880 THE FEDERATIONS AND THE UNION [PART Iv 
Quebec that escheats belonged to the province, and it was 
then agreed that ordinary escheats should go to the province 
and escheats in cases of treason, felony, &c., to the Dominion. 
Then Ontario legislated, and the Act was questioned in 1878 
in the case of the property of one Andrew Mercer, who had 
died intestate. The claim of the Government was made 
good in the Courts of the province, and then the Supreme 
Court decided in favour of the Dominion? This decision 
was reversed by the Judicial Committee,® who held, from 
8. 109 of the Constitution, that the escheats belonged to the 
province, as that section provides for leaving to the province 
lands, mines, minerals, and royalties, and the term royalties 
would cover the case. This section they held to include all 
the ordinary territorial revenue of the Crown.? 
(f) Pardon and Precedence 
The same curious view about the inability of the provinces 
to touch cases affecting the prerogative is seen in the attempts 
to show that the provinces could not give the Lieutenant- 
Governors the power of pardon, which was at last negatived 
by the Supreme Court,’ though merely on technical grounds, 
after the Judicial Committee ® had admitted the power of 
the laws of Quebec to deprive the Crown of the right to 
priority in the winding up of the affairs of an insolvent. 
c. 26, was disallowed; see Provincial Legislation, 1867-95, pp. 838, 839. 
The lands there are still Dominion lands (except the swamp lands), and so 
in Saskatchewan and Alberta ; they are provided for by a Dominion Act 
9 & 10 Edw. VII. c. 18. Cf. as to inability of orovinces to affect prerogative, 
Lefroy, op. cit., pp. 174 seq. 
' Canada Sess. Pap., 1877, No. 89, pp. 88-105; Attorney-General of 
Quebec v. Attorney-General of Canada, (1876) 1 Q. L. R. 177; 2 Q. L. R. 236. 
In Dumphy v. Kehoe, (1891) 21 R. L. 119, it was held that the goods of a 
felon belong to the province, not to the Dominion. Customs forfeitures 
belong to the Dominion according to 2 Q. L. R. at p. 241 ; Lefroy, p. 616. 
58. CR. 538. # 8 App. Cas. 767. 
' Hence Quebec legislated by 48 Vict. ¢. 10; New Brunswick in 1877, 
c. 9; Nova Scotia in Rev. Stat,, 1900, c. 127, &c. See also the Dominion 
Act of 1910 for Alberta, Saskatchewan, and the Manitoba crown lands. 
#238. C. R. 458; see 19 0. A. R. 31; 20 0. R. 222. 
3 118921 A, C. 437.