ABSTRACT
This short chapter cannot recount the richness of events and opinions relating to monetary theory and policy in nineteenth-century Canada West. Fortunately, there are other sources. Once again the account here can build on Craufurd Good win’s book which refers to all the main works in question.1 In addition there is Adam Shortt’s awesome account of institutional and legislative developments,2 E.P.Neufeld’s masterful Financial System of Canada,3 and R.C.Mclvor’s Canadian Monetary, Banking and Fiscal Development.4 These supports notwithstanding, there are special difficulties in recounting the economics of Canada in the nineteenth century with reference to money and banking. Harold Innis, who dominated Canadian economic history in what must be considered its most flourishing years, dismissed Adam Shortt’s work on monetary policy in order to tell his own
story entirely in terms of fiscal policy. In consequence the financial and real aspects of Canadian economic development have never been pulled together. Little can be done here to remove this debilitating lacuna from Canadian economic history.
