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Home , Robert Borden

11 From Macdonald to Mulroney: Transformative Conservative Leadership Geoff Norquay

From the founding of Canada under Sir John A. Mac- 1891, completing the initial building donald to under , Conservatives of Canada from sea to sea. Conservatives’ relationships with have provided Canada with transformative leadership, Québec have often been tenuous including Sir Borden in the First World War and but they started from a solid base. Schooled in the necessities of double on his Bill of Rights, forerunner of the majorities in the old United Province, Charter of Rights. Veteran Conservative strategist Geoff one of Macdonald’s greatest accom- on Conservative nation-building over 150 years. plishments was the tying together of the British and French realities of Canada, without which Confedera- tion would never have occurred. In many ways, he set the pattern for ike most political movements, Brown, to create a Grand Coalition to successful national political leader- Canadian Conservatives in the bridge the French and English-speak- ship in Canada, by bridging the “two L past 150 years have celebrated ing elements of Canada, to seek politi- solitudes” of the two founding na- the heights of achievement, suffered cal reform and pursue a confederation tions that created the country. the ignominy of defeat, seized oppor- uniting the British colonies in North tunities and lost them, been divided, America. Between 1864 and 1866, Macdonald lost the reunited and redefined several times, conferences in Charlottetown, Qué- recovered to regain victory and per- bec City and led to the cre- government in severed. As other parties, they have ation of the of Canada on 1874, but he returned in celebrated heroic leaders and spurned July 1, 1867. Shortly after assuming 1878 and then served as bad ones who left behind smoulder- office, his purchase of the Hudson’s prime pinister until his ing ruins of regret. Canadian Conser- Bay Company lands in the west added vatives have created national insti- an astounding one-third of the North death in 1891, completing tutions and innovative foreign and American continent to Canada. the initial building of trade policies that have helped define Macdonald’s second and third ac- Canada from sea to sea. our nation and have become part of complishments are fused together the Canadian fabric. and were very nearly the end of him The coalitions and compromises as a political leader. Facing a seri- that founded Canada were all about ous threat from American manifest destiny, he needed to add the west- hile Macdonald did allow Sir. John A. Macdonald. He was not the hanging of Louis Riel, heroic in the ways of many leaders ern territories and British Columbia to his fledgling nation and the only which outraged many in who have founded nations—he faced W way to do that was to build a railroad Quebec, a much larger defining mo- challenges by working through them across the continent. The construc- ment for the party in that province with practical strategies and tactics, tion of the CPR took many years and came with the conscription crisis in and often with the help of others of initially resulted in serious corrup- . In June 1917, the Minis- different political stripes. tion, with both Macdonald’s govern- ter of Militia told the House that fewer When political instability and dead- ment and the prime minister himself than five per cent of the 432,000 Ca- lock paralyzed the legislature of the taking significant bribes. Macdonald nadians who had volunteered had United Province of Canada in 1864, lost the government in 1874, but he come from Québec, which then com- he reached out to an individual he returned in 1878 and then served prised 28 per cent of Canada’s popu- disliked, the reformer George as prime minister until his death in lation. Québecers saw the war as Eu-

July/August 2017 12 rope’s battle, while was at one with the . With resentment growing in Eng- lish Canada and armed with a huge majority for his Unionist govern- ment, Prime Minister Robert Borden brought in conscription through the Military Service Act, which took ef- fect January 1st, 1918. To quell the resulting Easter weekend disturbanc- es in Quebec City, Canadian soldiers fired on the rioters, killing five and wounding close to 150 people. Not surprisingly, the Conservatives would be virtually shut out of Québec until the Diefenbaker sweep of 1958.

As he campaigned towards the largest Sir John A. Macdonald, the first Conservative R.B. Bennett, who had the misfortune to majority of any government in Cana- PM, and founding father of Canada. Library and govern during the Great Depression, but also Archives Canada photo created the CBC and the Bank of Canada. dian history in 1984, Brian Mulroney Library and Archives Canada photo sought a mandate from Québecers for a new vision of federalism and that led to the Charlottetown Accord diers remain as a single group and for national reconciliation, in light of in 1992. In addition to again recog- under our command, instead of be- Québec having declined to sign on to nizing the distinctiveness of Québec, ing split up and assigned to British the new constitution in 1982. In of- the Accord addressed many of the divisions. At the end of the war, Bor- fice, Mulroney led consultations that oversights of Meech, awarding cul- den successfully argued that Canada resulted in the Meech Lake Accord ture, forestry, mining and natural re- must have a separate seat at the sources to the provinces, and formally in 1987, which recognized Québec Peace Conference as an independent institutionalizing the federal/provin- as a distinct society within Canada, country, which enabled Canada to cial/territorial consultative process. strengthened powers of the provinc- sign the in its own It provided for a Triple-E Senate and es in areas of joint jurisdiction, lim- right and to gain separate member- recognized Aboriginal governments ship in the . ited the federal spending power and as a third order of government, en- slightly changed the constitutional By the early 1960s, the British Com- trenched existing treaty rights in the amending formula. monwealth was rapidly becoming a constitution and provided constitu- multi-racial organization as the for- tional recognition of Métis rights. mer colonies of Asia, Africa and the Borden successfully Notwithstanding support for the ac- Caribbean gained independence. At argued that Canada cord from the three principal federal the 1961 Commonwealth Conference must have a separate seat parties, all premiers and many aborig- in London, Prime Minister John Dief- inal leaders, a variety of dissenters enbaker led the Commonwealth in at the Paris Peace found cause to attack it in the subse- rejecting the readmittance of South Conference as an quent referendum and it was defeated Africa to the organization over apart- independent country, which on October 26, 1992 by 55 per cent heid. As the London Observer noted at to 45 per cent. In 1993, Mulroney left enabled Canada to sign the the time, “Mr. Diefenbaker’s role was office and the Progressive Conserva- of decisive importance. Not only did Treaty of Versailles in its tives were reduced to two seats in that he provide a bridge between the old own right and to gain year’s federal election. It would take white and the new non- separate membership in 10 years and successive Liberal major- white members, he also demonstrated ity governments to convince Stephen the importance of someone giving a the League of Nations. Harper and Peter MacKay to merge lead.” Diefenbaker’s stand began the the Alliance and the Progressive Con- campaign of international pressure on servatives into the new Conservative to abandon its racist ap- Party of Canada in 2003. proach to defining citizenship. hen Meech Lake failed Throughout Canada’s history, Con- in 1990 after all provinces servative prime ministers have con- young law student named W had not ratified it within tributed significantly to the foreign, Brian Mulroney was so im- the three-year time limit, Mulroney defence and trade policy of Canada. A pressed by Diefenbaker’s quickly returned to the fray, launch- When the country entered World leadership on South Africa that he ing a series of national consultations War I, Borden insisted Canadian sol- went to to help welcome him

