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Extraordinary Canadians
Extraordinary Canadians: Louis Hippolyte Lafontaine & Robert Baldwin
Canada has no better interpreter than prolific writer and thinker John Ralston Saul. Here he argues that Canada did not begin in 1867; indeed, its foundation was laid by two visionary men, Louis-Hippolyte LaFontaine and Robert Baldwin. The two leaders of Lower and Upper Canada, respectively, worked together after the 1841 Union to lead a reformist movement for responsible government run by elected citizens instead of a colonial governor.
But it was during the "Great Ministry" of 1848—51 that the two politicians implemented laws that created a more equitable country. They revamped judicial institutions, created a public education system, made bilingualism official, designed a network of public roads, began a public postal system, and reformed municipal governance. Faced with opposition, and even violence, the two men— polar opposites in temperament—united behind a set of principles and programs that formed modern Canada. Writing with verve and deep conviction, Saul restores these two extraordinary Canadians to rightful prominence.
273 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 5, 2010
About the author
John Ralston Saul
56 books231 followersJohn Ralston Saul is a Canadian writer, essayist, and public intellectual best known for his provocative works on themes such as individualism, citizenship, democracy, globalization, and the role of the public intellectual. His books, widely translated and read around the world, challenge conventional economic and political thinking and advocate for civic responsibility and ethical governance. A celebrated critic of technocratic and corporatist ideologies, Saul is often recognized for his passionate defense of the public good and his deep belief in the transformative power of engaged citizenship.
Born in Ottawa, Saul was educated in Canada, France, and the United Kingdom. He holds a PhD from King’s College London, where he focused on the modernization of France during the Algerian War. Early in his career, he worked in both the corporate world and in diplomacy, notably serving as an assistant to André Malraux, the famed French novelist and minister. These experiences informed his understanding of the interplay between power, culture, and politics, which would later become central to his writing.
Saul first gained international attention with his 1988 philosophical novel Voltaire’s Bastards: The Dictatorship of Reason in the West, a critique of how rationality, while necessary, had been distorted into a cold, managerial ideology disconnected from ethics, culture, and human values. The book, and subsequent works like The Unconscious Civilization and The Doubter’s Companion, positioned him as a leading voice in what he called “responsible humanism”—a worldview that values reason but insists it be balanced by intuition, memory, and imagination.
His 2008 book A Fair Country: Telling Truths About Canada argued that Canada’s political culture is deeply shaped by Indigenous values, particularly egalitarianism, negotiation, and mutual respect. The book challenged traditional Eurocentric narratives and emphasized the need for a new national conversation built on inclusion and reconciliation. This work reflects Saul’s long-standing commitment to Indigenous issues in Canada, which has also shaped his public advocacy.
Saul served as president of PEN International, the global writers’ organization, from 2009 to 2015, where he championed freedom of expression and supported writers under threat around the world. He is also the longtime companion and husband of Adrienne Clarkson, former Governor General of Canada, and served as her close advisor during her tenure from 1999 to 2005.
His many awards include the Governor General’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction, the Pablo Neruda Medal, and the Canada Council Molson Prize. Saul is also a Companion of the Order of Canada and a Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France.
Through his essays, novels, lectures, and international work, John Ralston Saul has established himself as one of Canada’s foremost thinkers—a defender of thoughtful dissent and a persistent voice for a more just, inclusive, and imaginative society. His work continues to influence debates on democracy, culture, and civic engagement both in Canada and abroad.
Born in Ottawa, Saul was educated in Canada, France, and the United Kingdom. He holds a PhD from King’s College London, where he focused on the modernization of France during the Algerian War. Early in his career, he worked in both the corporate world and in diplomacy, notably serving as an assistant to André Malraux, the famed French novelist and minister. These experiences informed his understanding of the interplay between power, culture, and politics, which would later become central to his writing.
Saul first gained international attention with his 1988 philosophical novel Voltaire’s Bastards: The Dictatorship of Reason in the West, a critique of how rationality, while necessary, had been distorted into a cold, managerial ideology disconnected from ethics, culture, and human values. The book, and subsequent works like The Unconscious Civilization and The Doubter’s Companion, positioned him as a leading voice in what he called “responsible humanism”—a worldview that values reason but insists it be balanced by intuition, memory, and imagination.
