Journals of the Legislative Assembly of the Colony of Newfoundland: 1833-, St. Johns, var. gov. printers, ser. continues. (Although the first
London-appointed governor of Newfoundland took residence in 1728, it was almost a century later, 1825, before a nominated Executive Council was appointed. In
1832 the constitution was liberalized to provide for a nominated Legislative Council and an elective House of Assembly. The reconstituted legislature
held its first session in 1833. Newfoundland acquired responsible governance in 1855, the same year in which it was granted to New South Wales and
Victoria in Australia. The colony declined to join in the Canadian federation movement in 1867, and might remain a British colony today had not it run
afoul of the Great Depression and fallen into bankruptcy in 1935. At that point the constitution was suspended and governance passed into the hands of
a “Commission of Government”; three members from Newfoundland and three appointed from Great Britain. Under that regime, the “Governor in Commission”
administered the colony’s affairs, reporting only to the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs in London. This unique constitutional arrangement
continued until 1949, when Newfoundland took refuge in federation with Canada, and local constitutional governance was restored. In the new
dispensation, the legislature became unicameral, and the Legislative Assembly undertook responsible governance, with 13 of its 28 members comprising an Executive
Council, or cabinet, headed by a Premier.)
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