774 THE FEDERATIONS AND THE UNION [part IV 
assent of the Crown cannot be given to any such Bill until 
the Legislative Assembly has presented an address to the 
Lieutenant-Governor, reciting that the assent of such majority 
has duly been given, and the instructions to the Lieutenant- 
Governor remind him of the obligation. This clause was 
inserted at the desire of those who wished to secure for the 
districts in question, which were in part British and not 
French, that their votes should not be swamped by their 
merger with other French-Canadian districts.* This express 
provision must override, it would seem, the general power 
to amend given by s. 92 (1) of the Act of 1867, which 
allows the amendment from time to time, ‘ notwithstanding 
anything in this Act,” of the constitution of the province, 
except as regards the office of Lieutenant-Governor. But 
though such an Act, which merely changed the districts, 
would require to be so passed, it does not seem that an 
Act abolishing the proviso itself could need more than 
ordinary majorities, in which case the proviso could first 
be repealed and then the Act passed. The position has 
not yet arisen, for the main change made in the constitu- 
tion by the province is the increasing of the period of the 
Legislature to five years in place of the four contemplated in 
the Act of 1867. The other provinces have also changed their 
constitutions : in New Brunswick the Upper House has 
disappeared by an Act of 1891, and in Prince Edward Island 
the same fate has befallen it by an Act of 1893 ; in Manitoba 
it went in 1876, after a brief existence of six years. In British 
Columbia the constitution from being a Crown Colony one was 
before federation made by local Act representative, it being 
agreed in the articles of union 2 that this would be the case. 
' They are now mainly French, Times, June 24, 1911. 
* This is an interesting case, according to Lefroy, p. 749, n. 1, for before 
anion the province, having a non-representative legislature, had no power of 
alteration ; the power was then given by the Order in Council approving 
the union, which has, under 30 Vict. ¢. 3, the force of an Imperial Act. 
But this is an error; by Order in Council of August 9, 1870, a representative 
legislature was constituted under the authority of 33 & 34 Vict. c. 66, and 
responsible government was created by Act No. 147, 1871.