His 2008 book A Fair Country: Telling Truths About Canada argued that Canada’s political culture is deeply shaped by Indigenous values, particularly egalitarianism, negotiation, and mutual respect. The book challenged traditional Eurocentric narratives and emphasized the need for a new national conversation built on inclusion and reconciliation. This work reflects Saul’s long-standing commitment to Indigenous issues in Canada, which has also shaped his public advocacy.
Saul served as president of PEN International, the global writers’ organization, from 2009 to 2015, where he championed freedom of expression and supported writers under threat around the world. He is also the longtime companion and husband of Adrienne Clarkson, former Governor General of Canada, and served as her close advisor during her tenure from 1999 to 2005.
His many awards include the Governor General’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction, the Pablo Neruda Medal, and the Canada Council Molson Prize. Saul is also a Companion of the Order of Canada and a Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France.
Through his essays, novels, lectures, and international work, John Ralston Saul has established himself as one of Canada’s foremost thinkers—a defender of thoughtful dissent and a persistent voice for a more just, inclusive, and imaginative society. His work continues to influence debates on democracy, culture, and civic engagement both in Canada and abroad.
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
October 23, 2016
A must-read for Canadians, about the two architects of Responsible Government that replaced the Family Compact and colonial puppet masters, circa 1850, and paved the way for Confederation.
Canada has had a bloody history too. But one tempered by non-confrontation espoused by these two lesser-known politicians, an art that was later made famous by Gandhi and Mandela.
Canada has been a racist and bigoted country too, and we don't have to look south of the border in smugness to find these ills. And yet, it is through the vanquishing of such forces that democracy is born.
Canada has had crooked politicians too, and politics has always been a dirty business.
Despite this shady past, it is good to discover that Canada was one of the leaders in modern democracy along with Belgium, and to a limited extent, Britain. According to the author, the rest of the world truly arrived on the democratic map a hundred year later, following the end of WWII.
It is also good to know that Canada was one of the first nations to enact laws governing universities, municipality corporations, the national postal service, trial by jury, appeals court, title registration and other building blocks that anchor a modern democracy. The architecting of many of these laws is attributed to Lafontain and Baldwin.
Baldwin and LaFontaine were opposites in many ways: one an Anglophone, the other Francophone, one haunted by and faithful to the memory of his dead spouse, the other who was never left wife-less for too long, one quiet, the other gregarious; and yet they were friends, brought together by the evolution of a nation that called upon them to seize the moment. Kudos also need to be given to Lord Elgin, Governor General, for keeping out and letting the locals get on with the process of designing self-government, something mishandled in later nations like Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.
What is sad is that just as they were at the height of their power and influence, Lafontaine and Baldwin quietly faded out of the political scene, retiring into obscurity, allowing others to take the credit for Confederation that followed shortly after their deaths.
Ralston Saul has done us a great service by bringing Lafontaine and Baldwin to our consciousness.
Canada has had a bloody history too. But one tempered by non-confrontation espoused by these two lesser-known politicians, an art that was later made famous by Gandhi and Mandela.
Canada has been a racist and bigoted country too, and we don't have to look south of the border in smugness to find these ills. And yet, it is through the vanquishing of such forces that democracy is born.
Canada has had crooked politicians too, and politics has always been a dirty business.
Despite this shady past, it is good to discover that Canada was one of the leaders in modern democracy along with Belgium, and to a limited extent, Britain. According to the author, the rest of the world truly arrived on the democratic map a hundred year later, following the end of WWII.
It is also good to know that Canada was one of the first nations to enact laws governing universities, municipality corporations, the national postal service, trial by jury, appeals court, title registration and other building blocks that anchor a modern democracy. The architecting of many of these laws is attributed to Lafontain and Baldwin.
Baldwin and LaFontaine were opposites in many ways: one an Anglophone, the other Francophone, one haunted by and faithful to the memory of his dead spouse, the other who was never left wife-less for too long, one quiet, the other gregarious; and yet they were friends, brought together by the evolution of a nation that called upon them to seize the moment. Kudos also need to be given to Lord Elgin, Governor General, for keeping out and letting the locals get on with the process of designing self-government, something mishandled in later nations like Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.
What is sad is that just as they were at the height of their power and influence, Lafontaine and Baldwin quietly faded out of the political scene, retiring into obscurity, allowing others to take the credit for Confederation that followed shortly after their deaths.
Ralston Saul has done us a great service by bringing Lafontaine and Baldwin to our consciousness.
March 8, 2021
This was a great story which I am glad to have read from the perspective of Baldwin and Lafontaine.
