Just Watch Me

by John English

  17. Kidder interview and Kidder in Southam, Pierre, 255; interview with Gale Zoë Garnett, April 2008; Boyd, In My Own Key, 141; and Buffy Sainte-Marie to Trudeau, Nov. 20, 1977, TP, MG 26 020, vol. 11, file 11-9, LAC. A very good compilation of comments made about Trudeau “l’objet” (Trudeau as object) is found in François-Xavier Simard, Le Vrai Visage de Pierre Elliott Trudeau (Montréal: Les Éditions des Intouchables, 2006), chap. 6. Simard has collected a fascinating group of quotations dealing with Trudeau and women and men.

  18. Jeffrey Simpson, Discipline of Power: The Conservative Interlude and the Liberal Restoration (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996); Globe and Mail, July 20, 1979; and Richard Gwyn, The Northern Magus: Pierre Trudeau and Canadians (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1980), 336.

  19. Based on discussions with John Godfrey and David Silcox and Godfrey’s account of the trip in The Hidden Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The Faith behind the Politics, ed. John English, Richard Gwyn, and P. Whitney Lackenbauer (Ottawa: Novalis, 2004), 175–76.

  20. Interview with Alexandre Trudeau, June 2009. Quotation from introduction by Alexandre Trudeau to Pierre Trudeau and Jacques Hébert, Two Innocents in Red China (1961; repr., Vancouver: Douglas and McIntyre, 2007), 2–3.

  21. Patrick Gossage, Close to the Charisma: My Years between the Press and Pierre Elliott Trudeau (Halifax: Goodread Biographies, 1987), 182–83.

  22. Conversation with Jim Coutts. Paul Martin learned in London of Trudeau’s insistence on Marchand and was troubled. He wrote in his diary: “In any event, Marchand would be a disaster. Perrault has done well [as Senate leader]. Is it true that he was closed out of a meeting of the Liberal shadow Cabinet? … Marchand has had trouble wherever he has moved. It would be a mistake to make him Senate leader.” Paul Martin, London Diaries, 565–66. Martin is atypically silent on Trudeau’s defeat.

  23. Gwyn, Northern Magus, 337ff., covers this period well; interview with Arthur Erickson, Sept. 2007. Globe and Mail, Oct. 11, 1979. The “boa constrictor” comment is found in Geoffrey Stevens’ column; the description of Trudeau’s first question is in the news story. Canada, House of Commons Debates (10 and 30 Oct. 1979).

  24. The best account of this period is Jeffrey Simpson’s Discipline of Power, upon which this summary paragraph is based. There is also a fine description of the energy problems in R.B. Byers, ed., Canadian Annual Review of Politics and Public Affairs 1979 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981), 90–97 (Gallup polls for year).

  25. Globe and Mail, Nov. 14, 1979; Canada, House of Commons Debates (13 Nov. 1979). The CBC clip with Trudeau, Duffy, and Nash is on the CBC digital archives site: http://archives.cbc.ca/politics/parties_leaders/clips/13255/.

  26. Gossage, Close to the Charisma, 184–85.

  27. Ibid.; Gwyn, Northern Magus, 340–41. The video of the press conference can be found at http://archives.cbc.ca/politics/prime_ministers/clips/13256/.

  28. The House of Commons exchanges can be found at ibid.

  29. Gwyn, Northern Magus, 341.

  30. Michel Roy, Le Devoir, Nov. 26, 1979. Gossage, Close to the Charisma, 187; Globe and Mail, Nov. 22, 1979. Reactions are summarized in Byers, ed., Canadian Annual Review 1979, 56–57. The Maclean’s article “An Era Ends,” by Robert Lewis and Susan Riley, is typical in its brief attention to the Trudeau resignation, followed by extensive speculation on his successor (Dec. 3, 1979, 25–26).

  31. The Gregg memorandum is found in Simpson, Discipline of Power, 86. Reg Whitaker, “Reason, Passion, and Interest: Pierre Trudeau’s Eternal Liberal Triangle,” Canadian Journal of Political and Social Theory/Revue canadienne de théorie politique et sociale (winter 1980): 28. Whitaker (30n18) argues that the limitations of Trudeau’s understanding of popular sovereignty were ironically revealed when Clark won a majority with 4 percent less of the vote. He claims that it was “curious” that Trudeau was silent about this fact. He wasn’t: he attacked the result and called for proportional representation in his farewell address to his constituency.

  32. George Radwanski, Trudeau (Toronto: Macmillan, 1978). Chap. 16 is entitled “A Leader Unfulfilled.” A good summary of the RCMP Security Service is found in Philip Rosen, “The Canadian Security Intelligence Service,” Library of Parliament Document 84-27E; Trudeau to Kenneth McNaught, Nov. 16, 1979, TP, MG 26 020, vol. 22, file 13, LAC. The document McNaught sent to Trudeau was produced by Dr. Martin Friedland, professor of law at the University of Toronto.

  33. Tony Judt, Postwar: A History of Europe since 1945 (New York: Penguin, 2005), 447.

  34. Whitaker, “Reason, Passion, and Interest,” 31n50. On the PQ and the referendum, discussion is in Martine Tremblay, Derrière les portes closes: René Lévesque et l’exercice du pouvoir (1976–1985) (Montréal: Québec Amérique, 2006), 221. Pierre Vallières, L’Urgence de choisir: essai (Montréal: Éditions Parti-Pris, 1972).

  35. Lévesque’s comments in May 1979 about the advantages for separatists caused by the departure of Trudeau are found in La Presse, Nov. 22, 1979. Tremblay describes the later return of Trudeau as a profound shock, which had “un impact majeur sur la campagne référendaire.” Tremblay, Derrière les portes closes, 236.

  36. Interview with Hugh Faulkner, Aug. 2008. When a female friend from Calgary wrote to Trudeau in 1980, expressing familiar grievances, he replied:

  I am glad your feet are back on the ground if that is where you want them. But I am not sure that that is your best place. On oil and gas I must respect your expertise. But I am a bit sad that on East and West you speak in clichés: Ontario’s wealth, freight rates, rules of the game, treated as a colony, unwise to continue….

  You are a special stranger, and I am sad. I do not hear the Canadian in you. Is Alberta really so poor, so oppressed? Why are so many of you miserable? But joyeux noel, happy new year anyway.

  TP, MG 26 020, vol. 3, file 3-44. Statistics on unemployment: Canada Year Book, 1978–79 (Ottawa: Ministry of Supply and Services, 1978), 362.

  37. Kenneth Norrie, Douglas Owram, and J.C. Herbert Emery, A History of the Canadian Economy, 4th ed. (Toronto: Thomson Nelson, 2008), 404, 415. On the standard of living, see Pierre Fortin, The Canadian Standard of Living: Is There a Way Up? (Toronto: C.D. Howe Institute, 1999), and on the oil sands, see Paul Chastko, Developing Alberta’s Oil Sands: From Karl Clark to Kyoto (Calgary: University of Calgary Press, 2004). Chastko is generally critical of Ottawa but acknowledges the importance of the 1975 intervention in the financing crisis of the oil sands. Some details in this passage are from a student paper: Bob Shields, “The Oil Sands: A Business History, 1973–1975,” paper for History 602, University of Waterloo, April 2009.

  38. Trevor Findlay, “Canada and the Nuclear Club,” in Canada among Nations 2007: What Room for Manoeuvre?, ed. Jean Daudelin and Daniel Schwanen (Montreal and Kingston: McGill–Queen’s University Press, 2008), 206.

  39. Allan Gotlieb, The Washington Diaries: 1981–1989 (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2006).

  40. These judgments are based on conversations with former Canadian high commissioner to Singapore Barry Carin, former Mexican official Andrés Rozental, former German official (and Schmidt assistant) Hans Gunter Sullima, Lord Trend of Britain, former high commissioner to Britain Paul Martin (a view reflected in his published diaries), and many Canadian officials who worked with Trudeau. Trudeau’s letter to Schmidt after his 1979 defeat is exceptional for the handwritten additions, which expressed the hope that they would keep in touch and offered thanks for “our personal talks.” Trudeau to Schmidt, June 22, 1979, Depost HS Mappe 6600, Archives of Germany.

  41. Catherine Annau, Just Watch Me: Trudeau and the 70’s Generation (National Film Board of Canada, 1999).

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: TRUDEAU REDUX

  1. Jeffrey Simpson, Discipline of Power: The Conservative Interlude and the Liberal Restoration (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996), 118, 228ff.; Ottawa Citizen, Nov. 23, 1979. Regarding Turner and Macdonald, see R.B. Byers, ed., Canadian Annual Review of Politics and Public Affairs
1979 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1981), 57.

  2. Campagnolo to Trudeau, Nov. 28, 1979, TP, MG 26 020, vol. 2, file 62, LAC; Danson to Trudeau, Nov. 21, 1979, ibid.

  3. The best account of the fall of the Conservatives remains the first chapter of Simpson’s Discipline of Power. My account also draws upon conversations with Allan MacEachen, Marc Lalonde, Jim Coutts, Flora MacDonald, Geoffrey Stevens, Mark MacGuigan, Herb Gray, Bob Rae, Ed Broadbent, and several others present at the time.

  4. See Byers, ed., Canadian Annual Review 1979, 79–80, and the detailed account in Simpson, Discipline of Power, 33–47. Sheppard makes his comment in Globe and Mail, Dec. 14, 1979. Trudeau’s comment is in his memoirs (Trudeau, Memoirs [Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1993]), 264. Keith Davey gives his account in The Rainmaker: A Passion for Politics (Toronto: Stoddart, 1986), 261ff. Richard Gwyn provides a lively commentary in The Northern Magus: Pierre Trudeau and Canadians (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1980), 349ff., which is based on contemporary recollection and conversations. Comments about Liberal presidents and phone calls are based on personal recollection. I was president of the Kitchener Federal Liberal Association when the government fell and was personally called about the constituency’s views. The constituency was strongly opposed to Trudeau’s return, but I was not. In discussion with other Ontario Liberals, it appeared to me that the split was principally between conservative and liberal factions of the party, with the former favouring a leadership convention. There continued to be hope that John Turner would reverse his decision, a view expressed to me by two Liberal MPs.

  5. Christina McCall and Stephen Clarkson, The Heroic Delusion, vol. 2 of Trudeau and Our Times (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1994), 229. A story in Montreal Gazette, Dec. 17, 1979, alleged that Buchanan was lobbying Ontario Liberals against Trudeau. In his role as MP responsible for Ontario organization, he had the responsibility to test opinions. However, he was well known as one who thought Trudeau should resign, and the calls were interpreted by many as an attempt to get support for his views. When Buchanan told Trudeau about his findings, which indicated strong opposition to Trudeau, the conversation permanently affected his position with Trudeau, who would not put Buchanan in the Cabinet after the election.

  6. Trudeau sums up his “friends’” reaction with this statement. Memoirs, 268.

  7. This account is taken from Trudeau’s Memoirs, 267–68. A somewhat different version is found in Davey, Rainmaker, 264, where Coutts is presented as persuading Trudeau, the following morning, to run. The same account, with a comment by Coutts that he did not know of Trudeau’s decision until the press conference, is found in Gwyn, Northern Magus, 352. The best description is in Simpson, Discipline of Power, 33–47, which has the same account as Davey—indicating that Trudeau told Coutts at 8:30 a.m. that he was not running.

  8. Simpson, Discipline of Power, 46–47; Globe and Mail, Dec. 19, 1979; Patrick Gossage, Close to the Charisma: My Years between the Press and Pierre Elliott Trudeau (Halifax: Goodread Biographies, 1987), 188–89.

  9. Grafstein’s trip to Harry Rosen and the approach to the campaign are described in campaign chronicler John Duffy’s Fights of Our Lives: Elections, Leadership, and the Making of Canada (Toronto: HarperCollins, 2002), 292.

  10. Davey wrote in his memoirs that the Liberal campaign was principally about Joe Clark: “However, it was equally clear that this was not the campaign where our leader should be in the front of the window. Whether or not it was Pierre Trudeau—but especially because it was Pierre Trudeau” (Rainmaker, 265). The information on the relations with the press is drawn from Gossage, Close to the Charisma, 193–95. Gossage made his comment about the poetry wars to me in an interview, June 2009. The best academic study of the elections of 1979 and 1980 is Howard Penniman, ed., Canada at the Polls, 1979 and 1980: A Study of the General Elections (Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1981), although it concentrates on the 1979 election. Robert Bothwell wrote an excellent summary of the 1979 and 1980 elections for Historica, the Canadian historical organization: http://www.histori.ca/prodev/article.do?id=15406.

  11. Both Davey and Gossage describe the incident, at 269 and 194, respectively. Neither is sure whether or not Trudeau used the wrong name intentionally.

  12. Gossage, Close to the Charisma, 190–91. Other comments are based on conversations with Lorna Marsden, Allan MacEachen, and Tom Axworthy. See also Clarkson and McCall, Heroic Delusion, 156–57, including a good description of Marsden’s influence. The letter to Trudeau’s friend was cited in chapter 13, note 34. TP, MG 26 020, vol. 3, file 3-44.

  13. Davey, Rainmaker, 270. Liberal strategist John Duffy emphasizes how the East-West division became a central feature of Canadian politics. He describes the 1979 campaign in detail in his Fights of Our Lives, 291ff. Byers, ed., Canadian Annual Review 1979, 43–45.

  14. The CBC election night clip can be seen at http://archives.cbc.ca/on_this_day/02/18/. Trudeau’s comments are in his Memoirs, 270.

