Rogue Tory

by Denis Smith

  The Conservative campaign was submerged and virtually invisible. Three parties dominated the contest: the governing Liberals, the CCF, and Social Credit. Only the Liberals nominated a full slate. Social Credit came closest to that, with forty-one candidates, and the CCF named thirty-one. The Liberal Party could count on the assistance of its pervasive provincial organization and generous federal patronage under the guidance of Jimmy Gardiner. Since 1934 the CCF, with five seats, had formed the official opposition. Its prospects grew as the depression continued, and its organizations blossomed in rural districts throughout the province. Perhaps out of insecurity, perhaps out of a sense that the Conservatives were a waning force, the party offered confusing signs that it would cooperate with Conservatives in saw-off nominations in some constituencies. Diefenbaker recoiled from such links, but could not prevent the nomination of three “Unity” candidates who stood with local support from both CCF and Conservative associations.80

  For Diefenbaker, the most annoying competition came from Social Credit, because it upstaged his campaign, gave the Liberal incumbents a handy focus, and assured that corporate funding from the east would flow to the Liberals rather than the Conservatives. Although the Aberhart government in Alberta had already lost momentum, it made an aggressive thrust into the Saskatchewan campaign. The party barely existed outside a few local associations; decisions and management came from Alberta. Aberhart’s deputy in religion and politics, Ernest Manning, was made chief organizer in Saskatchewan, and candidates were chosen by the executive of the Western Canada Social Credit League, which was established in Edmonton a few weeks before polling day. Aberhart himself made an imperial progress through Saskatchewan, addressing one mass meeting after another about the crimes of finance capital and creating enough uncertainty to allow the Liberal Party to campaign as though it faced only a single challenger.81 In a year when international aggression was in the headlines, Aberhart’s peaceful invasion was alarmingly compared with Japanese, German, and Italian conquests in Manchuria, Austria, and Ethiopia. “Upon the result of this election,” Liberals intoned, “will depend whether or not Canada is to continue as a united British nation.”82

  In this four-party turmoil, the Conservative Party’s modestly progressive program was lost. Diefenbaker, like the CCF, criticized the Liberal government for its failure to deal with the weight of farm debt, but insisted that a Conservative government would not spend beyond its means. The party program called for refinancing of the provincial debt, “equitable adjustment” of farm debts, a study of crop insurance or guaranteed acreage payments, and a commitment in principle to public health insurance. Diefenbaker was attacked from the right by some Tory true blues, but was generally ignored in the din of overheated rhetoric. As usual, he complained about the Liberal machine. In his own riding of Arm River, he said, “Government inspectors … are so thick they have been ordered to wear a distinctive ribbon in their lapels so they will not go around asking each other for their vote.”83

  The outcome was devastating, though predictable. The Patterson government was returned with thirty-eight seats; the CCF elected ten members; Social Credit and Unity each won two seats; and the Conservatives failed across the board. In Arm River, John Diefenbaker lost a two-way contest against the incumbent Liberal. The Conservative popular vote fell to 12 percent, less than half that of 1934. Social Credit proved to be a thirty-day wonder, and the CCF emerged as the clear alternative to the provincial Liberal Party.84

  The leader’s bitter reaction combined complaint with self-justification. He wrote a few days after the election to a Winnipeg friend:

  I have never passed through difficulties the like of which I experienced during the four months preceding the election. Without funds it was impossible to get candidates in the field…

  In the latter days of the campaign Social Credit did the Party much harm. Almost all Eastern Financial concerns instructed their employees to vote Liberal in order to withstand Social Credit, and while much is made of the fact of the falling away of about 50% of the vote as compared with the 1934 election figures, the comparisons are not fair because in that year the co-operative party (Conservatives, Independent, etc.) received 114,000 votes with every seat contested. In the last Provincial election the vote received was only 50% of this total with only twenty-three seats contested, and the situation was, therefore, that in twenty-seven seats Conservatives had to cast their votes for C.C.F., Social Credit or Independent candidates. As a matter of fact the vote cast for Conservative candidates in this election was greater than the number cast for Conservative candidates in the last Federal election. So much for the past.85

  Diefenbaker complained to E.E. Perley of Liberal vote-buying and Conservative miserliness, and warned of his own disenchantment.

