Rogue Tory

by Denis Smith

  Since then we have had no national policy - and we have had no transcending sense of national purpose, no national myth, no unifying force.

  Practically throughout the entire course of this period, bankrupt of any sense of national purpose, there has been a Liberal administration in Ottawa. This has been particularly unfortunate since that party has never understood the significance of national policy and the imperative need for a transcending sense of national purpose.

  They have been vaguely aware of the vacuum and have attempted to fill it by policies designed to mitigate regional disparities in income and welfare. This was a necessary task but as one actor remarked of another: “He’s a fine chap. There is absolutely nothing wrong with him - except that he has no character!”

  Liberal policy has no character, no vision, no purpose - with appalling consequences to our parliamentary system and national unity. Regionalism in many vital respects is growing not diminishing (B.C. for example). The national government is tolerated because its policy is to keep everyone comfortable (more or less) and to “keep the boom going” - but it is not respected. It is undermining parliamentary government and national unity by failing to provide a transcending unifying force - the essential myth - by its deliberate determination to avoid a national policy, by its acceptance of a policy of drift which can have only one conclusion…

  Time is running out and only the Conservative party can stem this complacent drift … The present drift can only be stemmed by a new unifying force, a new national policy, a new national myth.

  That is why I have proposed a new national policy - the NEW FRONTIER POLICY; a new national strategy - that of “Defense in Depth”; a new national myth - the “North” in place of the “West” which “died” a quarter of a century ago.38

  Menzies insisted that a Conservative “New Frontier Policy” would be distinct from the passive, piecemeal, pork-barrel approach of the Liberal Party. “The difference between the Liberals and Conservatives is fundamental - it is one of principles - and it is vital for our future that the nation become alive to that difference.” The best way to assure that was “to enunciate a new and striking policy which sums up that difference, and then to dramatize that Policy by a few audaciously far-sighted proposals.”

  In his paper for Glen Green, Menzies had linked a series of programs in a national scheme: an export policy that would assure Canadian use of the country’s energy resources; a national electricity grid; power development on the Columbia and Fraser rivers in British Columbia, the Hamilton River in Labrador, and the Bay of Fundy; and construction of the South Saskatchewan dam. Now he focused on the romantic idea of the North with an “audacious proposal.” There should be a new province between the 60th and 65th parallels, including the southern Yukon, the southern Mackenzie Valley, and Great Slave Lake. There, he foresaw that mining and hydroelectric power would provide “the dynamic impulse” - to be followed by agriculture, forestry, the fishery, and a local consumer market. The new province would be Diefenbaker’s new West; its creation and settlement, Menzies hinted, would make Diefenbaker the new nation-builder, the new Macdonald. The proposal was accompanied by a series of detailed suggestions for railway, highway, waterway, hydro power, and public service projects to be planned and financed for the north by the federal government.39

  The idea of a new province was too audacious for Diefenbaker, but the inspirational language and many of the projects were not. He incorporated them in his election speeches. He listened more and more to Menzies and was flattered by his adviser’s encouragement. On Menzies’s urging, he disregarded most of the party’s formal efforts to produce policy statements and an electoral program, picking up only those that repeated or reinforced his own and Menzies’s thoughts.40 By mid-April Diefenbaker could already sense that what he said had resonance in the country. Others in the party sensed it too, and they threw themselves energetically into the campaign behind him. What John Diefenbaker said was Conservative policy - and nothing else mattered.

  WHEN PARLIAMENT DISSOLVED, THE CONSERVATIVE PARTY WAS READY TO LAUNCH its election campaign under the new leader. Diefenbaker’s parliamentary office was in the efficient hands of Derek Bedson, the former private secretary to George Drew. The party’s research staff under Donald Eldon was working in tandem with Merril Menzies to provide a series of policy statements consistent with Diefenbaker’s views. Allister Grosart was coordinating the national campaign, and fundraising was progressing well. In the key province of Ontario, Diefenbaker had confided local organization to Premier Leslie Frost and his provincial party.41 Dalton Camp’s advertising firm, Locke, Johnson, had produced a campaign slogan that summed up the party’s miraculously transformed character: “It’s time for a Diefenbaker government.”42 The opening rally of the national campaign would take place at Massey Hall in Toronto on April 25, 1957.

