Joseph-Adolphe Chapleau

The Honourable Sir Joseph-Adolphe Chapleau KCMG
7th Lieutenant Governor of Quebec
In office December 5, 1892 – January 20, 1898
Monarch	Victoria
Governors General	The Lord Stanley of Preston The Earl of Aberdeen
Premier	Charles Boucher de Boucherville Louis-Olivier Taillon Edmund James Flynn Félix-Gabriel Marchand
Preceded by	Auguste-Réal Angers
Succeeded by	Louis-Amable Jetté
5th Premier of Quebec
In office October 31, 1879 – July 29, 1882
Monarch	Victoria
Lieutenant Governor	Théodore Robitaille
Preceded by	Henri-Gustave Joly de Lotbinière
Succeeded by	Joseph-Alfred Mousseau
Member of the Canadian Parliament for Terrebonne
In office July 29, 1882 – December 5, 1892
Preceded by	Guillaume-Alphonse Nantel
Succeeded by	Pierre-Julien Leclair
MLA for Terrebonne
In office September 1, 1867 – July 29, 1882
Preceded by	Provincial district created in 1867
Succeeded by	Guillaume-Alphonse Nantel
Personal details
Born	(1840-11-09)November 9, 1840 Sainte-Thérèse, Lower Canada
Died	June 13, 1898(1898-06-13) (aged 57) Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Political party	Conservative Party of Quebec
Other political affiliations	Conservative
Spouse	Marie-Louise King ​ (m. 1874)​
Cabinet	Solicitor General (1873–1874) Minister Without Portfolio (1876–1878) Provincial Secretary (1876–1878) Commissioner of Agriculture and Public Works (1879–1881) Commissioner of Railways (1880–1881) Secretary of State of Canada (1882–1892) Minister of Customs (1892)

Sir Joseph-Adolphe Chapleau KCMG PC (November 9, 1840 – June 13, 1898), born in Sainte-Thérèse, Quebec, was a French-Canadian lawyer and politician who served as the 7th Lieutenant Governor of Quebec from 1892 to 1898.

As a lawyer, he defended Ambroise-Dydime Lépine against the charge of murdering Thomas Scott during the Red River Rebellion of 1869–1870.

He served as the fifth premier of Quebec, federal Cabinet minister, and the seventh lieutenant governor of Quebec.

After the 1878 Quebec election, he was the Leader of the Opposition. He became premier in 1879 after the fall of the minority government of Henri-Gustave Joly de Lotbinière. He won the 1881 election, but resigned on July 29, 1882, to seek election to the federal House of Commons. He won a by-election held on August 16, 1882.

Chapleau planned to quit politics in 1885 when Louis Riel was sentenced to be hanged but decided to stay, fearing it would only inflame the situation. After Riel was hanged, he was attacked by Quebecers who accused him of the death of Riel along with John A. Macdonald.

He served as Minister of Justice under prime ministers John A. Macdonald and John Abbott, but declined to serve under John Thompson. He resigned in 1892, and was appointed Lieutenant Governor of Quebec from December 1892 until January 1898. He died in June of that same year in Montreal, Quebec. His funeral monument can be seen at the Notre Dame des Neiges Cemetery.^[1]

He won the 1881 election.

On November 25, 1874, he married Marie Louise, daughter of Lieutenant-colonel Charles King of Sherbrooke in the province of Quebec.^[2]

Note: popular vote is compared to vote in 1882 general election.

• List of Quebec general elections
• Politics of Quebec
• Provincial premiers who have become Canadian MPs
• Timeline of Quebec history

• DUSSAULT, Roy. « Défense des intérêts des Canadiens français et unité de la Confédération canadienne : la pensée nationaliste de Joseph-Adolphe Chapleau, 1840–1898». Mémoire de maîtrise, Québec, Université Laval, 2018, 177 p.
• Carlyle, Edward Irving (1901). "Chapleau, Joseph Adolphe" . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography (1st supplement). London: Smith, Elder & Co.
• "Biography". Dictionnaire des parlementaires du Québec de 1792 à nos jours (in French). National Assembly of Quebec.
• Joseph-Adolphe Chapleau fonds, Library and Archives Canada.
• Biography at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online
• Joseph-Adolphe Chapleau – Parliament of Canada biography

• Works by or about Joseph-Adolphe Chapleau at the Internet Archive