by Denis Smith
113 HCG, “Memorandum to the Prime Minister,” December 30, 1960; HCG, “Memorandum to the Prime Minister,” January 16, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110
114 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 177-78
115 Creighton had served, at Diefenbaker’s nomination, as a member of the British commission on the future of the Central African Federation, and thus had recently informed opinions on southern Africa. There had been intense public debate on South Africa in Canada, and Diefenbaker had received a large correspondence on the issue, including a resolution of the Board of Evangelism and Social Service of the United Church of Canada opposing readmission and a statement from Patrick Nicholson urging a “bold acceleration” of South Africa’s policy of creating Black homeland states, which he saw as “the germ of an acceptable solution to the Commonwealth problem.” D.G. Creighton, “Should the Republic of South Africa be readmitted to the Commonwealth?” nd, JGDP, XII/54/C/109.1; “Canada Must Reject Apartheid,” Telegram, January 21, 1961; United Church of Canada, “Canada, South Africa and the Commonwealth Conference”; Pat Nicholson, Memorandum, March 1, 1961, JGDP, XII/76/C/404
116 RBB, “Memorandum: Prime Minister,” nd, JGDP, XII/76/C/404
117 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 179-80; JGD, “Memorandum for Cabinet: Memorandum for Saturday February 11, 1961,” JGDP, XII/76/C/404; George Drew, Memoranda to JGD, February 23, 24, and 27, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110. The Diefenbaker memorandum contains the prime minister’s brief handwritten notes of views expressed at the meeting.
118 “Press Conference with the Rt. Hon. John G. Diefenbaker … at London Airport,” March 7, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110
119 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 181-82
120 RBB, “Memorandum for the Prime Minister: Re: South African issue,” March 9, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110
121 Ibid.
122 RBB to JGD, March 10, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110
123 “Press Conference: Mr. R.B. Bryce and Mr. G.S. Murray,” March 10, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110
124 JGD, “Points for Preliminary Discussion on South African Membership,” March 12, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 182-84
125 “Press Conference, The Hon. E. Davie Fulton and Mr. R.B. Bryce,” March 13, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110
126 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 184
127 “Meeting of Commonwealth Prime Ministers: Draft of Paragraphs for Communique,” March 13, 1961; JGD, “Points for Further Statement on South Africa,” March 14, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110; XII/76/C/404; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 184-85
128 Diefenbaker added his questions and Verwoerd’s answers in handwriting to his copy of the revised draft communiqué. “Meeting of Commonwealth Prime Ministers: Communique: Revised draft of passage on South Africa’s racial policy,” 3:30 pm, March 14, 1961, JGDP, XII/55/C/110; see also Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 185; “Press Conference, The Hon. E. Davie Fulton and Mr. R.B. Bryce, March 14, 1961,” JGDP, XII/55/C/110
129 Diefenbaker’s and Fulton’s handwritten notes appear on pages headed “Mr. Macmillan.” Ibid., XII/55/C/110
130 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 185
131 Macmillan’s full account of the meeting appears in his Pointing the Way, 285-300.
132 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 186
133 “Draft of Communiqué: 15th March, 1961,” JGDP, XII/55/C/110
134 Macmillan suggests that he “induced” Verwoerd to withdraw the application by making clear that if the issue were forced to a vote, “the result … would be an almost overwhelming vote against.” Macmillan, Pointing the Way, 299
135 In his background press briefing, Davie Fulton told Canadian reporters that “the reason why South Africa withdrew its application for membership was because they found that insistence by the other members of the Commonwealth on a declaration of principle, first, and second, on a declaration that South Africa’s policies were inconsistent with these principles, was felt by South Africa to be unacceptable.” JGD, “Mr Verwoerd Mar 15/61,” JGDP, XII/55/C/110; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 186; “Supplementary Press Briefing - March 15, 1961, Hon. E. Davie Fulton and Mr. R.B. Bryce,” JGDP, XII/55/C/110
136 “Press Conference - Right Hon. John G. Diefenbaker … March 16, 1961,” JGDP, XII/55/C/110
137 Debates, March 17, 1961, 3079-83, esp. 3082-83; OC 2, 217-18; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 188. The draft text was written by Basil Robinson and Geoffrey Murray on the overnight return flight from London to Gander, and refined by Diefenbaker on the last leg to Ottawa. As an example of Diefenbaker’s extended prose on a single subject, it was unusually precise and coherent.
