They were regarded with suspicion by most of the established settlers, and particularly by the local Métis population led by Louis Riel.
Members of the Canadian Party engaged in military skirmishes with Riel's provisional government during the Red River Rebellion of 1869-70.
The federal government of John A. Macdonald favoured a policy of conciliation among the province's ethnic, linguistic and religious groups, and Lieutenant-Governor Adams George Archibald kept Schultz's followers out of his first cabinet.
In Manitoba's first general election (December 30, 1870), Schultz's followers were the only real opposition to the governing alliance.
The party did not long survive as a coherent organization, but Edward Hay appears to have turned against Schultz in 1872, and later joined the government of francophone Premier Marc-Amable Girard.