Government in Canada had hitherto been conducted by a Governor and a Legislative Council appointed by the Crown, there being no elected representative. A further advance in constitutional self-government was now considered desirable, and the "Constitutional Act of 1791" was passed by the parent Parliament in Great Britain. The ancient Province of Quebec was divided into two provinces, called Lower Canada and Upper Canada, very fairly representing the localities occupied, the one by the older or French-speaking subjects of His Majesty, and the other by the newcoming English-speaking Loyalists, who had followed their old flag into the forests of the northland.
This Act of 1791 gave the right of Parliamentary government to the people of Canada. A Legislative Council and a House of Assembly were created for each Province, the members of the latter house being elected by the votes of people in the counties and towns of each.
The Legislature of Upper Canada held its first session at Newark (now Niagara-on-the-Lake) in 1792, summoned, as said Lieutenant-Governor Simcoe in his opening speech, "Under the authority of an Act of Parliament of Great Britain, passed in the last year, which has established the British Constitution in this distant country." To this he added:
"The wisdom and beneficence of our Most Gracious Sovereign and the British Parliament have been eminently proved not only in imparting to us the same form of government, but in securing the benefit of the many provisions which guard this memorable Act, so that the blessings of our invulnerable constitution, we hope, will be extended to the remotest posterity."
As a sign of this self-government under the British Crown, the King issued his warrant from the Court of St. James on March 4th, 1792, authorizing a "_Great Seal for the Province of Upper Canada_," to be used in sealing all public instruments. The engraving (46), which is a photo reproduction of the seal attached to the Crown Patent of a grant of one hundred acres of land near Port Hope, Upper Canada, made to a U. E. Loyalist, shows the details of the design, being, as described in the royal warrant, "an anchor and sword crossed on a calumet of peace, encircled by a wreath of olives, surmounted by an imperial crown and the Union of Great Britain."