William Alexander Foster
| William Alexander Foster | |
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Foster in the 1880s
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| Born |
16 July 1840 Toronto, Province of Canada |
| Died | 1 November 1888 (aged 48) Toronto, Ontario, Canada |
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William Alexander Foster, QC (16 July 1840 – 1 November 1888), was a Canadian barrister and essayist, best remembered as a co-founder of the Canada First movement and for his contributions to liberal nationalism in Canada.
William Alexander Foster was born in Toronto in the Province of Canada on 16 July 1840 to James and Mary (née Morrison) Foster, who had emigrated to Canada from Ireland. Foster's father worked as a hardware merchant on Toronto's King Street.
Foster received his education at the Toronto Academy and earned a Bachelor of Laws at the University of Toronto in 1860, after which he articled with Adam Wilson and was called to the bar in 1861. He was a member of several legal partnerships, such as Harrison, Osler and Moss, and served on the University of Toronto senate.
As a writer Foster contributed to Canadian peridicals such as the Daily Telegraph, the Canadian Monthly and National Review, The Grumbler, and wrote scathing editorials in J. W. Bengough's humorous Grip, where his stance against Oliver Mowat's Ontario Liberal Party provided a balance to Bengough's position. Foster also contributed to British publications such as The Times and the Westminster Review. In 1867 he co-founded and edited the Monetary Times.
Foster wrote extensively on the conditions of the British North America that he believed conducive to Canadian Confederation which he believed would produce a nation he believed would thrive despite the dissipation of the British Empire's influence in the face of the growth of power of the United States. He co-organized the Canada First movement in Ottawa in 1868. the movement promoted ideals of plurality, Canadian national self-interest, political purity, and equality within the British Empire. The group idolized the conceptions of Canadian Confederation espoused by Thomas D'Arcy McGee, a Father of Confederation. The group opposed Louis Riel and the Métis resistance to joining Confederation that resulted in the Red River Rebellion in 1869–70; Foster may have authored the editorials in the Daily Telegraph that announced the execution of Thomas Scott by Riel's government and incited calls for retribution against the "dirty, ignorant, miserable half-breeds [the Métis]".
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