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Canada becomes a country
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Canadian government buys land known as the Northwest from the Hudson's Bay Company. The Prairies become part of Canada.
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Canada creates first Immigration Act
The Canadian parliament passes its first Act dealing with immigration. This Act says nothing about which people will be allowed to immigrate to Canada. As a result, it is necessary to make amendments, or changes, to the law. These amendments prohibit criminals and destitute people from coming to Canada. Resource:
http://www1.canadiana.org/citm/specifique/immigration_e.html -
The Dominion Lands Act/ Homestead Act is passed.
On the payment of a ten-dollar fee, men aged over twenty-one can receive 160 acres of land. The Canadian government wants to settle the West with farmers loyal to Canada. They want to prevent American settlers from moving into the Canadian prairies and annexing the land to the United States. The government is also afraid of the territory becoming rampant with crime. Resource:
http://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/archives/prairie_immigration/educational_site/illhist/04.shtml -
Indian Act is created.
The government of Canada passed the Indian Act in 1876. It set out a process to move all First Nations people onto reserves and to set up a way of governing them. The government wanted the First Nations people to give up their traditionsand accept the laws, customs, and language of the majority of Canadians. Resource:
http://dsp-psd.pwgsc.gc.ca/Collection-R/LoPBdP/EB/prb9923-e.htm#1876-1996 -
National Policy introduced by Sir John A MacDonald.
When the Canadian-American Reciprocity Treaty ended Canada turned to tariffs. The National Policy was a Canadian economic program introduced by John A. Macdonald's Conservative Party in 1879 after it returned to power. It was based on high tariffs to protect Canada's manufacturing industry. Macdonald campaigned on the policy in the 1878 election, and beat the Liberal Party, which supported free trade. Resource:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation -
The federal government passes an Immigration Act restricting Chinese immigration to Canada.
A fifty-dollar head tax is charged to each immigrant. The head tax is gradually increased over the years, finally peaking at five hundred dollars in 1903. Resource:
http://www.ccnc.ca/redress/history.html -
Clifford Sifton is appointed Minister of the Interior.
Clifford Sifton is appointed Minister of the Interior, the government portfolio in charge of immigration. He is determined to populate the Canadian West with farmers and pursues this plan aggressively. Sifton prints pamphlets encouraging immigration to the Canadian Prairies in many languages and distributes them across the United States and Europe. Resource:
http://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/archives/prairie_immigration/educational_site/illhist/05.shtml -
The North Atlantic Trading Company is organized by Sifton.
Through this company, European shipping agents would direct agricultural settlers to Canada. If they did this, and the settlers were genuine farmers with at least one hundred dollars per family, the government in Ottawa would pay the shipping companies a large bonus. Resource:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3683/is_199710/ai_n8766767/
Image: http://bit.ly/aBZBBJ -
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Frank Oliver becomes Minister of the Interior.
Frank Oliver, the founder of the Edmonton Bulletin, the first Edmonton newspaper, becomes Minister of the Interior. While Sifton worried only about attracting farmers to Canada, Oliver worries about the ethnic origins of the immigrants. He moves to make Canada’s immigration policy more selective. Resource:
http://www.umanitoba.ca/libraries/archives/prairie_immigration/educational_site/illhist/05.shtml -
A new Immigration Act is passed.
This law amalgamates all previous legislation dealing with immigration. It also prohibits immigration to Canada for a group of undesirable people, primarily people either mentally or physically handicapped. The bill also gives the government the right to deport undesirable immigrants. Resource:
http://www1.canadiana.org/citm/specifique/immigration_e.html -
Continuous Journey Regulation of 1908 implemented
The Canadian government’s first attempt to restrict immigration from India was to pass an order-in-council on January 8, 1908, that prohibited immigration of persons who in the opinion of the Minister of the Interior did not come from the country of their birth or citizenship by a continuous journey and or through tickets purchased before leaving their country of their birth or nationality. Resource:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_immigration_to_Canada -
Frank Oliver passes another Immigration Act 1910
Frank Oliver passes another Immigration Act which places further restrictions on Canadian immigration. Although it does not openly restrict any ethnic group from coming to Canada, it gives the cabinet power to restrict access to any group on any grounds it chooses. Resource:
http://www1.canadiana.org/citm/specifique/immigration_e.html
Image: http://bit.ly/dmy4AY -
Chinese Immigration Act 1923 implemented.
A wave of immigrants from China were labourers brought in to help build the C.P.R. transcontinental railway but many left. In 1885 the Chinese Immigration Act was enacted, and a head tax was levied to control the ongoing influx of labour, although immigration continued as corporate interests in BC preferred to hire the cheaper labour made available to them by Chinese labour contractors
Resource:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_immigration_to_Canada
Video: http://bit.ly/cyCkNZ