My problem with this book is that it seems to totally fail as a piece of political history. First, there is a lot that one need already know about Canadian history in order to understand the details of what is going on. For example, you would have to understand what the Rebellion Losses Bill was or why there were even riots to begin with in 1837. Second, this book failed because it was totally biased. Why were the Reformers successful? Because they were principled and not divided by race. Why did the English persist in their attempts to control Canada? Because they were prideful and stupid, of course. But neither of these explanations make clear that there were very real interests in both reforming Canada and keeping it colonial. At the end, Saul admits that the Compacts' betrayal of the Crown was out of their own self-interest but will not provide that as a reason for their being so opposed to a republican (or Responsibly Governed) Canada in the first place. Further, Saul cannot explain why the Reformers saw electoral success in 1841 and 1848 but failed in 1844. What were the political interests at play which saw these drastic differences in electoral results?
Don't get me wrong, I think Baldwin and Lafontaine are Canadian political heroes and I also understand that this is a bibliography, not a political history book. But, it's difficult to really understand what Baldwin and Lafontaine were up against if all we can do is label their opposition as "English stupidity" and their quest as "restrained Canadian democracy".
As a point in the author's favor, he argued that Lafontaine paved the way for peaceful resistors like Gandhi and Mandela which is dope.
My problem with this book is that it seems to totally fail as a piece of political history. First, there is a lot that one need already know about Canadian history in order to understand the details of what is going on. For example, you would have to understand what the Rebellion Losses Bill was or why there were even riots to begin with in 1837. Second, this book failed because it was totally biased. Why were the Reformers successful? Because they were principled and not divided by race. Why did the English persist in their attempts to control Canada? Because they were prideful and stupid, of course. But neither of these explanations make clear that there were very real interests in both reforming Canada and keeping it colonial. At the end, Saul admits that the Compacts' betrayal of the Crown was out of their own self-interest but will not provide that as a reason for their being so opposed to a republican (or Responsibly Governed) Canada in the first place. Further, Saul cannot explain why the Reformers saw electoral success in 1841 and 1848 but failed in 1844. What were the political interests at play which saw these drastic differences in electoral results?
Don't get me wrong, I think Baldwin and Lafontaine are Canadian political heroes and I also understand that this is a bibliography, not a political history book. But, it's difficult to really understand what Baldwin and Lafontaine were up against if all we can do is label their opposition as "English stupidity" and their quest as "restrained Canadian democracy".
As a point in the author's favor, he argued that Lafontaine paved the way for peaceful resistors like Gandhi and Mandela which is dope.
November 18, 2010
Excellent biography of two of the founding philosophers of Canada--and two of the people who did so much of the early heavy lifting in creating it.
If you've read John Ralston Saul's previous book, A Fair Country, what's also neat about this book is seeing how he's developed his argument in that book through these figures and through history. It would be interesting to see another historian's take on all this -- is he finding confirmation in the foundation of Canada for his theories on what makes it a nation, or is he viewing everything through his own philosophy's lens so narrowly that he sees support for it everywhere?
I admit my bias and note that it's a philosophy and a theory that I love and wholeheartedly support, so it makes both books wonderful to me. And I got to know a little about two of the people who kicked all of that off, staring down many a mob in Toronto and Montreal in the 1840s.
If you've read John Ralston Saul's previous book, A Fair Country, what's also neat about this book is seeing how he's developed his argument in that book through these figures and through history. It would be interesting to see another historian's take on all this -- is he finding confirmation in the foundation of Canada for his theories on what makes it a nation, or is he viewing everything through his own philosophy's lens so narrowly that he sees support for it everywhere?
I admit my bias and note that it's a philosophy and a theory that I love and wholeheartedly support, so it makes both books wonderful to me. And I got to know a little about two of the people who kicked all of that off, staring down many a mob in Toronto and Montreal in the 1840s.
February 27, 2013
Absolutely vital to understanding how politics in Canada developed. Two underrated Canadian heroes.
July 23, 2018
An excellent dual biography of two Canadian political figures who deserve to be better known for their development of the reform movement for Responsible Government and other contributions to modern Canadian politics, education and society. John Ralston Saul presents the closely intertwined personal and political lives of Baldwin and LaFontaine. They were both surrounded by strong women. Baldwin's daughter Maria became his unofficial private secretary, declaring confidently "Do you think I have lived all my life among politicians for nothing? No indeed! Politics are with me as though they were a second nature." LaFontaine's wife Adele worked on behalf of political prisoners during the 1837 Rebellions. Both men were haunted by circumstances in their personal lives: Baldwin became a widower at a young age and LaFontaine's first marriage was childless. They both poured their energies into politics.
