It is not possible here to analyse the Resolutions in detail. They called the attention of the home government to some real abuses. The subservience of the Legislative Council to the Executive Council; the partisanship of some of the judges; the maladministration of the wild lands; grave irregularities in the receiver-general's office; the concentration of a variety of public offices in the same persons; the failure of the governor to issue a writ for the election of a representative for the county of Montreal; and the expenditure of public moneys without the consent of the Assembly--all these, and many others, were enlarged upon. If the framers of the Resolutions had only cared to make out a very strong case they might have done so. But the language which they employed to present their case was almost certainly calculated to injure it seriously in the eyes of the home government. {40} 'We are in no wise disposed,' they told the king, 'to admit the excellence of the present constitution of Canada, although the present colonial secretary unseasonably and erroneously asserts that the said constitution has conferred on the two Canadas the institutions of Great Britain.' With an extraordinary lack of tact they assured the king that Toryism was in America 'without any weight or influence except what it derives from its European supporters'; whereas Republicanism 'overspreads all America.' Nor did they stop there. 'This House,' they announced, 'would esteem itself wanting in candour to Your Majesty if it hesitated to call Your Majesty's attention to the fact, that in less than twenty years the population of the United States of America will be greater than that of Great Britain, and that of British America will be greater than that of the former English colonies, when the latter deemed that the time was come to decide that the inappreciable advantage of being self-governed ought to engage them to repudiate a system of colonial government which was, generally speaking, much better than that of British America now is.' This unfortunate reference to the American Revolution, with its {41} hardly veiled threat of rebellion, was scarcely calculated to commend the Ninety-Two Resolutions to the favourable consideration of the British government. And when the Resolutions went on to demand, not merely the removal, but the impeachment of the governor, Lord Aylmer, it must have seemed to unprejudiced bystanders as if the framers of the Resolutions had taken leave of their senses.