For almost fifty years Joseph Howe was at the centre of public affairs, first in Nova Scotia and later in imperial relations and in the earliest years of the new Dominion. Drawing on a variety of records including Howe's private papers and the vigorous press of his day, J. Murray Beck places Howe firmly in the political, social, and intellectual life of colonial Nova Scotia and of British North America, assessing his contributions to those societies and revealing the breadth both of his vision and his influence. Joseph Howe is an epic scholarly account of the life of one of the towering figures of the fight for Responsible Government in the colonies that would come together to form the modern Canadian nation.