The British North America Act received Royal Assent on March 29, 1867 and went into effect July 1, 1867. The Act divided Federal and Provincial authority and set the framework for the new country.

The other provinces and territories that make up Canada today joined Confederation in the years following: Manitoba (1870), Northwest Territories (1870), British Columbia (1871), Prince edward Island (1873), Yukon Territory (1898), Alberta (1905), Saskatchewan (1905), Newfoundland (1949), and Nunavut (1999).

Watch Heritage Mississauga’s video: “The Road to Confederation: I Am Mississauga” to learn more about Confederation and the connections to Mississauga.

Watch “Indigenous Peoples Are Not Seen as Equals in Confederation; It’s Time to Fix That” with Joshua Nichols, as he considers Indigenous Peoples’ self-governance alongside the Supreme Court of Canada’s decisions about the Province of Quebec’s request to leave Canada in the 1990s, and The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP).