[1] The manifesto was published in two versions (October 11, 1849, and December 1849) by the Annexation Association, an alliance of 325 Montreal businessmen.
[Note 1] Most of these were English-speaking Tories, who were opposed to Britain's abolition of the Corn Laws, which ended preferential colonial trade,[2] and by its consent to the Rebellion Losses Bill, and French Canadian nationalists (including Louis-Joseph Papineau) who supported the republican system of government in the United States.
[5] They predicted a lack of foreign capital investment leading to economic downturn and massive job losses.
[8] Future Prime Minister of Canada John Abbott was a signatory to the manifesto, though he later described that action as a youthful error.
[1] The manifesto was strongly opposed by members of the British American League and by leading politicians such as Robert Baldwin plus the followers of Louis-Hippolyte Lafontaine.