by Denis Smith
When Mackenzie King presented his plebiscite legislation to the House in February, he argued on the high ground of moral principle that his solemn promise to the public could only be revoked with the public’s consent. Diefenbaker led off for the opposition by conceding that “I am not now opposing the plebiscite to release the government from its pledge.” Instead, he chided the government for undermining the supremacy of parliament by appealing beyond it, called for “a one hundred per cent vote” of the public in favour of the plebiscite question, and challenged the prime minister to say what his government would do once it received that public consent. The campaign period should be minimal, and voters should be promised immediate mobilization after the vote. “Where shall we be in ten weeks?” he worried. “Only on Thursday last we read in the press that if Java falls and Australia be attacked, the next places on the Japanese time-table to be attacked are Hawaii and Alaska in April.”58 The dominos were falling while Mackenzie King dithered.
The plebiscite gave the prime minister a strong English-speaking majority in favour of release from his promise, but a majority against release in Quebec. King had appeased English-speaking sentiment and bought some time, but he dared not confront Quebec voters, who remained overwhelmingly opposed to conscription. In June 1942 his government made the next move in its skilful game of ambiguity by repealing the legal limitation on overseas service for conscripts, without actually drafting anyone for service abroad. Diefenbaker protested that “the government cannot forever procrastinate; it cannot forever fight this delaying action, if the morale of the people of Canada is to be maintained.”
When Paul Martin asked whether Diefenbaker wanted immediate conscription for overseas service, he replied that “the time has come when there is only one mobilization that will assure equality, and fairness, and unity in Canada.” To his French Canadian friends, he appealed for “unity of effort” – something, if it were granted, that would permit King to proceed with compulsory service overseas. The appeal for fairness and unity was Diefenbaker’s way of opposing French-speaking attitudes without overtly opposing French Canadian voters. He perceived the whole Canadian war effort as something beyond calculation of merely Canadian interests. There was now a higher duty to Britain and the empire which should transcend all domestic divisions. If Diefenbaker did not understand that many French Canadians could never share that belief, he did know the political realities: his arguments would not persuade the House. King’s ambiguity won the day.59
The Saskatchewan member’s second general criticism of the King government concerned its wartime usurpation of parliamentary authority. It was a strong traditional – and populist – theme, which Diefenbaker had first used in the 1940 campaign. By 1942 it was fully developed. In the budget debate that July he made his case for the prosecution.
I intend to discuss a trend which is gradually becoming more pronounced as the war goes on and is against the full operation of our parliamentary institutions and all that they stand for in the democratic way of life … This parliament represents the people of Canada; it is the repository and trustee of their hopes of survival … I have no apologies to offer for speaking on this subject; for this is the only place, the only forum, where one can express one’s views, where one can make one’s criticisms, where one can advance constructively such ideas as one believes are in the interests of the country as a whole.60
Diefenbaker’s touchstone was a speech that day in the British House of Commons by Prime Minister Churchill, in which he had pointed to free parliamentary debate as the very purpose for which the war was being fought. In Mackenzie King’s parliament, Diefenbaker saw but a poor shadow of Churchill’s Westminster.
There is a tendency on the part of this government not to give the attention to parliament that it should, and we are approaching a state where parliament need not be called together except for the purpose of voting supply.
…I refer … to the attitude of the government in continuing in ever-increasing measure to govern by order in council, with the result that we in this parliament are denied the opportunity of debate on matters which affect the welfare of the people as a whole.
The member’s charges were wide. Price, trade, and agricultural regulations had been imposed by order-in-council during a parliamentary sitting; not all regulations had been made public; private members’ days in the House had been suspended; and the government responded to more and more questions with the answer that “it is not in the public interest to reveal information.” Canadian newspapers had been prosecuted under the defence regulations for what he saw as “fair and constructive criticism.”
