The Canadian politician Robert Baldwin (1804-1858) played a decisive role in articulating and applying the concept of "responsible government" that underlies the constitutional development of the Commonwealth.

Robert Baldwin was born on May 12, 1804, in York, Upper Canada, the son of a well-to-do physician. He studied law and was called to the bar in 1825. In 1829 he was elected to the House of Assembly of Upper Canada but was defeated in another election in the following year.

Responsible Government

For most of his political career Baldwin was a man of a single idea--responsible government. This principle alone, he felt, could cure the evils of the existing system of government in the British North American colonies. The root of the trouble lay in an irresponsible executive. The British-appointed governor was surrounded by a group of advisers and hangers-on who filled most of the offices in the colonial administration and controlled all...