19th century Canadian history has a reputation for being calm and uneventful but John Ralston Saul provides a vivid account of the conflicts of times. As a child, Baldwin fled the burning of what is now Toronto by American troops during the war of 1812. The Rebellions of 1837 cost lives in both Upper and Lower Canada and a few of the rocks thrown at Governor General Lord Elgin at the time of the burning of parliament in 1849 are still in the collection of Library and Archives Canada. Ralston Saul also places events in Canada in a wider trans-Atlantic context, examining the impact of the European political upheavals of 1848 and the emigration following the Irish Potato Famine on Canadian politics and society. Highly recommended, especially for Canadians!
19th century Canadian history has a reputation for being calm and uneventful but John Ralston Saul provides a vivid account of the conflicts of times. As a child, Baldwin fled the burning of what is now Toronto by American troops during the war of 1812. The Rebellions of 1837 cost lives in both Upper and Lower Canada and a few of the rocks thrown at Governor General Lord Elgin at the time of the burning of parliament in 1849 are still in the collection of Library and Archives Canada. Ralston Saul also places events in Canada in a wider trans-Atlantic context, examining the impact of the European political upheavals of 1848 and the emigration following the Irish Potato Famine on Canadian politics and society. Highly recommended, especially for Canadians!
January 9, 2011
Excellent book. Interesting historical dynamic in Canada, and the British revisionist history we are all used to is a bit sad. Great writing style, and I'd say a must for any proud Canadian.
December 30, 2025
Not as interesting as some of the others books in the Extraordinary Canadians series, but I am glad to know more about pre-confederation politics now.
November 9, 2010
Excellent book about Canadian History. Easy to read
February 19, 2019
A book by a clear and brilliant mind. Thoroughly enjoyable read!
July 7, 2019
Fascinating double biography of two great Canadian figures. The author restores credit to these two friends for developing a stable basis for modern Canadian democracy; he argues that their innovations are distinctively Canadian, especially with respect to long-established European divisions of class or race or language. Most of all, this book is a gripping read that makes the chaotic & passionate period in Canadian history come alive!
February 14, 2022
John Ralston Saul has written a wonderful little book on two underappreciated Canadians; one English, Robert Baldwin, and one French, Louis-Hippolyte Lafontaine. He makes a persuasive case that these two political leaders shaped the social and political landscape at a time when Canada was emerging from under the direct control of Imperial Britain. The book reaffirms and celebrates some key foundations of the Canadian identity. An accessible and an easy-to-read story.
May 28, 2023
It is interesting account of two men who are responsible for the political and judicial system we take for granted in Canada today. Up until then, political, judicial, and economic decisions were made by the Family Compact, an anti-democratic group of appointed men. Louis-Hippolyte and Robert Baldwin laid the basis for Responsible Government.
October 15, 2019
Excellent history lesson, especially as we are looking at a very difficult federal election right now.
June 16, 2014
I was given this book took read by a fellow book club member and was absolutely astounded by what I didn't know about Canadian History and history in my own back yard!!
I was enthralled by the accomplishments of these two brave men in spite of the Orange order and Family Compact. Every Canadian should know about these men and their accomplishments.
These men deserve poems songs and Accolades,please read this book if you are Canadian.
I was enthralled by the accomplishments of these two brave men in spite of the Orange order and Family Compact. Every Canadian should know about these men and their accomplishments.
These men deserve poems songs and Accolades,please read this book if you are Canadian.
August 12, 2013
Thank you Mr. Saul for reminding me that Canada has interesting history; that Canada has great historical figures, these two being among the greatest; that Canada is indeed exceptional in the world. Lafontaine and Baldwin were men decades, if not a full century, ahead of their time. They, along with Governor General, Lord Elgin, are the true fathers of democracy in Canada.
August 11, 2016
Probably the most important popular book on Canada published in the last decade.
I bought ten copies as Christmas presents the year it came out.
Understanding Canada requires a bit of detective work - this book is a great place to start.
I bought ten copies as Christmas presents the year it came out.
Understanding Canada requires a bit of detective work - this book is a great place to start.
November 15, 2015
This should be required reading for every Canadian student and immigrant. If you want to understand modern Canada, this true story is a great place to start. It's the story of how the modern nation of Canada really began, many years before 1867.
July 26, 2014
One of the most important books on the history of Canadians ever written. Every school should make this a part of their Canadian History curriculum.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews