by Denis Smith
Bryce made a general report on the Security Panel’s discussion of homosexual cases in a memorandum to Diefenbaker and Fulton in January 1961. He reflected the views of the more liberal members of the panel, including his own and Norman Robertson’s, in suggesting that inquiries should henceforth be limited to employees susceptible to blackmail by foreign intelligence services. In those cases, Bryce proposed that the Security Panel should review files before any departmental actions took place. These recommendations - which were clearly aimed at narrowing both the range and the damaging personal results of RCMP snooping - still allowed for dismissals, transfers, and induced resignations without due process under the existing cabinet directive. In addition, Bryce recommended a program of psychological research designed to work out “tests to identify persons with homosexual tendencies” as a screening device for federal employment. His recommendations received the approval of Diefenbaker and Fulton in 1961.
A year later Bryce received an extensive and decidedly loony preliminary research report proposing a larger project aimed at identifying homosexuals on the basis of eye movements and pupil dilation when reacting to nude pictures. The Security Panel approved that project, with funding, in February 1963, as one of the last acts of the Diefenbaker government.76
Paradoxically, as the scholars Robinson and Kimmel point out, at the same meeting, and on the basis of American experience, the panel also supported a more permissive and liberal approach, handled on a case-by-case basis, to the removal of homosexuals from posts requiring security clearance. That led the new Liberal government, in December 1963, to adopt a revised Cabinet Directive on Security. But sweeping RCMP investigations continued without any clear cabinet mandate.77
This odious security policy resulted in the arbitrary disruption of scores of careers and lives, including those of senior civil servants personally known to Diefenbaker and whose cases he reviewed. It was carried out in the hysterical Cold War atmosphere of the late 1950s and 1960s with the tacit approval of the official opposition, as Liberals and Conservatives traded places in power.78 For John Diefenbaker, the record must be judged against his unusual claims of virtue as a civil libertarian. On grounds of “national security” that the prime minister preferred not to question too closely, he countenanced secret investigations and rulings, without any legal protections, directed at citizens whose careers were in his care. This was not, on his part, a policy of active persecution; it was a policy of omission. Diefenbaker preferred to accept the advice of his permanent advisers, and to leave in place a system which, in principle, he rejected. Arthur Lower’s complaints about RCMP security files only hinted at the possibilities of abuse. The reality was worse.
In the same period Diefenbaker dealt with one security case in a more direct way. In December 1960 Davie Fulton received a report from the RCMP commissioner indicating that Pierre Sévigny, the associate minister of defence, had been intimately involved with a Montreal woman, Gerda Munsinger, who might pose a security risk. Fulton recalled:
I went at once to see the prime minister, and told him that I wanted to discuss it with him. What should we do? I expected to have some sort of an investigation; but … he said, in my presence, “My God! This is terrible!” and he reached for the phone and called Sévigny, and said, “Get over here right away!” And without any chance to discuss with me as to how we might handle this … he had him over here and presented him with the facts and said, “What in the hell did you do?”
Sévigny admitted it: he said, “Yes, I did. But don’t worry; I never gave a state secret away. I would never give a state secret away. I would resign at once if I had ever done it.”
Diefenbaker accepted his word, and I think I did too … What was I to do? I didn’t know how I could report this to the commissioner, so I’m afraid that I … left the commissioner up in the air … I found out later that he was very dissatisfied, and thought that the minister had taken no action on the matter at all, when in effect the prime minister had settled it. That was … typical of Dief … that he would do it that way instead of the normal way.79
The prime minister recorded his own memory of the incident in April 1966.
My first knowledge of the Munsinger affair was when Mr. Fulton called me and said he wished to take a matter up with me … I said that I was available immediately if he would come to my office, which he did.
He gave me a general outline of what had been brought to his attention by the Commissioner of the R.C.M.P., and informed me that in the course of investigating Mrs. Munsinger it was established by tapped telephone operations that Mr. Sévigny was seeing her from time to time and that on one occasion he went to her flat in Montreal around midnight and did not leave until early morning.
Mr. Fulton placed before me only one document, and as I recall it was two pages in length setting out the facts. She had had a suspected background of relations with Russians shortly after the war, and furthermore her suite was in a building in which the Russians had a trade office…
After some discussion I immediately called Mr. Sévigny and informed him that while I was no judge of morals, this type of conduct caused me great concern; that he was consorting with a woman of loose character and that all relations with her must cease at once. I pointed out her alleged past in Europe and Mr. Sévigny took the strongest objection to any suggestion that he in any way would do anything of a disloyal nature. He finally said that there would be no more meetings with her. I again stated to him I would not accept any evasive explanations… “This must end between you and this woman forthwith, period.” He then replied that Mrs. Munsinger intended to return to Germany.
I saw Mr. Sévigny again a day or two later and asked him, “Has this ended?” and he replied, “Yes,” and said, “She will be leaving Canada shortly.”
