Bob Plamondon

Full Circle: Death and Resurrection In Canadian Conservative Politics


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in Bennett’s success in the 1930 election than was the hardship facing voters. Canada was suffering from the stock market crash of 1929 and the subsequent collapse in commodity prices. Unemployment was on the rise, and a devastating drought in Western Canada further depressed the national economy and spirit.

      Bennett ran on an interventionist platform that promised employment in Canadian industries through tariff protection coupled with a program of public works. What he offered was a shot of hope with a bad economics chaser. Voters chose hope and gave Bennett a mandate on July 28, 1930, with the election of 137 Conservatives, 91 Liberals, and 17 others.

      In a move that would make modern-day economists cringe, Bennett implemented heavy tariffs, hoping to create markets for Canadian producers and to keep Canada independent of the United States. The economy failed to improve; in fact, it worsened. Bennett responded with more tariffs, more direct relief for the unemployed, and more public infrastructure programs. Unemployment reached 27 per cent of the workforce. Remedial measures were implemented, including legislation to help farmers avoid foreclosure. Marketing boards were established to help secure better prices for farm products.

      Bennett also attacked some of the pillars of capitalism. He established public broadcasting, the Bank of Canada, unemployment insurance, the Canadian Wheat Board, and a national infrastructure program, and he enhanced old age pensions. He believed in labour unions and in improved working conditions.

      With his government’s popularity at record-low levels and an election looming, he launched a new plan that took dead aim at laissez-faire capitalism. One of his cabinet ministers, Henry Herbert Stevens, was forced to resign over his remarks about the capitalist system. While out of cabinet, a disgruntled Stevens formed a new political entity called the Reconstruction Party.

      The election was called, and Bennett went down to defeat. At first glance the results were devastating, with the Liberals rising from 88 seats to 171, and the Tories collapsing from 137 to 39. However, it was not a higher Liberal vote that caused the devastation to the Tories. The problem was the Reconstruction Party, which received 8.7 per cent of the popular vote and cut deeply into conservative support. It was a case of vote splitting, 1930s style.

      There is no doubt that R.B. Bennett was an accomplished, intelligent, ambitious, and hard-working man. He invested substantial sums of money in the Conservative party and brought many innovative approaches to the art of politics. He was also very moody, but for this it is hard to blame a prime minister governing during a great depression.

      Bennett was not much of a coalition-builder while out of office and a one-man band while prime minister. He was also not much of a conservative. His electoral success was based largely on good timing. He was a single-term prime minister, but the extent of his defeat can be blamed on party disunity and an overcrowded ballot, with the Reconstruction Party dragging the Tories down. Yes, history probably had some important lessons the Tories could have learned, to avoid the debacle of 1993.

      PROGRESSIVE PARTY

      Before turning to John Diefenbaker, it is worth reviewing the events that led to the change in the party’s name, from Conservative to Progressive Conservative. The change occurred after Bennett’s tenure and during a twenty-three-year period when Conservatives were out of power. To understand the significance of the name change, we need to look at the history of the Progressive Party.

      The Progressive Party was a significant force in federal politics in the early 1920s. At its peak, it was the second largest party in the House of Commons, winning 65 seats in the 1921 general election. Preston Manning credits the Progressive Party with pressuring the government to pass the 1930 constitutional amendment that transferred the ownership of natural resources from the federal government to the prairie provinces. Many similarities can be found between the Progressive Party of the 1920s and the Reform Party of the 1990s. Both were western-based and populist. Both believed in similar approaches to democratic inclusiveness. They shared a distrust of mainstream political parties and advocated giving more power directly to voters through initiatives such as referendum, recall, and more free votes in the House of Commons. Both parties were heavily influenced by social issues with identifiable spiritual dimensions. The Progressive Party supported free trade, and was a voice against the power and interests of big business, particularly in the sectors of transportation and agriculture. The Progressive Party carried a more agrarian influence than Reform, likely because of the era in which it existed. On matters of social policy, both Reform and the Progressives were strongly conservative. Finally, Reform and Progressives built voter support on what was otherwise the electoral base of the Conservative party while in government. Unlike Reform, however, Progressives were able to establish some popularity in Ontario.

      Among the more notable Progressive politicians was John Bracken, who served as the Liberal-Progressive premier of Manitoba from 1922 to 1942.When Bracken was elected leader of the federal Conservative party on December 11, 1942 (at a convention in which John Diefenbaker was a candidate), he insisted that the party be called the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada.

      Many Canadians believed that the term progressive was added to indicate a more compassionate form of conservatism. The history of the Progressive Party shows that this was not the case. When the 2003 merger of the PCs and the Alliance was analyzed, critics cited the dropping of the progressive moniker as evidence of a hard shift in policy to the right. The implication was that if the party was no longer progressive, then perhaps it had become regressive. The Progressive Party was historically a closer cousin to the Reform party than it was to the so-called Red Tories, who thought of themselves as the progressive wing of the party. When John Bracken changed the party name in 1942, an important historical connector to Progressive—some would say Reform—values was symbolically lost.

      Unfortunately for conservatives, the name change was of no clear immediate electoral benefit, as the Progressive Conservative Party did not achieve power for fifteen years, until John Diefenbaker led the charge in the election of 1957.

      JOHN DIEFENBAKER

      “Dief the Chief,” as Diefenbaker was affectionately known, was a different brand of conservative. He was certainly far removed from the central-Canada businessman image of a conservative. A firebrand populist, Diefenbaker was a performer of the highest order.

      Using inspiring and visionary language, Diefenbaker put forward a national economic development program that appealed to the regions of Canada. Evoking images of Sir John A. Macdonald’s vision of westward expansion, Diefenbaker spoke of a National Vision to provide Canadians with control over their economic and political future. He offered to improve infrastructure and provide financing that would lead to the opening of Canada’s northland and the development of its national resources.

      Diefenbaker was a spirited and lively sixty-one-year-old campaigner. In 1957 the electorate was fed up and ready to throw the Liberals out of office. In addition to harvesting those that wanted change, Diefenbaker built alliances with Leslie Frost’s Ontario Conservatives and Quebec premier Maurice Duplessis and his Union Nationale party machine. Diefenbaker’s platform drew in the regions of Canada, and his coalition was attractive enough to business to sustain traditional conservative loyalties.

      The Tories earned a minority government in 1957 under the campaign slogan “It’s time for a Diefenbaker government.” He beat the Liberals by a mere 7 seats—112 to 105—with other parties holding the balance of power with 44 seats.

      While Diefenbaker appeased the business community, he was hardly a free trader. He pursued the foolish policy of diverting 15 per cent of Canada’s foreign trade from the United States to the United Kingdom. Diefenbaker was highly interventionist in economic and social policy with a legislative program that included farm price supports, housing loans, aid for development projects, increases in civil service salaries, and a strong dose of regional economic development.

      His government lost the confidence of the House less than ten months after his 1957 minority victory, but was awarded a massive majority government on March 31, 1958. In his first campaign as prime minister, Diefenbaker’s populist and charismatic message caught the public’s mood, and he triumphed, winning 208