Chapter 11 “Hazard … Our Constant Companion”
1 JGD to Mary F. Diefenbaker, January 4, 1960, JGDP, V/l, 1002
2 House of Commons, Debates, January 14, 15, and 28, 1960, 1-3, 43-74, 435; Saturday Night, February 20, 1960, 33; CAR 1960, 3-5. The Cross column is in the Diefenbaker Papers, XII/50/C/59.
3 Newman, Renegade, 378-79; Globe and Mail, June 17, 19, and 24, December 23, 1961
4 Le Devoir, September 14, 1960, quoted in CAR 1960, 61
5 The Globe and Mail reported in a front-page story in December 1959 that Pearkes was “fatigued by the pressures of the toughest portfolio in the Government,” and remained “only because Prime Minister Diefenbaker hasn’t settled on anyone to succeed him.” Globe and Mail, December 19, 1959
6 “Notes on Cabinet Organization,” August 24, 1960, JGDP, XII/51/C/65
7 JGD, Memoranda, “Cabinet Changes Proposed by Jim Oastler, August 18,” “Cabinet Suggestions by Senator Thorvaldson,” August 27, 1960, JGDP, XII/51/C/66
8 Globe and Mail, October 12, 1960; JGD, Memorandum, “Rearrangement of Cab,” nd, JGDP, XII/51/C/66; CAR 1960, 61-63
9 CC, 22-60, February 6, 1960
10 RBB, “Memorandum for the Prime Minister: Re: Cabinet procedures,” February 9, 1960, JGDP, XII/96/F/33
11 The cabinet committee on finance and credit, which dealt with the finance minister’s borrowing plans, worked efficiently under Fleming’s guidance. In August the Globe and Mail reported that “top civil servants” were complaining about Diefenbaker’s failure to fill over two dozen senior vacancies, while overlooking many obvious internal candidates. Fleming, Near 2, 150-51; Globe and Mail, August 26, 1960
12 Horne, Macmillan 1957-1986, 233
13 Quoted in CAR 1960, 100
14 “Remarks by the Rt. Hon. John G. Diefenbaker … at Washington Airport on arrival June 3, 1960,” JGDP, XII/42/B365
15 JGD, “Toast to the President - Dinner, Friday night,” JGDP, XII/42/B/365
16 H.B. Robinson, “Briefs for Prime Minister’s Visit to Washington, June 3, 1960”; JGD, Memorandum, “Can US Relations,” nd, JGDP, XII/112/F/212, XII/42/B/365; CC, 68-60, 72-60, 73-60, June 6, 14 and 15, 1960
17 CC, 72-60, 73-60, June 14 and 15, 1960. Exercise “Sky Shield” would involve the suspension of private and commercial air traffic in North America for several hours, a simulated attack by 250 aircraft to be met by 1000 interceptors, and emergency operations by the two governments. A previously planned operation, “Sky Hawk,” had been cancelled in 1959 in the absence of Canadian agreement. This time the Canadian cabinet accepted a smaller exercise within North American radar range, but noted the risks: “Aircraft might stray beyond the intended range, or the Soviets might regard the exercise as sufficient provocation to lead them to carry out their threat of attacking American bases without warning.” Cabinet also noted “an article in the current issue of Maclean’s magazine which asserted that Canada was controlled by the United States.”
