Joly de Lotbinière had become premier two months earlier when the previous Conservative premier Charles-Eugène Boucher de Boucherville had resigned or was deposed by Lieutenant-GovernorLuc Letellier de Saint-Just. He was therefore the incumbent. Boucher de Boucherville left the premier's office when the Lieutenant Governor refused to approve railway legislation that had been passed by the Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council, i.e., by both houses of the Quebec legislature.
Joly de Lotbinière did not quite win the election: the Conservatives won 32 seats to the Liberals' 31 (and there were two "Independent Conservatives"). Four Conservatives supported him, allowing him to form a minority government, but the Legislative Council pushed him to resign on October 31, 1879, and Joseph-Adolphe Chapleau then took office.
The resulting minority government would be Quebec's last until 2007.