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Sir Alexander Tilloch Galt in 1869

Sir Alexander Tilloch Galt, GCMG, PC (September 6, 1817–September 19, 1893) was an English-born Canadian politician, and a father of Canadian Confederation. He was the son of Scottish novelist and Colonizer, John Galt and Elizabeth Tilloch Galt.^[1][2]

Alexander Galt is interred in the Mount Royal Cemetery in Montreal, Quebec. In Lennoxville, Quebec, the Alexander Galt High School was named in his honour.

He was a member of the Great Coalition government in the Province of Canada that secured Confederation between 1864 and 1867. He became a leading figure in the creation of the Coalition when he was asked to become Prime Minister of the Canada East-West by then Governor General Sir Edmund Head. Doubting his own ability to demand the loyalty of the majority of Members of the Provincial Parliament, he turned down the position, but recommended that George Etienne Cartier and John A. Macdonald be asked to become co-leaders of the new government. ^[1]

In return, Cartier and Macdonald asked him to become Inspector-General of Canada. He accepted the post on the condition that Macdonald and Cartier made Confederation a key platform in their new government. In 1858, Alexander Tilloch Galt made a motion in the Provincial Parliament at Kingston recommending that the Province of Canada ask the British Government to create federal union of British North America (Canada East and West, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia) and Rupert's Land (owned by the Hudson Bay Company). The motion succeeded and Alexander Galt, John Ross, and Sir George Etienne Cartier went to London to begin the long process of convincing the British to make British North America into the first sovereign Dominion within the British Empire. (The British Empire was reformed into the Commonwealth of Nations in the 20th Century. Twenty-first Canada remains fully sovereign constitutional monarchy within the Commonwealth of Nations.)

As Inspector General, Galt reformed the Province of Canada's banking system trade policies. He was the main architect of the Cayley-Galt Tariff, which protected colonial businesses and caused consternation in both Britain and the United States.^[3]

July 1, 1867, Canada East and West, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia became the first provinces in British North America to form the Dominion of Canada. Galt served as the first Minister of Finance in the new confederation. As minister of Finance, he reversed many of the his earlier policies, promoting trade within the British Empire. In late 1880, he became the first Canadian High Commissioner in London.^[1][3]

In 1848, he married Elliott, the daughter of Montreal merchant John Torrance. After her death in 1850, he married her younger sister Amy Gordon. Galt appears to have a very non-sectarian approach to religious faith, Although the grandson of a Calvinist Theologican, Alexander Tilloch, Galt supported both the Methodist and Anglican Churches while his wife, Amy, was a lifelong Presbyterian.^[3]

Sir Alexander Galt and his son Elliott Torrance Galt co-founded the Town of Lethbridge in 1883, when he established a mine on the banks of the Oldman River in the SW portion of the District of Alberta, Northwest Territories. The Canadian Post Office refused to accept the name Lethbridge for the community until 1885 because there was another town with the same name in the Dominion of Canada. Sir Alexander Galt, laid out the street plan of Lethbridge's present location in 1885 after his settlement was moved to the prairie level from the river valley. Canada's Governor General, The Marquis of Lorne, demonstrated the Dominion Government' support of the Galt Enterprises, by opening the Galts' railway in September 1885 in Lethbridge.^[1][3]

Galt's company, the North Western Coal and Navigation Company went through a variety of name changes as it moved into railways, and irrigation enterprises. A public park and a museum (formerly a hospital) in Lethbridge are named after him. Prime Minister Sir Wilfred Laurier dedicated the Galt Hospital addition, which houses the Galt Museum, in 1910.^[1][3]

Was founding President of The Guarantee Company of North America in 1872 providing fidelity bonds to guarantee the honesty of employees of Railroads and Government, which still exists today as the largest provider of surety bonds in all of Canada in Public Works and Government Services.

• Biography at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online
• Synopsis of federal political experience from the Library of Parliament

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