Lawrence and Atlantic Railways were stimulated by legislation which gave a provincial guarantee for the construction of lines not less than seventy-five miles in length.  In 1851 Hincks succeeded in passing a measure which provided for the building of a great trunk line connecting Quebec with the western limits of Upper Canada.  It was hoped at first that this road would join the great military railway contemplated between Quebec and Halifax, and then earnestly advocated by Howe and other public men of the maritime provinces with the prospect of receiving aid from the imperial government.  If these railway interests could be combined, an Intercolonial railroad would be constructed from the Atlantic seaboard to the lakes, and a great stimulus given not merely to the commerce but to the national unity of British North America, In case, however, this great idea could not be realized, it was the intention of the Canadian government to make every possible exertion to induce British capitalists to invest their money in the great trunk line by a liberal offer of assistance from the provincial exchequer, and the municipalities directly interested in its construction.

The practical result of Hincks’s policy was the construction of the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada, not by public aid as originally proposed, but by British capitalists.  The greater inter-colonial scheme failed in consequence of the conflict of rival routes in the maritime provinces, and the determination of the British government to give its assistance only to a road that would be constructed at a long distance from the United States frontier, and consequently available for military and defensive purposes—­in fact such a road as was actually built after the confederation of the provinces with the aid of an imperial guarantee.  The history of the negotiations between the Canadian government and the maritime provinces with respect to the Intercolonial scheme is exceedingly complicated.  An angry controversy arose between Hincks and Howe; the latter always accused the former of a breach of faith, and of having been influenced by a desire to promote the interests of the capitalists concerned in the Grand Trunk without reference to those of the maritime provinces.  Be that as it may, we know that Hincks left the wordy politicians of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick to quarrel over rival routes, and, as we shall see later, went ahead with the Grand Trunk, and had it successfully completed many years before the first sod on the Intercolonial route was turned.

In addition to these claims of the LaFontaine-Baldwin government to be considered “a great ministry,” there is the fact that, through the financial ability of Hincks, the credit of the province steadily advanced, and it was at last possible to borrow money in the London market on very favourable terms.  The government entered heartily into the policy of Lord Elgin with respect to reciprocity with the United States, and the encouragement of trade between the different provinces