Mowat served as provincial member for the riding of Oxford North, about 150 km west of Toronto, for his entire term as premier. As premier in the 1880s a series of disputes with the Dominion arose over Provincial boundaries, jurisdiction over liquor licenses, trade and commerce, rivers and streams, timber, escheats, and other matters. In 1890, it was said: These court battles resulted in a weakening of the power of the federal government in provincial matters. Although Macdonald had dismissed him as "
Blake's jackal", Mowat's battles with the federal government greatly
decentralized Canada, giving the provinces far more power than Macdonald had intended. He also served as his own
Attorney-General concurrently with his service as Premier, and introduced reforms such as the
secret ballot in elections, and the extension of
suffrage beyond property owners. He also extended laws regulating liquor and consolidated the laws relating to the municipal level of government. His policies, particularly regarding liquor regulation and
separate schools, routinely drew criticism from political conservatives, including the
Orange Lodge and its associated newspaper,
The Sentinel. ,
J. M. Gibson,
R. Harcourt,
E.H. Bronson,
J. Dryden,
G. W. Ross and
C. F. Fraser. The boundary between Ontario and
Manitoba became a hotly contested matter, with the federal government attempting to extend Manitoba's jurisdiction eastward to the Great Lakes, into the areas that Ontario claimed. In 1882, Premier Mowat threatened to pull Ontario from Confederation over the issue. Mowat sent police into the disputed territory to assert Ontario's claims, while Manitoba (at the behest of the national government) did the same. The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in Britain, serving as Canada's highest appeal court, repeatedly issued rulings taking the side of provincial rights. These decisions would to some extent neutralize the power of the central government, creating a more decentralized federation. John Ibbitson writes that by 1914: :Confederation had evolved into a creation beyond John A. Macdonald's worst nightmare. Powerful, independent provinces, sovereign within their own spheres, manipulated the rights of property, levied their own taxes—even income taxes, in a few cases—exploited their natural resources, and managed schools, hospitals, and relief for the poor, while a weak and ineffectual central government presided over not much of anything in the drab little capital on the banks of the Ottawa.
George William Ross praised Mowat's ability to read the public mind, and
John Stephen Willison remarked that his political genius rose from "the fact that for so long he had a generous support from the liquor interest and a still more generous support from Prohibitionists". His government was moderate and attempted to cut across divisions in the province between Roman Catholics and Protestants as well as between country and city. He also oversaw the northward expansion of Ontario's boundaries and the development of its natural resources, as well as the emergence of the province into the economic powerhouse of Canada. Mowat's nearly 24 years as premier of Ontario remains the longest consecutive service by any premier in Ontario history, and is the third longest by any premier in Canada, behind only
George Henry Murray of
Nova Scotia and
Ernest Manning of
Alberta. Mowat was notoriously hostile to aboriginal and treaty rights. In 1884, when the federal government urged that Ontario transfer to the
Teme-Augama Anishnabai Indigenous people all or some of the as a reserve, for which that band's head chief,
Ignace Tonené, had campaigned with the federal authorities for many years, Mowat blocked the land transfer, primarily concerned about the
value of the
red and white pine lumber at the location. It was not until 1943 that lands were finally set aside for the Temagami, and the official creation of their Bear Island Reserve did not occur until 1971. ==Federal level==