  Eastern Canada certainly let me down badly… Relief was distributed in a way that was never equalled in this Province. I know of instance after instance where distribution of seed oats and wheat was made a day or two before the election in excess of the allotments allowed, and in some cases after the recipient had completed his seeding. Bribery by relief and direct was practised on every hand, and the only salvation for the Conservative Party is to start in organizing now.

  If Eastern Canada will not give us assistance, then I do not know how the Conservative Party in this Province can ever hope to get any where. If, on the other hand, they give us assistance, I will continue to do my part in building up the organization.86

  The provincial party, in its disarray, did not blame John Diefenbaker for the loss. From its perspective, his performance had been an act of valiant self-sacrifice. Despite the defeat, he was reinforcing a small provincial network of loyalists who expected to fight again at his side. One of them, the Saskatoon lawyer John Hnatyshyn, a candidate in Touchwood constituency, wrote to say: “I only wish to reaffirm my admiration and confidence in you as leader. I will always be proud to be a member of the party and hope that I can be of some assistance to you in the future.”87 At a post-election meeting in Moose Jaw in October, Diefenbaker’s resignation as party leader was unanimously refused. He was the only leader they had. In 1939 he was still paying off provincial electoral debts from his own pocket.88

  CHAPTER 4

  Seats of the Mighty

  1940-1945

  JOHN AND EDNA SHARED THE DISAPPOINTMENT OF THE SASKATCHEWAN election, his fifth personal defeat. Despite all the signs that the cause was lost before the campaign began, Diefenbaker had thrown himself into it without reserve. Edna had been at his side as he toured the province, offering advice and comfort, tirelessly gracing his presence with her engaging smile and her capacity for friendship. They were both demoralized. But if John Diefenbaker suffered the public loss, his position also allowed him to compensate for disappointment in ways unavailable to his wife. As provincial leader he was inexorably bound up in the party’s national activities. That meant he had both a potential scapegoat for local failure and an arena for continuing activity. The burden of defeat could be lessened and some dignity restored by blaming the eastern party establishment for its indifference and by stoically holding onto his presence in the national organization. By 1938 he was too much a politician simply to drop out and make his career as a criminal lawyer.

  At first the thought certainly passed through his mind. He wrote later: “What I wanted to do was gradually and responsibly to relinquish my political obligations, and to devote the rest of my life to the practice of law.”1 Alvin Hamilton, who acted as Diefenbaker’s organizer in northern Saskatchewan for the disastrous campaign, recalled: “Up until the 1938 defeat John was determined to go on. But this one was the hardest yet, and he made up his mind to drop it and just concentrate on the law.”2 The law office did indeed offer an immediate refuge, but so did the political timetable. Diefenbaker did not have to rush into any decisive acts of renunciation that he might later regret. “Gradually and responsibly” stepping back could as easily mean waiting for the next opportunity while the wounds gradually healed
.

  For Edna, there was no public activity to absorb her energy or comfort her distress. Sometime after the strenuous campaign had ended, she began to show worrying symptoms of stress.3 To relieve the strain of the couple’s incompatible night-time routines, Edna had moved into the spare bedroom in 1937 or 1938. Now her insomnia was growing worse, and her physician, Dr Humphreys, recommended “a small glass of beer at bedtime.” When that seemed inadequate, he prescribed the mild sedative phenobarbitol. Edna’s niece Sheila Brower believed that she took the pills reluctantly and often too late, which meant that she was frequently drowsy or confused in the mornings, or when John returned for lunch. Her maid Florence Pelletier encouraged Edna to get out and walk, but she refused. Her lethargy and inactivity increased. She knew, at thirty-nine, that she would not have children, and she knew too that she was the prisoner of her husband’s political addiction. The 1938 campaign had sharpened her distaste for the abrasion, hypocrisy, and cruelty of politics, yet she could think of no other life beyond the one she shared with John. In these months his own pain meant that he was unusually brusque and testy with her. Relief for both of them, in the form of totally distracting activity, would only come when John plunged into his next campaign.4

