With such endowments, it was a matter of course that he should sooner or later enter the political arena. He had been only two years at the Bar, when (in 1834) he was elected by acclamation to represent the county of York in the New Brunswick Assembly. His return under such circumstances was a notable event, for he was only twenty-five years of age, and was the first candidate ever returned by that constituency without a contest. Prior to his return he held several political meetings in different parts of the county, at which he addressed the people in a fashion to which they had theretofore been wholly unaccustomed. He described the fundamental points of the constitution, and showed that the rights of the people had been systematically violated for a great many years. It is said that during one of these addresses a member of the ruling faction rode up to the hustings and demanded that Wilmot should be pulled down, or that he would yet become Attorney-General of the Province. The story sounds too good to be true. However that may be, he was not long in making his presence felt in the Assembly. He arrayed himself as the champion of Liberal principles--principles which had a much more slender following in those days than they have had in later times. The Family Compact had an existence in New Brunswick, as well as in the other British American colonies, and any aspiring young politician who refused to bow his head beneath the yoke, had to make up his mind for a large measure of obloquy and determined opposition. Young Wilmot had to bear his share of the burdens which fell to the lot of all advocates of popular rights in the days when Responsible Government was sneered at by those in authority. The New Brunswick oligarchy were somewhat less besotted and tyrannical than were those of Upper Canada and Nova Scotia, but there were abuses which called imperatively for removal, and grievous wrongs which cried aloud for redress. All the important offices were in the hands of the members of the Compact and their sycophants, and the only road to public preferment lay through their favour. Political power was confined to the Legislative and Executive Councils; for, although there was a Body called the Assembly, which was supposed to be the guardian of the rights of the people, it was a shadow without substance. Its votes produced no direct influence upon the advisers of the Sovereign's representative in the colony, who were permitted to keep their places of power and emolument, no matter how distasteful themselves and their policy might be to the popular branch of the Legislature. This oppressive domination was not confined to secular matters, but extended likewise to matters ecclesiastical. There was a dominant State Church. Dissenters were regarded by the adherents of that Church with disfavour, and were sometimes treated with contumely. A dissenting minister was not permitted by law to solemnize