page_title: Reform movement (Upper Canada)
section_title: The Children of Peace and the Grand Convention of Delegates
hierarchical_section_title: Reform movement (Upper Canada) / The Political Union Movement in Upper Canada / The Upper Canada Central Political Union / The Children of Peace and the Grand Convention of Delegates
caption_attribution_description: English: One of the few known photos of David Willson, founder of the Children of Peace. From the collection of the Sharon Temple Museum Archives.
context_page_description: The Reform movement was a political movement in British Canada in the early 19th century.
  It started as a rudimentary grouping of loose coalitions that formed around contentious issues. Support was gained in Parliament through petitions meant to sway MPs. However, organized Reform activity emerged in the 1830s when Reformers, like Robert Randal, Jesse Ketchum, Peter Perry, Marshall Spring Bidwell, and Dr. William Warren Baldwin, began to emulate the organizational forms of the British Reform Movement, and organized Political Unions under the leadership of William Lyon Mackenzie. The British Political Unions had successfully petitioned for the Great Reform Act of 1832 that eliminated much political corruption in the English Parliamentary system. Those who adopted these new forms of public mobilization for democratic reform in Upper Canada were inspired by the more radical Owenite Socialists who led the British Chartist and Mechanics Institute movements.
context_section_description: In the absence of Mackenzie, the village of Hope (now Sharon), founded by the Children of Peace, a branch of Quakerism, became the new focus of reform activity. They were leaders in the new Fourth Riding of York (a part of the riding that had continued to re-elect Mackenzie over the years). A member of the group, Samuel Hughes, the president of Canada's first farmers' cooperative (the Farmers' Storehouse), established a "committee of vigilance" to nominate an "independent member" for the Assembly in June 1832. Half the committee were members of the Children of Peace, including the leader of the Children of Peace, David Willson. The group also included Randal Wixson, the editor of the Colonial Advocate in Mackenzie's absence.
  Mackenzie returned to Toronto from his London journey in the last week of August, 1833, to find his appeals to the British Parliament had been ultimately ineffective. At an emergency meeting of Reformers, David Willson proposed extending the nomination process for members of the House of Assembly they had begun in Hope to all four Ridings of York, and to establish a "General Convention of Delegates" from each riding in which to establish a common political platform. This convention could then become the core of a "permanent convention" or political party – an innovation not yet seen in Upper Canada. The organization of this convention was a model for the "Constitutional Convention" Mackenzie organized for the Rebellion of 1837, where many of the same delegates were to attend.
  The Convention was held on 27 February 1834 with delegates from all four of the York ridings. The week before, Mackenzie published Willson's call for a "standing convention" (political party). The day of the convention, the Children of Peace led a "Grand Procession" with their choir and band (the first civilian band in the province) to the Old Court House where the convention was held. David Willson was the main speaker before the convention and "he addressed the meeting with great force and effect". The convention nominated 4 Reform candidates, all of whom were ultimately successful in the election. The convention stopped short, however, of establishing a political party. Instead, they formed yet another Political Union.
caption: David Willson, leader of the Children of Peace, in old age
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