Policy 13 institutions and programs, and Con- servatives have been no exception. Borden extended suffrage to women and created the National Research Council. Despite a disastrous term as PM from 1930-1935, R. B. Bennett launched the Canadian Radio Broad- casting Commission, which became the CBC. He also founded the Bank of Canada, created the Canadian Wheat Board and laid the groundwork for a national air transport system. The government of John Diefenbaker appointed Saskatchewan Judge Em- mett Hall as chair of the royal com- mission on health services, which led to the creation of Medicare. Diefen- John Diefenbaker, father of the 1960 Bill of Brian Mulroney, father of free trade and baker also brought in the 1960 Cana- Rights, opponent of apartheid, proposer of a negotiator of the Acid Rain Accord with the Northern Vision for Canada’s Arctic. U.S. Library and Archives Canada photo dian Bill of Rights, the forerunner of Wikipedia photo the Charter of Rights and Freedoms a generation later, and appointed the back to Canada following the Com- lions of dollars in trade for Canada first woman to cabinet, Ellen Fair- and resulted in millions of addition- monwealth Conference. As prime clough, and the first aboriginal sena- al Canadian jobs. It is Mulroney’s minister in the 1980s, that same tor, James Gladstone. Brian Mulroney crowning achievement. In 2006, he Brian Mulroney would renew Diefen- laid the groundwork for the creation was also named Canada’s Greenest baker’s fight against apartheid, per- of La Francophonie, advocated for the Prime Minister by the environmental sonally taking on both British Prime reunification of Germany at the end of movement for his championing of Minister Margaret Thatcher and U.S. the Cold War, appointed the first west- the 1991 Acid Rain Accord with the President Ronald Reagan, and seeing ern ambassador to Ukraine and creat- U.S. and the 1987 UN Pro- it through to a successful conclusion ed the third Canadian territorial gov- tocol on the ozone layer. Both acid as the champion of Nelson Mandela ernment, Nunavut. His government rain and ozone depletion, the leading and implacable foe of what he termed also brought in the goods and services environmental issues of the day, are “the scourge of apartheid.” tax, which, while it angered voters, no longer public policy concerns. made eminent economic sense. Ste- Conservatives have been on both phen Harper extended a much-lauded sides of free trade with the United Under the government of Stephen apology on behalf of to Ab- States, 100 years apart and with the Harper, Canada stepped back from originals for residential schools, and right response in both cases. Sir John multilateralism, at least as it involved appointed the landmark Truth and A. Macdonald had always feared free the United Nations, and made Israel Reconciliation Commission. trade with the U. S., believing that the centrepiece of its foreign policy in the Middle East. The Harper gov- Canada’s nascent industries needed As Canada turns 150, Canada’s Con- ernment inherited the Afghanistan protection through his National Pol- servatives have a new leader, Andrew assignment in Kandahar Province, icy. By the time Mulroney became Scheer. He has youth, experience, where Canada ultimately lost 158 prime minister in 1984, Canada was a happy disposition and has come soldiers, a diplomat and several civil- still exporting much of its natural re- through the fire of an exhausting and ians over the course of the mission. source production to the U.S. but was competitive leadership campaign. Creating a more muscular and less also growing as an industrial middle Those of us who know him are con- nuanced foreign policy, Canada also power. Having opposed free trade as fident that when his time comes, he spent some $18 billion in Afghanistan a candidate for leader, in office, he will be ready to join the ranks of Con- before withdrawing its troops at the servative leaders who have defined concluded that the time was right end of 2014. Harper also successfully once again Canada’s future, and re- to pursue a deal with the Americans. negotiated the breakthrough Compre- newed its promise. The Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agree- hensive Economic and Trade Agree- ment (FTA), vehemently opposed by ment (CETA) with Europe, and took a Contributing writer Geoff Norquay, ’s Liberals, became the t ough stand against Russia following a principal of Earnscliffe Strategy dominant issue of the 1988 election its aggressive intervention in Ukraine. Group, was social policy adviser to campaign, which Mulroney won. By Prime Minister Mulroney and later any measure the FTA, which quickly ll governments regardless communication director to Stephen morphed into the North American of party make contributions Harper as leader of the Conservative Free Trade Agreement, created bil- A to the building of national opposition. [email protected]

July/August 2017