  Despite these encouraging signs, Diefenbaker doubted his own performance. “I think I will be through the session without too much trouble - altho’ I don’t think I have done at all well and am just getting full control now,” he wrote to his brother on April 11. “It’s a very onerous and trying position as L.O. - no one can really know unless he has the job.”43 His congenital difficulty in organizing his time, his thoughts, and his files had worsened with his new responsibilities. “Tomorrow I shall start on working on my speeches for Newfoundland,” he told Elmer. But three days later he wrote that “I have absolutely nothing ready for Newfoundland at all and will have to put the speech together after I get there.” On top of that, he could not complete his income tax return because he had lost his previous statement, “and I think the best thing to do would be to call on the authorities … and have them help me make it out.” He sent Elmer a memorandum for safekeeping until he could meet officials in Saskatoon to settle the affair.44

  As leader of the party, Diefenbaker could devote little time to his own constituency or to family matters. For help and reassurance in both, he depended on Elmer. John’s mother was now bedridden, and after two months of anxiety about nursing assistance at home she was moved to the University Hospital in May.45 At a distance from Prince Albert, Diefenbaker worried, too, that he might lose his own seat. “I wonder how things are going in Prince Albert,” he wrote to Elmer in February, “for the Grits are out to beat me at all costs … Gee it would be my end if I got defeated personally and I would be out for sure.”46 “I hope that the PA situation is in fair shape, although I am worried,” he repeated a few days later. “What they are doing there I do not know but will call Roy Hall in a few minutes.”47 In late March he reported that “the National Organization in Ottawa seems to be operating very well now under AI Grosart but I am naturally concerned about Prince Albert. I think one of these weeks when you are free I wish you would spend some time up there and make a survey of the situation and let me know what you think of things … I could arrange for an advance of $500 and your expenses.”48 When Mary Diefenbaker’s illness kept Elmer at home, John lamented: “I wish you could have gone to Prince Albert as I certainly will need help there.”49 For his only intensive campaign visit to the constituency from April 18 to 24, Diefenbaker hoped “that you will be able to attend all these meetings - you know so much about sound electioneering and get votes which no one else can succeed in getting.”50

  The Liberal Party, which had run third to Diefenbaker in Prince Albert in 1953, was determined to recover the seat in 1957. The party appointed a full-time local campaign manager and in early April it held an overflow nomination meeting in the Arcade Hall, preceded by a noisy motor cavalcade. Dr Russ Partridge, a local dentist and former provincial party president, was acclaimed as the Liberal candidate. Diefenbaker’s organizers were briefly worried. They revived the Diefenbaker Clubs of 1953 and renewed their efforts to recruit Liberals and CCFers to the cause.51 For seven days in April John and Olive travelled the riding, attending meetings in Shellbrook, Smeaton, Nipawin, Canwood, Debden, Macdowall, and Choiceland, before flying back to Toronto for the openin
g of the national campaign. From then on, Prince Albert was out of his hands as he toured the country from east to west and back again.

  When the leader flew into Toronto, his schedule was already looking frenetic. “This Pace Can Kill,” the Globe and Mail commented editorially. Diefenbaker’s leadership was “fresh and vigorous,” but the editors doubted it could long remain that way at the existing pace. His campaign managers, they advised, should slow him down for his own sake.52 They didn’t quite understand their man: Diefenbaker was reporting excellent health and an increase in weight.

  He reached the platform at Massey Hall that night before a “wildly enthusiastic” audience and stood arm-in-arm with his Ontario candidates before his introduction by Frost as “a great Canadian, a man of the people, and the next Prime Minister of Canada.”53 This was the first of many appearances by the premier in the campaign. He made clear throughout that he was committed to Diefenbaker as someone who could deal fairly with the provinces in tax-sharing, and his Ontario organization provided muscle, both financial and human, to the nationwide campaign.54