18 J.J.S. Garner to JGD, enclosing “Message from the Rt. Hon. Harold Macmillan …” September 15, 1960, JGDP, XII/77/C/435
19 JGD to Harold Macmillan, September 17, 1960, ibid.
20 “Memorandum for the Prime Minister: Comments on Khrushchov’s Speech to the U.N.,” September 23, 1960, ibid.; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 152
21 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s Worl
d, 153
22 H.B. Robinson diary, quoted in ibid., 154
23 “Address by the Prime Minister … John G. Diefenbaker, before the United Nations General Assembly, September 26, 1960,” JGDP, XII/77/C/435
24 CAR 1960, 126-27; Arnold Heeney to JGD, September 27, 1960; Foreign Language Press Review Service, Department of Citizenship and Immigration, “Comments on PM Diefenbaker’s UN Speech,” October 1960, JGDP, XII/77/C/435, XII/113/F/229; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 154-55
25 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 156
26 Horne, Macmillan 1957-1986, 278-79; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 155; JGD to Elmer Diefenbaker, September 29, 1961, JGDP, V/4, 2019
27 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 154-55; Horne, Macmillan 1957-1986, 278-79
28 Basil Robinson, Memo for file, November 9, 1960, quoted in Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 165-66
29 Diefenbaker reported his “wonderful visit” in a letter to his brother the same day. JGD to Elmer Diefenbaker, January 17, 1961, JGDP, V/4, 2063
30 JGD, “Memorandum Re: Visit with President Eisenhower, Washington, January 17, 1961,” JGDP, XII/86/D/149. Sometime later, perhaps in the preparation of his memoirs, Diefenbaker wrote five foolscap pages of similar reminiscences about his encounters with Ike, from their first meeting - “First showed friendship at the Church Service in Paris in Dec 1957 (NATO meeting) when he got up from his place by himself and came over to the right aisle and shook hands with Olive and me”; to the opening of the St Lawrence Seaway in 1959 - “he took Olive and I back to Montreal by helicopter. I got in back seat but security guards said ‘No’ - no one must sit behind him”; to their joking discussion in New York in September 1960 over whether Nixon should have agreed to the television debates with Kennedy - “I opposed - (a) Poker Game - (b) Why advertise your political opposition … After a while in came Howard Green and C.A. Herter … and Pres. said John agrees with your view.” JGD, “Eisenhower,” nd, JGDP, XIV/14/E/119
31 Dwight Eisenhower to JGD, January 18, 1961, JGDP, XII/7/A/232
32 Richard Nixon to JGD, January 16, 1961, JGDP, XII/9/A/306
33 JGD, “Memorandum Re: Conversation with Arnold Heeney,” January 17, 1961, JGDP, XII/86/D/149
34 Quoted in Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 168
35 Ibid., 169
36 Livingston Merchant (the US ambassador-designate to Canada), who was then undersecretary of state for political affairs, was a helpful intermediary. Ibid.
37 Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 63-65. The official transcript reporter spelled the name “Diefenbacher.” The two “old friends” had only once shaken hands.
38 Debates, February 8, 1961, 1852; Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 64. Knowlton Nash commented: “ABC-TV news referred to the Canadian prime minister as ‘Diefenbacon,’ the Washington Post called him ‘Diffenbaker,’ and United Press called him ‘Fiffenbaker.’ Even the American ambassador to Canada always called him ‘Diefenbacker.’ ”
39 Dean Rusk, “Memorandum for the President, Subject: Prime Minister Diefenbaker’s Visit …” February 17, 1961, Kennedy Papers, POF/113/Canada/Security 1961
40 JGD, “Notes for Conference in Washington with President Kennedy,” February 20, 1961, JGDP, VII/260/A/2347; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 170-71
41 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 171-73
42 The print was framed and on the prime minister’s wall for Kennedy’s visit to Ottawa in May 1961. OC 2, 168; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 199; Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 113
43 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 172-73; Debates, 2220-21; Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 91-100; OC 2, 167-69
44 Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 99
45 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 191-92
46 Ibid., 192-93; Debates, April 19, 1961, 3795
47 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 194; Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 104
48 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 194-95
49 Livingston Merchant to secretary of state, May 11, 1961, No. 893; “Triangular Proposition: F101B-Pinetree-F104G (To be raised only at Canadian initiative),” May 12, 1961, Kennedy Papers, POF/113/Canada Security, JFK Trip to Ottawa, 5/16-18/61; Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 195-96
50 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 196
51 SecState WashDC to The White House, May 15, 1961, Kennedy Papers, NSF/Canada: General:05/15/61-05/30/61, 4485
52 Kennedy had managed to disguise that he suffered from Addison’s disease, a painful degenerative disease affecting the spinal cord. It was obvious from his appearance that he was taking frequent injections of cortisone, purportedly to deal with the pain of a war time injury; and he took various other medications “prescribed and unprescribed, each day, sometimes every hour.” The Kennedy biographer Richard Reeves added that he had “persistent venereal disease, a very uncertain stomach that restricted him to a bland diet all his life, some deafness in his right ear, and a baffling range of allergies that sometimes laid him out.” By contrast, the hypochondriacal Diefenbaker - although also partially deaf - was in thriving good health. Reeves, President Kennedy, 42-44, 120
53 Ibid., 120
54 Debates, May 17, 1961, 4962-65, esp. 4965; Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 124-25
55 This account is based primarily on Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 198-209, and follows consistently the lines proposed in the American briefing documents, especially the main collection of briefing papers in the Kennedy Papers, POF/113/Canada Security, JFK trip to Ottawa/5/61 (B).
