Dalton McCarthy or D'Alton McCarthy, was a Canadian

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 lawyer and parliament

Parliament of Canada

The Parliament of Canada is the federal legislative branch of Canada, seated at Parliament Hill in the national capital, Ottawa. Formally, the body consists of the Canadian monarch—represented by her governor general—the Senate, and the House of Commons, each element having its own officers and...

arian. It was his firm, Boulton & McCarthy in Barrie, that was the first incarnation of what is now Canada's largest law firm, McCarthy Tétrault

McCarthy Tétrault

McCarthy Tétrault LLP is a law firm with offices in Canada’s major commercial centres and in London, UK. It provides business law, litigation, tax, real estate, and labour and employment law services....

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McCarthy was first elected to the Canadian House of Commons

Canadian House of Commons

The House of Commons of Canada is a component of the Parliament of Canada, along with the Sovereign and the Senate. The House of Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 308 members known as Members of Parliament...

 in the 1878 federal election

Canadian federal election, 1878

The Canadian federal election of 1878 was held on September 17 to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 4th Parliament of Canada. It resulted in the end of Prime Minister Alexander Mackenzie's Liberal government after only one term in office. Canada suffered an economic depression...

 as a Conservative. An Irish

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

-born Protestant, McCarthy was stridently anti-Catholic

Catholic

The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...

 and anti-French Canadian

French Canadian

French Canadian or Francophone Canadian, , generally refers to the descendents of French colonists who arrived in New France in the 17th and 18th centuries...

. He broke with the Conservatives in the 1890s, running and being re-elected as an Independent Member of Parliament

Member of Parliament

A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...

 (MP) in the 1891 election

Canadian federal election, 1891

The Canadian federal election of 1891 was held on March 5 to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 7th Parliament of Canada. It was won by the Conservative Party of Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald....

. McCarthy was a founder of the "Imperial Federation League", which proposed uniting the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 and the emerging dominions under a central Cabinet government responsible to an Imperial Parliament elected from throughout the Empire

British Empire

The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...

. McCarthy ran his own slate of McCarthyite candidates

McCarthyite candidates 1896

The McCarthyites were a short-lived anti-Catholic and anti-French-Canadian political movement which contested the 23 June 1896 federal election in Canada.Dalton McCarthy was the only "McCarthyite" to win election, and the movement disbanded in 1898....

 in the 1896 election

Canadian federal election, 1896

The Canadian federal election of 1896 was held on June 23, 1896 to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 8th Parliament of Canada. Though the Conservative Party won a plurality of the popular vote, the Liberal Party, led by Wilfrid Laurier, won the majority of seats to form the...

, but was the only one elected.

Following the 1896 election, McCarthy forged an alliance with Wilfrid Laurier

Wilfrid Laurier

Sir Wilfrid Laurier, GCMG, PC, KC, baptized Henri-Charles-Wilfrid Laurier was the seventh Prime Minister of Canada from 11 July 1896 to 6 October 1911....

's Liberal Party

Liberal Party of Canada

The Liberal Party of Canada , colloquially known as the Grits, is the oldest federally registered party in Canada. In the conventional political spectrum, the party sits between the centre and the centre-left. Historically the Liberal Party has positioned itself to the left of the Conservative...

. He would likely have been appointed to cabinet in 1898 had he not died following a carriage accident.

McCarthy was a key figure in the Manitoba Schools Question

Manitoba Schools Question

The Manitoba Schools Question was a political crisis in the Canadian Province of Manitoba that occurred late in the 19th century, involving publicly funded separate schools for Roman Catholics and Protestants...

, and a major proponent in pushing English only in legislatures, courts, and schools of Western Canada. He also defended Emily Stowe

Emily Stowe

Dr. Emily Howard Stowe was the first female doctor to practice in Canada, and an activist for women's rights and suffrage. Emily Stowe was born in Norwich Township, Oxford County, Ontario...

 in the 1879 abortion trial of Emily Stowe

Abortion trial of Emily Stowe

The abortion trial of Emily Stowe was a famous early Canadian judicial decision on abortion in Canada. The case involved Dr. Emily Stowe, one of Canada's first female doctors. Stowe was acquitted, which was a rare outcome for abortion trials in the nineteenth century.-Background:The case began...

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