Diefenbaker noted that the Canadian emergency regulations permitted prosecution for making statements “likely to prejudice” the war effort, regardless of intent. In Britain, by contrast, the rules prohibited only false statements intended to prejudice national defence; in other words, an intention to deceive was required for conviction. The Canadian rules were potentially “an instrument of tyranny.”
These are extraordinary sections. They were never intended to be used for the prosecution of political opponents. Their use should be circumscribed … There is not a member of this house, there is not an honourable, patriotic citizen anywhere in Canada who may not be convicted of an offence under these sections if they are used against him … I say the time has come … to stand up for … the rights of loyal citizens all over this dominion, and to secure from the government the assurance that these sections will no longer be used against loyal citizens of proven patriotism.
Diefenbaker closed with another reference to the words of Churchill, who had encouraged critics to speak out “in driving forward our war effort and trying to gain an earlier inch or a more fruitful hour whenever it may be possible.”61
Next to Arthur Meighen, no politician more easily annoyed Mackenzie King than John Diefenbaker. The member for Lake Centre knew it. He sensed the points of weakness in the prime minister’s vanity and took pleasure in plunging the knife. But his mischief was accompanied by covert admiration: Diefenbaker could see, and would himself emulate, King’s political skills. In the memoirs Diefenbaker wrote:
King had an infinite capacity to express one view and within five minutes to express the reverse. In debate, if you quoted some statement of his which you believed to be irregular, he would always clear it up by saying: “Read on.” He knew that sooner or later in the speech from which you were quoting he would have said the very converse. He also had a talent for a lachrymose performance when he believed this tactic to be to his advantage. Or, he could wrap himself in the garments of righteousness, quote scripture, and condemn the Tories as apostles of darkness. Throughout the years, he did all he could to destroy his political opponents, sometimes not excluding those within his own party, while all the time clasping his hands in pretence that he would never do anything unfair or unjust. No more sublime actor have I ever known.62
For the jealous prime minister, Conservative allusions to Winston Churchill were always odious. In May 1941, Diefenbaker recalled, when he accompanied R.B. Hanson and Grote Stirling to a private briefing on the war effort, King had exploded at his presence: “What business have you to be here? You strike me to the heart every time you speak. In your last speech who did you mention? Did you say what I’ve done for this country? You spoke of Churchill. Churchill! Did he ever bleed for Canada?”63
“There were tears in King’s eyes. There was rage on his face,” Diefenbaker wrote. But suddenly he became calm and reported that the British battleship Hood had been sunk; he was in despair. The embarrassment passed. A few days later the scene became the subject of gossip in the House, and King accused Diefenbaker of breaching confidence. Diefenbaker demanded a withdrawal. “I had not spoken to anyone about it. King withdrew, but only after he realized that I would reveal his inane conduct at the inter-party meeting. His outburst about Churchill, however, told me something important about King’s normally well hidden nature. Indeed, neither liked the other. Church
ill disliked the political opportunism of King. King envied the popularity of Churchill.”64 Henceforth, Diefenbaker used the words and example of the British prime minister frequently in the House. For him, in King’s presence, the image of Churchill was both talisman and weapon.
