Reform or Liberal party, but it also advocated such radical changes as
the application of the elective principle to all classes of officials
(including the governor-general), universal suffrage, vote by ballot,
biennial parliaments, the abolition of the courts of chancery and
common pleas, free trade and direct taxation.

The Toronto _Globe_, which was for a short time the principal exponent
of ministerial views, declared that many of the doctrines enunciated
by the Clear Grits "embody the whole difference between a republican
form of government and the limited monarchy of Great Britain." _The
Globe_ was edited by George Brown, a Scotsman by birth, who came with
his father in his youth to the western province and entered into
journalism, in which he attained eventually signal success by his
great intellectual force and tenacity of purpose. His support of the
LaFontaine-Baldwin ministry gradually dropped from a moderate
enthusiasm to a positive coolness, from its failure to carry out the
principles urged by _The Globe_--especially the secularization of the
clergy reserves. Then he commenced to raise the cry of French
domination and to attack the religion and special institutions of
French Canada with such virulence that at last he became "a
governmental impossibility," so far as the influence of that province
was concerned. He supported the Clear Grits in the end, and became
their recognized leader when they gathered to themselves all the
discontented and radical elements of the Liberal party which had for
some years been gradually splitting into fragments. The power of the
Clear Grits was first shown in 1851, when William Lyon Mackenzie
succeeded in obtaining a majority of Reformers in support of his
motion for the abolition of the court of chancery, and forced the
retirement of Baldwin, whose conservatism had gradually brought him
into antagonism with the extremists of his old party.