Political career
Papineau was not politically active as a young man, unlike his older brother and several cousins, who were involved in the Patriote movement and had been members of the Legislative Assembly of Lower Canada leading up to the Rebellion. It was not until the formation of the Province of Canada in 1841, merging Lower Canada with Upper Canada (now Ontario), that Papineau became involved in politics. In 1842, he was elected in a by-election in the electoral constituency of Ottawa County, on the Lower Canada side of the Ottawa River. In the Assembly, he joined the French-Canadian Group, a parliamentary caucus which generally opposed the government of the Governor General. Papineau's cousin Denis-Benjamin Viger was initially one of the leaders of the Group.
Papineau entered politics just as a political crisis was brewing, which eventually led to him becoming joint premier. In 1843, all but one of the members of the Executive Council, led by Louis-Hippolyte LaFontaine and Robert Baldwin, resigned in protest at actions taken by Governor General Charles Metcalfe, without consulting the council. The Assembly passed a resolution criticising Metcalfe and supporting LaFontaine and Baldwin. The vote on the resolution revealed a split in the French-Canadian Group. While most of the members of the Group, including Papineau, supported LaFontaine and voted for the resolution, two of the older members of the Group, Viger and John Neilson, supported Metcalfe and voted against the resolution. The result was a surprise, since Viger and Neilson had a long history of opposing the governors prior to the Rebellion.
Metcalfe then appointed Viger as joint premier, along with a moderate Tory from Upper Canada, William Draper. However, they lacked political support from the Assembly. Almost a year went by without additional appointments to the council. Finally, in September 1844, Viger and Draper were able to persuade some members of the Assembly to be appointed to the council. One of them was Papineau, who accepted the office of Commissioner of Crown Lands. Governor General Metcalfe and Viger hoped that appointing Papineau would gain support from French-Canadians, given the political strength of his family. Metcalfe then dissolved Parliament and called new elections.
The elections did not go well for the government. LaFontaine was now the clear leader of the French-Canadian Group. Viger and Neilson were both defeated in their own ridings, and LaFontaine and his supporters won a strong majority of the seats from Canada East. Papineau was one of the few members of the government in Canada East who was re-elected. After the elections, Governor General Metcalfe kept the Viger–Draper ministry in office, supported primarily by Draper and the Tories, who had won a majority of the seats in Upper Canada.
Instead of gaining support for the government, Papineau's appointment to the Council furthered the split in the French-Canadian Group. His own brother, Louis-Joseph Papineau, had earlier been critical of anyone who took an appointment from the governor, saying: "One cannot accept a position as minister and remain an honourable man." Louis-Joseph, now in exile in Paris, refused to endorse the new government, even with his brother as a member. Viger and Denis-Benjamin Papineau were considered to be Tories, supporting the governor.
Denis-Benjamin Papineau did not help his reputation with French-Canadians by his first vote in the Assembly after the 1844 elections. In the election of the new Speaker, he voted for Allan MacNab, a unilingual Family Compact Tory from Upper Canada. Nor did Papineau appear to have a firm grasp of parliamentary procedure, contradicting one of his own government colleagues during the debate on the speech from the throne. He was also hampered by his own deafness, making it difficult for him to follow the debates.
He did win some support by introducing an address to Queen Victoria, requesting that the statutory restrictions on the use of French in the Assembly be lifted, but he also attracted further criticism for introducing legislation to reorganise the schools and municipalities, triggering opposition from the Catholic church and landowners. Another controversial position was his support for compensation for residents in Upper Canada who had their property damaged during the Rebellion, while not bringing in a similar compensation system for residents of Lower Canada.
In light of Viger's failure to earn political support in Lower Canada, Draper began to make overtures to other French-Canadian politicians, suggesting that Viger and Papineau might both retire from politics to make way for others. Papineau was aware of the negotiations and appeared willing to retire, but Draper's efforts did not bear fruit. Viger remained in office for another year, until June 1846, when he retired from politics, resigning his leadership position in the ministry. Papineau took over as the leader of the Canada East members in the council. At first he was paired with Draper, who continued as leader of the Canada West members, but Draper resigned a year later, in May 1847. Draper's position was taken by Henry Sherwood, a Family Compact Tory from Toronto. There was considerable turnover in the membership of the Executive Council in the eighteen months after Viger's retirement (including the addition of a young John A. Macdonald in 1847). Not much was achieved by the ministry before Parliament was dissolved in December 1847. Papineau resigned his seat in the Executive Council at that time, and did not stand for re-election in the general elections that followed.
