The Bank of the People, 1835-1840: Law and Money in Upper Canada

Abstract

In Upper Canada, money and banking were viscerally political issues, considered central to the broader legal order. Faced with a chronic shortage of coin, the British flooded the colony with publicly issued bills to fund the War of 1812. By the 1830s, this monetary issue was fully redeemed and replaced with notes issued by the colony’s first three chartered banks. Upper Canada’s Reformers saw those banks as public agents, playing a public role, but without democratic accountability. After several failed attempts to modify that system, they turned to establishing their own institution, named the Bank of the People. In doing so, they saw themselves not as merely engaging in private commerce, but as directly contesting this fundamental public provision. This article provides a legal-political history of that early contest over Canadian money and sovereignty, and explores how the Reformers put forth a critique of bank-issued money that remains relevant today.

Keywords: Money, Banks, Monetary Sovereignty, Monetary System, Upper Canada, Legal History, Legal History of Capitalism, Canadian Legal History, Financial Institutions, Canadian Legal History