Some days later I asked Mr. Sévigny for unequivocal assurance that his relations with Mrs. Munsinger, whether social or otherwise, had ended and he said they had, and added that she had left Canada.80
Diefenbaker continued the story in another memo written two days later.
When it was decided she would leave the country it is alleged that Mr. Sévigny required $500.00 which was supplied by Bill O’Bront. [sic]
Before leaving the country she went to Morgan’s store where she purchased clothing, etc., and issued a cheque which was refused by the bank because of insufficient funds on deposit. She was immediately arrested. This was on the Friday before she finally left Canada. She was freed on bail and $50.00 with the understanding that she would leave for Germany on Sunday. Transactions by O’Bront were carried out by Leo Robidoux, chauffeur to O’Bront, who allegedly paid the $50.00 fine that was imposed on her for fraud and it was he who picked up her ticket, gave her pocket money and drove her to Dorval Airport.81
Fulton offered Diefenbaker further information, presumably from the RCMP, and expressed some anxieties about loose ends in a handwritten note soon after Munsinger’s departure:
The person whom we were discussing recently has now left on her trip to Europe.
An interesting feature of her trip is that she received a message to call at a certain place in Munich where she will be given $500. There were no conditions or instructions given in the message: presumably if any are to be given they will be given when the money is delivered.
A feature of this case is that the legal opinion is that a person who has been given the status of landed immigrant and acquired Canadian domicile, cannot be prevented from returning to Canada under the Act as it stands, even though landing was obtained by suppressing relevant information about criminal record, etc. All that can be done now would be to await her return to Canada, then prosecute her for an offence committed after she had acquired domicile - then, if a conviction is obtained, she may be liable to be deported. You will appreciate the implications - what she might say - if we were to start prosecuting her for any of her questionable activities in Canada.
In short, I am afraid the problem and the potential danger is still on
the doorstep if she returns.82
On December 21, 1960, Diefenbaker saw Sévigny again, and left him in suspense about his future in the cabinet.
Colonel Sévigny came in to advise that he was going away on vacation and I told him that circumstances were such that his business demands may necessitate his resigning from the Cabinet although not from the House.
He seemed greatly concerned about this but I told him I didn’t see any way out and that the person in question, while now in West Germany, could not be denied returning to Canada.
I said I would discuss it finally with him early in the New Year.83
Diefenbaker received no evidence that Sévigny had breached security. The “person in question” had conveniently departed, so Sévigny remained in cabinet. The brief episode had occurred entirely in private, and it seemed best to keep things quiet. Diefenbaker knew that, as long as Sévigny stayed, he had enhanced command of the minister’s loyalty. And he could take satisfaction in his own compassion. In 1966 he wrote:
I had not then nor have I now any doubt about Mr. S. being a loyal Canadian. His war record - his heroism on the battlefield even after he was grievously wounded - these attest to his devotion to Canada. He was unwise and very indiscreet in his association with this woman - but he was no traitor nor the making of one, so being satisfied that Canada’s interests had not been jeopardized I refused to destroy this gallant French Canadian and to embarrass his family and friends when there was no reason to do so. And I am as satisfied now as I was then that I took the right course.84
Diefenbaker gave Sévigny the benefit of the doubt - something he had not done in those cases not of imprudence or disloyalty but of “weaknesses of character,” brought to him earlier that year from the Security Panel. For the time being, the associate minister’s indiscretions had damaged no one except Mrs Munsinger; and she had departed for Munich with the promise of a $500 bonus.
IN THE MONTHS AFTER HOWARD GREEN’S APPOINTMENT AS MINISTER OF EXTERNAL affairs, international tensions were easing. Just as Green became foreign minister, the stern anti-communist voice of John Foster Dulles was silenced by his death from cancer. He was replaced as secretary of state by the more soft-spoken Christian Herter. Nikita Khrushchev’s jovial tour of the United States in September 1959 was followed by an invitation to President Eisenhower to visit the USSR. A moratorium on atmospheric nuclear tests continued, while the United States, Britain, and the USSR pursued negotiations on a test ban treaty. Plans progressed for a great-power summit meeting in the spring of 1960, now actively supported in Washington. As tensions softened, Green threw himself energetically into the international disarmament campaign, with the enthusiastic support of the opinion polls. Canada joined a new ten-nation disarmament committee and played a leading role in a United Nations program to monitor radioactive fallout from nuclear weapons tests. Green, who admitted he was still learning on the job, showed rosy confidence in the prospects for peace, general disarmament, and Canadian prominence in the world.85
Diefenbaker told the House of Commons in January that his government’s policy, in the evolving situation, was both to promote disarmament and to maintain the country’s defences. Negotiations would continue with the United States, so that “the necessary weapons can be made available for Canadian defence units if and when they are required.” The prime minister added that “Canada retains its full freedom of choice and decision” in approving the use of nuclear weapons by Canadian forces.86 That was premature speculation, true only in the sense that there was not yet any agreement to acquire the weapons. The Bomarc missile, meanwhile, continued its spectacular series of test failures at Cape Canaveral, Florida, while George Pearkes insisted that it would nevertheless become “a vital element in the air defence system.”87 The Toronto Star cartoonist Duncan Macpherson pictured a feathery and prancing Pearkes as a “white-crested Bomarc booster.”88
By late spring the atmosphere had darkened. Disarmament talks stalled, and east-west relations were disrupted by Soviet destruction of an American U-2 spy plane on an illicit photographic mission over Siberia. In mid-May the Paris summit meeting collapsed in black comedy and embarrassment over the incident.