  Diefenbaker had arrived in Toronto with three draft speeches, prepared for him by Merril Menzies, Rod Finlayson, and Allister Grosart, “so that you could choose between them, or make use of parts of all of them.”55 As they had expected, the address that emerged on stage was his own, its unity emotional rather than logical. His aides knew that once Diefenbaker launched himself before an audience they could have no control over what he said, so their practical advice was limited to a few essentials. “Stress leadership, vision and a positive approach to problems,” Menzies suggested, “rather than being driven by the Liberal campaign to fighting on ground of their choosing -chiefly on negative issues and on criticism.” This was safe, since Diefenbaker had already made that choice of emphasis. His speeches were upbeat and evangelical, looking ahead to an era of bliss. But there was always some balancing reference to Liberal darkness, the loss of national purpose, the extinction of parliamentary government, if Canada could not recover “all the wisdom, all the faith and all the vision” of John A. Macdonald. Diefenbaker did not quite tell his audience he was John A. incarnate, but he insisted on a place in the apostolic succession. And in that succession, his contact was direct. No one stood between the Old Chieftain and the new Chief: an intervening half-century of Conservative leaders had vaporized.

  I am of those who believe that this Party has a sacred trust, a trust in accordance with the traditions of Macdonald. It has an appointment with destiny, to plan and to build for a greater Canada. It has a sacred trust handed down to us in the tradition of Macdonald to bring about that Canada which is founded on a spirit of brotherhood, vision and faith - one Canada, with equality of opportunity for every citizen and equality for every province from the Atlantic to the Pacific.56

  The new leader promised to place before the country, “not a policy of criticism alone, but one based on the needs of the present, the building of one Canada.” In that Canada, the provinces and Ottawa would share revenues in “a healthy division and balance … in a spirit of unity and amity, with mutual tolerance and respect.” All would benefit equally from a great new initiative.

  We intend to launch a National Policy of development in the Northern areas which may be called the New Frontier Policy. Macdonald was concerned with the opening of the West. We are concerned with developments in the Provinces with provincial cooperation, and in our Northern Frontier in particular. The North, with all its vast resources of hidden wealth - the wonder and the challenge of the North must become our national consciousness. All that is needed, as I see it today, is an imaginative policy that will open its doors to Canadian initiative and enterprise. We believe in a positive National Policy of development, in contrast with the negative and haphazard one of today. We believe that the welfare of Canada demands the adoption of such a policy, which will develop our Natural Resources for the maximum benefit of all parts of Canada.

  What is more, a new government would preserve and increase Canadian ownership of industry and resources, reduce taxes to eliminate surplus budgets, begin a vast and humane immigration program, provide farmers with fair prices, assist small business, end government monopolies in air transport and television broadcasting, restore parliamentary freedom, increase old age pensions, and resist communism at home and abroad. The party would take the country “back to the vision and the idealism of Canada’s first Nation Builder … My purpose and my aim with my colleagues on this platform will be to bring to Canada and to Canadians a faith in their fellow Canadians, faith in the future in the destiny of this country.”

  The message was positive, generous, Utopian, a dreamscape for a people who “ask for a lift in heart.” Diefenbaker gave it to them. If there was contradiction, obscurity, imprecision, and wild hyperbole, so be it. What Diefenbaker offered first was faith. The rest could be left for another day, for without faith there would be no victory. The audience responded to his extraordinary gleaming eyes, his undulating voice and shaking jowls, his dashes of self-mockery and sarcasm, his assertion of that enticing northern vision. After Massey Hall, heartbeats quickened. Something was in the air that the Liberals could not manage. With variations of anecdote and local colour, the Massey Hall speech became the model for the entire campaign.57

  From Toronto, Diefenbaker began a six-week odyssey, travelling twenty thousand miles by special railway car, air, and auto to every province.58 On the train, he was accompanied by Olive and a personal staff of six: George Hogan as train manager, Derek Bedson as private secretary, Merril Menzies as research assistant, Fred Davis as personal photographer, and two secretaries.59 A small group of reporters, usually only five or six, accompanied the tour, to be joined by local and regional correspondents at every stop. By later standards, the entourage and camp followers were a distinctly modest company.