Diefenbaker knew, too, of King’s peculiar sensitivity about the reputation of his grandfather, the rebel William Lyon Mackenzie. When Diefenbaker was called upon, without notice, to second Howard Green’s motion of censure over the Hong Kong inquiry in July 1942, he had no notes on the subject of the motion. Instead, he diverted attention and disconcerted the prime minister by reading from army lectures on the sources of political freedom prepared for Canadian officers. Along with the Spartans at Thermopylae, the Barons at Runnymede, and Bishop Latimer, the lectures listed the brave William Lyon Mackenzie. “It was obvious to all that I found it passing strange that he should have been included along with the greats. Imagine, William Lyon Mackenzie! Well, King lost his customary sense of proportion. I have never seen him more annoyed, and his voice rose to a level that I imagine has only been equalled in the days when the buffalo roamed the Western plains.”65 Diefenbaker was temporarily shouted down. When he continued, he goaded the prime minister further with the tale that his own great-grandfather Bannerman had followed Mackenzie to the United States border – but in pursuit, as a loyal militiaman. “Well, if anyone thought there had been a noisy, uncontrolled, raucous House before, it was silence beside what happened afterwards. King was completely out of control; he screamed and referred to the Conservative Members as a ‘mob,’ a term he later had to withdraw.”66
During the lunchtime adjournment, Diefenbaker writes, King somehow persuaded Hanson that the entire exchange should be edited out of Hansard. King, however, tells a different story to his diary:
Shortly before noon … there was quite a scene when I began taking Diefenbaker, of Lake Centre, and Hanson, to task over some of the insinuations they were trying to make, and the effort to prevent me from speaking. I referred to the tactics as being typically Tory and that they were actions of a mob. Diefenbaker had sought to have it appear I was responsible for some references to my grandfather, in his struggle for freedom, in some book of instructions for the training camps … The whole thing was more of an emotional outburst … I think the incident rather pleased our men, but after lunch Hanson brought the matter up as a question of privilege. I quickly withdrew the remark about the “mob” and agreed to have the whole incident expunged from Hansard. I was not in any way ashamed of it, but realized that, as Prime Minister, I should not have used that particular expression.67
What remained in the official record were Diefenbaker’s mischievous references to the prime minister’s grandfather, minus the claims about his own loyal ancestor and King’s cries about the Conservative mob. But press stories the next day recounted the full exchange, without the offstage byplay.68 Diefenbaker’s show had amused the galleries, but perhaps distracted attention from the opposition’s more serious complaints about the secrecy of the Hong Kong inquiry.
JOHN DIEFENBAKER’S HISTRIONIC SKILLS BROUGHT HIM IMMEDIATE PROMINENCE IN the House. But that was not all gain. In letters to his parents he spoke of jealousy in the caucus and slights involving the pronunciation of his name. For the family, the matter of the name always involved Diefenbaker’s ambition for the leadership. “Do try and forget that name of yours,” wrote his mother in March 1941. “Surely you have lived that down. It is not your friends, but your enemy’s that talk that way … Some day you will get where you want to be, if not now later.”69 His father wrote twice on the subject in the same week. “Your name? Well, I imagine, in the end … any opposition will disappear from the very fact, that they are making so much of your being able to qualify as leader. Already, I should judge, the people are beginning to get used to it … Then too, possibly the best thing for you to do in the matter of jealousy, is to strive unnoticed to hide any feelings of dislike for such apparent attitude on the part of any of your party or other fellow members.”70 William was pleased that a radio reporter from Ottawa got the name right: “I am still glad when I think of how nicely he pronounced your name.”71
John conscientiously sent Hansard to his parents and maintained a flow of press clippings about his political activities. In 1942 the Diefenbaker name still troubled him. “And such publicity of late,” exclaimed his father in May.
The Globe and Mail are not speaking Conservative. But when they tell about your parliamentary stand in certain things – editorially – when it is in an approving way, to my notion, they are backing you.