56 The original and one photocopy of the memorandum are filed separately in the Diefenbaker Papers. The original is unblemished, but the photocopy contains Diefenbaker’s double underlinings wherever the word “push” appears. There are numerous copies, with appended comments, in the Kennedy Papers for 1962. WWR, “Memorandum to the President: What we want from the Ottawa trip,” May 16, 1961, JGDP, XII/88/D/204, XII/85/D/113
57 Robinson, Diefenbaker’s World, 206-07
58 Merchant to secretary of state, May 19, 1961, Kennedy Papers, NSF/18/Canada: General: 05/15/61-05/30/61, Embtel 923
59 JGD to Elmer Diefenbaker, May 18, 1961, JGDP, V/4, 2135
60 Diefenbaker spoke of that “callow young man” to the diplomat George Ignatieff, who is quoted in Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 130. Less than a month later the US Treasury Department briefly held up delivery of grain-unloading equipment needed for ships transporting Canadian grain from Vancouver to China, but exempted the equipment from the US Trading with the Enemy Act on representations from the US Embassy in Ottawa and the Canadian ambassador in Washington. Diefenbaker later claimed that he had berated and threatened Kennedy in a telephone conversation until the unloaders were released, and that this “was the end of any friendly personal relationship between President Kennedy and myself.” Diefenbaker’s secretary, Bunny Pound, and State Department officials doubted the accuracy of Diefenbaker’s account of the incident. On June 8, 1961, Diefenbaker told the House of Commons that the dispute had been settled by diplomatic means, and that “such cooperation is an example to all the world.” OC 2, 179-81; Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker, 132-35
61 The prime minister also sent Elmer a cheque, presumably to cover the funeral expenses. JGD to Elmer Diefenbaker, August 5, 1960, JGDP, V/4, 2003
62 The four were William, Edna, Edward - and Mary still to come. Diefenbaker neglected to mention that Edna had been buried deep so that his own body could lie above hers; the capacity was thus six. JGD to Elmer Diefenbaker, July 23, 1960, ibid., 2000
63 JGD to Elmer Diefenbaker, August 26, 1960, ibid., 2010
64 Dr D.M. Baltzan to JGD, December 1, 1960, JGDP, XII/49/C/36
65 Prince Albert Herald, February 21, 1961; Globe and Mail, February 22, 1961; Saskatoon -Star-Phoenix, February 23, 1961; Regina Leader Post, February 22, 1961; The Scotsman, March 11, 1961
66 JGD to Elmer Diefenbaker, April 1, 1961, JGDP, V/4, 2117
67 CAR 1960, 6-7; Debates, February 19, 20, March 1, 2, 3, 1960, 1231-33, 1241-44, 1608-25, 164
8-69, 1687-708
68 Diefenbaker briefly noted the comments of fourteen ministers and recorded nothing beside Fleming’s name - whose assumption, as minister of finance, that there would be a budget can probably be taken for granted. Two ministers, Maclean and Fairclough, seemed to suggest a dissolution without a budget, while most others favoured a budget in March. JGD, Handwritten notes, “Secret Discussion Budget, February 9, 1960,” JGDP, XII/51/C/65
69 CAR 1960, 7; Fleming, Near 2, 145-46
70 Fleming, Near 2, 146, 151-65
71 Charles Lynch, quoted in Fleming, Near 2, 166
72 Diefenbaker told his brother: “There have been all kinds of alibis for the outcome in Saskatchewan and no doubt there will be a number who will join with the Star-Phoenix in condemnation of me in connection with the deficiency payments decision. I believe that the medical doctors, by their lobby against the Medical Act, made that subject the issue to the exclusion of almost all others.” JGD to Elmer Diefenbaker, June 13, 1960, JGDP, V/4, 1979
73 Fleming, Near 2, 217-21
74 Ibid., 221-23; CC, 107-60, September 7, 1960
75 Three of the seats had previously been Conservative and one Liberal. In Niagara Falls, Judy LaMarsh held the seat for the Liberals; in Peterborough the “New Party” candidate Walter Pitman took an old Conservative riding; in Henri Courtemanche’s former riding of Labelle the Liberal candidate won; and in the New Brunswick seat of Royal, Hugh John Flemming claimed the government’s only victory.
76 Fleming, Near 2, 243-49; Debates, December 20, 1960, 999-1017
77 Diefenbaker’s retrospective view in his memoirs was that Coyne “apparently belonged to the economic school which had considered that the only way out of the Great Depression was to have more depression, and that the only way to cure unemployment was to create more unemployment.” Coyne, he asserted, had conducted “a political campaign against my government. He was an unregenerate Grit.” OC 2, 270-77; Fleming, Near 2, 304
