responsible government