The Quebec Conference is the second meeting…

The Quebec Conference is the second meeting held in 1864 to discuss Canadian Confederation, held at the Old Parliament Building in Quebec in October.

Newfoundland also sends two observers, but does not participate directly in the proceedings.

British Columbia does not participate in the conference.

The major source of conflict at the conference, which begins on October 10, was between those who favors a strong central government, such as John A. Macdonald, and those who favor stronger provincial rights.

Representatives from the Maritimes and Canada East (now Quebec) tend to argue for provincial rights, fearing they will lose their cultural identity under a centralized government.

Macdonald thinks the failure of smaller, localized governments is evident in the American Civil War, which is being fought in the United States as the delegates meet in Charlottetown and Quebec.

The delegates eventually compromise, dividing powers between federal and provincial governments.

They also decide to have an elected lower house, the House of Commons, and an appointed upper house, the Senate, although there is considerable debate about how many senators each province would have.

Eventually, a proposed structure for the government is written out in the form of the seventy-two resolutions at the end of the conference on October 27, and the delegates return to their provinces to submit the Seventy-Two Resolutions to the provincial legislatures