  As the campaign progressed, their mood changed from uncertainty to slightly disbelieving hope. The country was responding.60 Friendly headlines in the Globe and Mail traced the leader’s progress across the country: “Ontario Enthusiasm Moving East” (April 29), “Ontario Premier’s Aid Could Help Turn Tide” (May 4), “Crowd of 1500 at Guelph Welcomes PC Chieftain” (May 14), “Diefenbaker Finds Trend Toward PCs” (May 16), “Liberals Are Worried PC Party Tells West Audiences” (May 20), “Diefenbaker Hailed by 3800 in Victoria” (May 22), “Diefenbaker Receives His Greatest Acclaim in Vancouver Overflow” (May 24), “Liberals in Panic: Groundswell for PCs Noted by Diefenbaker” (May 30), “PC Leader’s Campaign Likened to a Crusade” (June 1).

  Diefenbaker’s choice was a whistle-stop campaign that made room for endless brief stops, handshaking, and repetitious speeches. In mid-May the Globe still complained that his pace was too hectic and fatiguing, his message too ill-focused. “He is making dozens of minor addresses which draw purely local attention, when he ought to be making a handful of major ones which forcibly impress themselves - and himself - upon the situation.”61 The American Embassy, reporting the campaign to Washington, made a similar judgment: “Indications at the present time are that the opposition parties, led by the Progressive Conservatives, have thus far failed to develop issues which might capture and fire the imagination of voters across Canada… Mr. Diefenbaker, while an earnest and capable orator and possessed of a zeal that can arouse audiences thus far seems to lack the political appeal necessary to draw a large enough following to defeat the Liberals.”62

  While Liberal candidates played on the party’s authority and experience, Diefenbaker stressed his links with local communities and the common people, and his interest in their needs. He cared, he had roots, he was one of them. Wherever he could claim them, his ties were personal. In Toronto he recalled that he had first seen the City Hall as a child in 1900 when the Boer War veterans returned; in Greenwood he spoke of his happy school days; in Scarborough he remembered his early years; in Saskatoon and Prince Albert he had come home.63 Olive - despite a painful and recurrent slipped disk -was always with him on the
platform, smiling regally and passing him reassuring notes and reminders.64 By now she was his closest and most trusted counsellor, a calm presence as he raced across the country. The frenetic schedule let up only on Sundays; John Meisel calculated that Diefenbaker campaigned actively for thirty-nine days (as compared with Louis St Laurent’s twenty-eight) and made personal appeals in 130 constituencies (as opposed to fewer than 120 for St Laurent).65

  What the Globe and Mail missed in its editorial comments on his lack of focus was the way Diefenbaker “forcibly impressed” himself on his audiences. His impact was made not by extended discussion of complex issues, but by his urgency and zeal, his appeals to national greatness and common sacrifice, his promise of deliverance. As Meisel noted, his imagery “was highly evocative to anyone reared in the Christian faith … The voter needed only to vote for the Diefenbaker party and he would at once become allied to those who were creating a dazzlingly bright and promising future. Each voter could, so Mr. Diefenbaker seemed to say, participate in an effort which would make his own dreams come true.”66 By contrast, Prime Minister St Laurent was the dignified corporate chairman dryly reporting another successful year. “He seemed,” commented the Winnipeg Free Press, “hardly to recognize the existence of a dissident group of shareholders demanding a change in the management. ” 67

  John Diefenbaker tapped the country’s discontents. The mood and the momentum of the campaign were increasingly with him and his party. His audiences grew larger, his appeals more confident, his jokes and anecdotes more relaxed and perfectly timed. Flattering pictures from his tour photographer blanketed the national press. Louis St Laurent, on his side, grew more irritable and aggressive. While the Conservative campaign had a vital centre and a target of attack, the Liberal campaign seemed listless, inflexible, and insensitive. As the mood turned against them, Liberal candidates squabbled publicly and made headlines by offending their audiences. The most vivid incident occurred at the prime minister’s rally in Maple Leaf Gardens, when a protesting youth was pushed roughly from the platform.68 The party’s insistent criticism of the Conservative slogan “It’s time for a Diefenbaker government” played into the opposition’s hands. For the Conservatives, every mention of it was free publicity; and it suggested that Liberals too could vote for Diefenbaker without becoming Tories. In 1957 Diefenbaker could not be discredited - even when, at the last moment, he falsely accused the prime minister of impropriety in seeking Liberal votes from members of the armed forces. In the circumstances, this seemed no more than normal electoral exaggeration.69