As these discouragements played out, Diefenbaker was on another stage, attending his second meeting of Commonwealth prime ministers. This time the Commonwealth faced the troubling issue of South African apartheid. Harold Macmillan had delayed a prime ministers’ conference until after his election victory in September 1959 (“You’ve never had it so good!” was the winning Conservative theme), but had now invited members to meet in London in May 1960. The prime minister of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah, indicated that the issue of South African racial policy should be discussed at the meeting. In November, however, Macmillan circulated a message to all members from the prime minister of South Africa, Hendrik Verwoerd, objecting that “there can be no interference at such discussions or conferences in the domestic affairs of member countries … we would regard as interference any criticism or discussion, formal or informal, of the policy or action of a member related to its domestic affairs.” Macmillan replied that “the convention of non-interference has always been fully understood and accepted among us all.”89
The harshness of South African policy, and the frequency of violence resulting from it, now made that convention of self-restraint and mutual self-interest unrealistic. In January 1960 the Canadian Labour Congress presented a brief to the Diefenbaker government indicating its support for the exclusion of South Africa from the Commonwealth. Diefenbaker replied, with surprising vehemence, “I would not bring before the prime ministers’ conference, or indeed support, any action that would exclude the Union of South Africa from the councils of the commonwealth of nations.”90 A few days later he clarified his position to the House:
Certainly, in so far as I am personally concerned, I have at all times strongly pressed for the need of action being taken to the end that discrimination based on colour, creed or other reasons should be abandoned everywhere in the world.
However, I do underline the fact that the representation of the C.L.C. was for action leading to the expulsion of South Africa from the commonwealth, and I made it clear that I would not take any part in bringing in a motion for action in that regard … It is clear that in the statement made by the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom no approbation was given to such a course as that suggested in the brief presented.91
Meanwhile, Macmillan was touring the African countries of the Commonwealth seeking to contain the incipient conflict. In South Africa, in mid-February, he called for recognition of the “winds of change” sweeping the continent: an appeal that seemed to be aimed directly at the South African government. Diefenbaker worried that “his own tactical freedom at the conference might be pre-empted” by Macmillan, and speculated that “Macmillan would not have spoken as he did if he had not been tipped off about South Africa’s intention to leave the Commonwealth.”92
Public appeals to Diefenbaker to take a harder stand in opposition to South African policy mounted to a crescendo by the end of March, after the police had killed sixty-seven blacks during disorders at Sharpeville. Diefenbaker also heard from Robert Menzies that Tunku Abdul Rahman of Malaya “felt compelled” to raise the issue in London because apartheid was a “denial of … respect for rights of the individual … which British institutions of government … inherited by commonwealth countries are intended to guarantee.” Diefenbaker could instinctively sympathize with the Tunku’s reasoning: Menzies reported that the Malayan leader was “constantly relating his thoughts on South Africa to deep racial, linguistic, cultural and religious differences which he is trying to bridge in creating [a] new Malayan nation with British institutions of government.”93 The UK government, on the other hand, made clear its desire to maintain a policy of non-intervention in order to protect the delicate relations of its African colonial territories with South Africa.94 Under these pressures, Diefenbaker responded in two ways: by sharpening his public criticisms and
by indicating privately that he expected “informal discussions” of apartheid at the Commonwealth conference, despite the convention of non-interference.95
Diefenbaker’s shifting position reflected conflicts within his own administration.96 Howard Green, his department, and the cabinet urged a course of extreme moderation on the prime minister at the conference, but Robert Bryce, who would be Diefenbaker’s chief adviser in London, was more radical. Basil Robinson summarized Bryce’s position as it had taken form by early April:
1. that the future usefulness and reputation of the Commonwealth as such in world affairs depended on a common acceptance of certain basic social and political standards which South Africa did not accept;
2. that Canada should consider initiating South Africa’s withdrawal from the Commonwealth so that its non-white members could hold up their heads; and
3. that though there would be a strain on relations with the United Kingdom and Australia, Diefenbaker could be sure of a place in history if he had the courage to put a stop to our present hesitations.97
On April 11 the prime minister went into the House uncertain of his line on South Africa, bearing conflicting texts for a statement from Bryce and from Robinson. He cobbled it together as he spoke, suggesting vaguely that there might be a major debate on South Africa after the Easter recess, and even more vaguely that the time was coming for a declaration of Commonwealth principles. Afterwards he departed for Easter in Saskatoon, “carrying with him speech drafts and briefing notes for the visit of President de Gaulle and for his own impending visit to Mexico, both of which would take place in the following week.”98