  Almost immediately after the Saskatchewan election, on July 5-7, the national Conservative Party held its leadership convention in Ottawa. Diefenbaker complained vigorously about the failure of eastern financial support for the Saskatchewan campaign and hinted that he and others might boycott the leadership convention in protest. At the same time he sought reservations at the Château Laurier for the convention period, and applied pressure from several directions when a room was denied him.5 The hints of boycott prompted a quick and appeasing response from John R. MacNicol, MP, joint chairman of the forthcoming meeting. MacNicol congratulated Diefenbaker on his “splendid effort” in the provincial campaign, insisted that his presence in Ottawa would be important, and offered to send a cheque for $125 to cover his rail fare and expenses.6

  At the same time Diefenbaker urged Murdoch MacPherson to attend the convention so that MacPherson might be nominated for the leadership. Diefenbaker told others that he had “received so many requests to attend that I have decided to do so providing my health will permit.” In mid-June he asked for, and received, complimentary railway passes to Ottawa for himself and Edna from a supporter in Regina. On June 27 he wired MacNicol to say that he could not accept the offer of party funds, but when MacNicol replied that the money had already been sent by cable, he relented and two days later acknowledged its receipt. Diefenbaker did not report that he had already received free rail passage, and must have regarded the cash as slight but deserved recompense for his personal spending in the provincial campaign. As provincial leader he was an ex officio convention delegate, but when invited to represent Lake Centre (or Arm River) he replied that he would do so. There may have been fleeting thoughts of withdrawal, but Diefenbaker was not yet closing any doors.7

  In Ottawa he was shown the ritual honours of a provincial party leader, and his resentments softened. But the Saskatchewan chief played no part in the manoeuvres preceding the selection of a new national leader. The leading candidate was Dr Robert Manion, an Irish Roman Catholic of pleasing disposition from Fort William, Ontario, and a former minister in the Bennett administration. Manion had the support of most Quebec delegates to the convention and seemed to offer the prospect of Conservative revival in Quebec in alliance with the Union Nationale government of Premier Maurice Duplessis. But Manion was opposed by the influential president of the CPR, Sir Edward Beatty, because he had persistently rejected Beatty’s campaign for amalgamation of the two national railways. In the weeks before the convention various alternative candidates were promoted in Toronto and Montreal, but Manion remained the favourite.

  The 1938 convention was, by later standards, a loosely organized affair to which many delegates came uncommitted. MacPherson’s stirring speech in acceptance of his nomination made him an instant challenger to Manion. Suddenly the other three candidates – Ontario’s Joe Harris, J. Earl Lawson, and Denton Massey – saw their support drain away as the dark horse from the prairies became the choice of the eastern party establishment. But Manion’s support held, and on the second ballot he was elected leader by a margin of less than two hundred votes over MacPherson.8 Although Diefenbaker had supported MacPherson, he was satisfied with the choice of Manion and he came home encouraged.

  By the spring of 1939 Diefenbaker was discreetly preparing the ground for a federal nomination in Lake Centre, while continuing to hold the lame duck position of provincial leader. He was concerned to avoid public rebuff and embarrassment, and wanted the nomination only if it was a sure thing. He would need assurances of adequate financing for a campaign and promises that no local candidates would challenge his nomination. Arthur Kendall, the national organizer for Saskatchewan, assured him in May that unusual efforts were under way to clear his path to the nomination. Once the date for a nominating convention was set, Kendall said, “I have made sure that you will receive many invitations to become the candidate … Several key men will take care of the build up.” What was more, Kendall wrote that secret efforts were under way to arrange for withdrawal of the CCF candidate, Ross Fansher, from the race. If that “saw off” could be achieved, “everyone agreed that you could win hands down in a straight fight.” Kendall advised Diefenbaker, in the meantime, to make no public commitments.9