Even the Financial Times. Well! They spoke of “Campbell-Bannerman.” What a nice name it would be and what it might mean to you.72
His mother responded, apparently, to the same article: “That about changing your name. I think its crazy would that make you a better Canadian than you are? I dont think it would help you to change your name now. If it had been done years ago it would have been all right.”73
THESE CONCERNS REFLECTED WHAT JOHN DIEFENBAKER SENSED AS AN EARLY CHANCE to seek the leadership of the Conservative Party. With the wartime suspension of most political activity, the party limped through 1940 and 1941, its prospects bleak and its treasury nearly empty. In June 1940, when Hanson made a desperate appeal to MPs and senators for funds to keep a small central office in Ottawa open, contributions of $50 each brought in $3350. That made up the budget for the rest of the year.74 In 1941, thanks to initiatives taken at an informal national meeting in January, the party raised $36,000 through solicitation of traditional business sources in Montreal and Toronto. Diefenbaker attended that meeting as the lame duck leader of his provincial party, and $9000 of the total was eventually contributed to the Saskatchewan wing.75
Hanson’s role as House leader was temporary, and he carried on desultory discussions about the choice of a permanent leader. Conservative loyalists talked gloomily of the party’s displacement by the CCF at the next general election if the party could not renew itself. Hanson led the parliamentary party with modest efficiency, but there were growing strains in the caucus over the party’s attitudes on overseas conscription. In a war for British survival, this was bound to be the fundamental issue in the party of Robert Borden and Arthur Meighen. Hanson, however, was sensitive to the memories of national conflict in the First World War and to the party’s rural supporters who opposed conscription; he did not press the issue so long as voluntary recruitment satisfied military needs, as it did through 1940 and 1941. But others in the party, and much of the English language press – moved by a sense of fairness, or convictions of principle, or anti-French prejudice, or anger at Mackenzie King’s political shrewdness on the issue – believed that the Conservatives should reject King’s caution and declare unambiguously for compulsory overseas service. Meighen, with his “measureless contempt” for the prime minister, was one of them, but for months he kept a frustrating silence.76 Once the caucus had decided in May 1941 to hold a party conference in the autumn to discuss a leadership convention, he was determined to see the leader chosen quickly so that the party could “get into action on strong British total war lines without delay.” That would mean a direct challenge to the King government. When Hanson still insisted on restraint in an address at the Albany Club in Toronto just before the autumn conference, Meighen and the proconscription lobby were moved to immediate action.77 Despite his own genuine fears about a return to the electoral wars, Meighen seemed the obvious candidate.
The Dominion Conservative Association – a gathering of about two hundred persons made up, in Diefenbaker’s words, of the parliamentary caucus and “the Warwicks or king-makers of the Party … the Toronto and Montreal groups” – met in the Railway Committee Room of the House on November 7, 1941. After Hanson’s opening remarks, Meighen made a fighting speech about the government’s inadequate war effort. The meeting fell into bickering over whether it had the authority to choose him as leader, or only to set the time and place for a convention.
A subcommittee eventually voted overwhelmingly to invite Meighen to take the leadership, but the next day he declined and left the meeting. Debate continued through the day, until a unanimous motion in favour of Meighen was adopted. Diefenbaker initially opposed Meighen, warning that “if you resign to seek a seat in the House of Commons, King, who hates you … will destroy you.” But in the end Diefenbaker voted for him.78
After days of painful reflection, Meighen reluctantly gave in to the pressure and told the party that he would lead it on a platform of coalition and conscription reminiscent of 1917. This was a heady and divisive mix that was certain to rouse old Canadian demons. A House of Commons seat was opened for him by the resignation of the Conservative member for York South, and Prime Minister King set the by-election for February 9, 1942. King promised, out of conventional courtesy, that the government would not nominate against Meighen, but privately he was horrified. If Meighen led the Conservatives in the Commons, “it would be helping to break up our Dominion.”79
Meighen meant to fight the by-election on the issue of conscription. He had the backing of a Committee for Total War organized by a group of Toronto businessmen with the aid of George McCullagh’s Globe and Mail, but the King government undercut Meighen by its announcement in late January of the forthcoming plebiscite on whether to release it from its pledge against compulsory overseas service. The CCF candidate, J.W. Noseworthy, and his party fought a vigorous campaign of personal invective, labelling Meighen as the stooge of the “Conservative old guard,” the voice of the war profiteers, a leader who had been chosen improperly to protect their privileges. Noseworthy called vaguely for the conscription of wealth as well as manpower. Editorials in the Financial Post and the Winnipeg Free Press gave credence to rumours that Meighen’s selection had been rigged by the “big interests”; and Meighen was distracted by what he described as “a ruthless and dishonest campaign all through Canada.” Despite Mackenzie King’s avowal of neutrality, Meighen believed that local Liberals were active in the CCF campaign.
