merchantocracy n

• Format: Manuscript
• Language: English
• Subjects: English language > Dialects > Newfoundland and Labrador; Newfoundland
• Online Access: http://collections.mun.ca/cdm/ref/collection/elrcdne/id/54781

merchantocracy The persons opposed to the merchantocracy-- which had been hitherto, in consequence of the island being merely a station for the fishery, the real rulers of it, and had become connected with several of the leading and subordinate resident officials, who, very naturally, had no desire to be disturbed, either in their offices or their power--say that, until the natives and the / leading people of the Roman-catholic persuasion can gain admission to the participation of these offices, things can never go on smoothly. 80 The merchants or their nominees were returned for the first parliament by "universal suffrage" and "acclamation," and everything was joy and gladness in the land. But this pleasant face of affairs quickly altered; the people who had sighed for the honours of a provincial parliament soon found they were as far from it as before, and that the merchantocracy was not quite so foolish or so blinded by the novelty of the thing as to give up one iota of its time-honoured claims and rule. PRINTED ITEM DNE Sup G. M. Story DEC 8 1988 WK Used Sup Used Sup Used Sup