Sir James Pliny Whitney was a Canadian politician and lawyer in the province of Ontario. He served as Conservative member of the legislature for Dundas from 1888 and as the sixth premier of Ontario from 1905 until his death 1914. He is the only premier of Ontario to have died while in office.

Regulation 17 was a regulation of the Government of Ontario, Canada, designed to limit instruction in French-language Catholic separate schools. The regulation was written by the Ministry of Education and was issued in July 1912 by the Conservative government of premier Sir James P. Whitney. It forbade teaching French beyond grade two in all separate schools.