  The local executive set a convention date for mid-June in the village of Imperial and wrote formally to ask whether Diefenbaker would allow his name to go into nomination. Diefenbaker took Kendall’s advice and replied noncommittally on June 6: “This letter came to hand only today, and I am giving the question every consideration, and will let you know in a few days.” Writing the same day to his adviser Jack Anderson, Diefenbaker displayed his calculated indecision. He had “not definitely decided yet,” and was “very much in doubt as to what I should do.” He thought he should go no further than saying “I will accept nomination provided that no local candidate is in the field.” His health required an early visit to the Mayo Clinic – and that, he implied, might rule out his candidacy altogether. On the other hand, he asked Anderson whether he could obtain promises of national financial support for his candidacy “before the Convention.”10 He was hedging, he was overtly reluctant – but he was inviting nomination on the right terms. He wanted a unanimous convention and the appearance of a draft.

  After some last-minute juggling of court dates with his partner Jack Cuelenaere, Diefenbaker cleared his calendar to attend the nominating convention and, on June 15, he drove down from Prince Albert to Imperial with Edna. Diefenbaker’s name was the first in nomination, followed by six others, including three from Regina and that of the local president, W.B. Kelly. Diefenbaker spoke first: “I stated that, in my opinion, they should have a local candidate. I stated that if it had not been for the number of excellent local candidates whose names had been placed in nomination, I would have welcomed the opportunity to stand as their candidate. My mover and seconder accepted my disclaimer,” and Diefenbaker formally withdrew.11 A small fire interrupted proceedings, but balloting then went ahead without his name on the list. In what appears to have been an elaborate and prearranged charade, W.B. Kelly was victorious, but immediately withdrew in favour of Diefenbaker, who had left the hall and was sitting in his car with Edna while engaged in conversation with another delegate. Diefenbaker was called back – with apparent surprise – to hear the convention join in unanimous support for his nomination. “So there I was,” he would recall with a smile, “caught right by the ears.”12

  In the memoirs Diefenbaker writes that he returned to the car, and Edna, in silence. When he finally confessed that he had been nominated, “We decided that I had somehow to get out of it.” Diefenbaker says that he telephoned Kelly the next day to withdraw, but was told – and agreed – that he could only do so at the next meeting of the constituency executive in Febru
ary 1940. This was an unlikely part of the larger charade: it may have been the means of dealing with Edna’s opposition. If he really did intend to withdraw, and if Kelly knew it, the local association would not have delayed a fresh nomination for eight months. The national office had been urging a series of early nominations. The next day Diefenbaker commenced intensive efforts, by telephone, letters, and meetings, to organize his constituency campaign in every town, village, and hamlet in the riding. He never stopped, until the declaration of war in September put a temporary halt to all partisan political activity. On July 4 he wrote to Anderson that “I had my medical examination and the doctor reports on a very distinct improvement in my condition, and no necessity of an operation at this time. The blood report was exceptionally good, and I am, therefore, all ready to get started.” With the nomination in his pocket, Diefenbaker revealed himself as anything but a reluctant candidate.13

  Beyond his intensive work over the summer to build a campaign organization in Lake Centre, Diefenbaker faced two tactical issues, one national and one local. R.B. Bennett’s brother-in-law, W.D. Herridge, had left the Conservative Party after Bennett’s resignation to join with the editor of the Ottawa Citizen, Charles Bowman, in forming the New Democracy Party – a heterodox splinter on the centre-right of a confused political spectrum. Herridge claimed that it would adopt and build upon Bennett’s New Deal policies to offer a radical alternative to the Liberals, and he sought Diefenbaker’s allegiance. Diefenbaker met Herridge in 1938 and again after his own nomination in 1939, each time rejecting the invitation on the practical ground that breakaway third parties never succeeded in Canada. But Herridge persisted. He gained the national support of Social Credit, whose candidates ran under the name of New Democracy in 1940, and Herridge himself ran in Kindersley, Saskatchewan.14