  15. On the washroom story, see Gossage, Close to the Charisma, 195. The Quebec government statement was published as Québec-Canada: A New Deal: The Quebec Government Proposal for a New Partnership between Equals, Sovereignty-Association (Quebec: Government of Quebec, 1979). The polls are discussed in Byers, ed., Canadian Annual Review 1979, 103–4. Three of four polls taken in 1979 indicated a lead for the “yes” side. The lack of clarity in the wording of questions in the polls makes it difficult to judge their validity. However, the discussion indicates that the Quebec government was moderately optimistic about the result before Trudeau’s return. See Martine Tremblay, Derrière les portes closes: René Lévesque et l’exercice du pouvoir (1976–1985) (Montréal: Québec Amérique, 2006), 236.

  16. Edward McWhinney, Canada and the Constitution 1979–1982: Patriation and the Charter of Rights (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982), 32; Léon Dion, Le Québec et le Canada: Les Voies de l’Avenir (Montréal: Les Éditions Québécor, 1980); and André Burelle, Pierre Elliott Trudeau: L’Intellectuel et la Politique (Montréal: Fides, 2005), 424. The livre beige is described in Le Devoir, Jan. 11, 1980; and Ryan discusses it with journalist Denise Bombardier on http://archives.radio-canada.ca/emissions/523-7461/page/1/, an interview which illustrates well Ryan’s seriousness as well as his clarity in exposition.

  17. Trudeau discusses the offer in his Memoirs. He says he respected Broadbent but that they were not close, a view shared by Broadbent. A photograph of the meeting appears in Trudeau, Memoirs, 272–73. Interview with Bob Rae, Sept. 2005. Quotations from Judy Steed, Ed Broadbent: The Pursuit of Power (1988; repr., Markham, Ont.: Penguin, 1989), 240–41. Rae told Steed in the late 1980s: “The party was not in good spirits, facing another four years of Trudeau. We were in an awfully tough position” (243).

  18. Trudeau, Memoirs, 277; L. Ian MacDonald, From Bourassa to Bourassa: Wilderness to Restoration, 2nd ed. (Montreal and Kingston: McGill–Queen’s University Press, 2002), 98; La Presse, March 31, 1980; poll results are summarized in Globe and Mail, April 12, 1980. Gérard Bergeron, Notre Miroir à deux faces (Montréal: Québec Amérique, 1985), 218.

  19. Their first encounter is described in detail in vol. 1 of this biography. The Champions (1994) is a brilliant 1994 CBC and National Film Board documentary in three parts, dealing with the relationship between Trudeau and Lévesque. Part 3 is a major source for this chapter.

  20. Quoted in Gérard Pelletier, Years of Impatience, 1950–1960, trans. Alan Brown (1983; repr., Toronto, Methuen, 1984), 119.

  21. Canada, House of Commons Debates (15 April 1980). The photograph is in Globe and Mail, April 16, 1980. For criticisms of Trudeau’s approach, see Le Devoir, April 16, 1980.

  22. The phenomenon has attracted scholarly attention from feminists. See Naomi Black, “Les Yvettes: Qui sont-elles?” in Thérèse Casgrain: Une Femme tenace et engagée, ed. Anita Caron and Lorraine Archambault (Sainte-Foy: Presses de l’Université du Québec, 1992), 165–69, and Micheline Dumont
, “Les Yvettes ont permis aux femmes entrer dans l’histoire politique québé-coise,” L’Action nationale, Oct. 1991, 40–44. An excellent account also appears in MacDonald, Bourassa to Bourassa, chap. 10. There is an enormous literature concentrating on the referendum. An excellent bibliography has been compiled by the library of Quebec’s National Assembly: http://www.assnat.qc.ca/fra/Bibliotheque/publications/thematiques/btHs.pdf.

  23. Library and Archives Canada chose to place the speech on their website as emblematic of addresses by prime ministers: http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/primeministers/h4-4083-e.html. MacDonald, Bourassa to Bourassa, 169–70. MacDonald’s emotions are described in Gossage, Close to the Charisma, 197. Trudeau’s essay, “The Ascetic in a Canoe,” is found in his Against the Current: Selected Writings 1939–1996, ed. Gérard Pelletier (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1996), 9–12.

  24. Bergeron is one of many who made this assertion. Globe and Mail columnist Stevens was a consistent critic of the injection of constitutional reform into the debate. He also took strong objection to an angry attack on Quebec intellectuals and the media by Liberal MP André Ouellet. Globe and Mail, April 17, 1980.

  25. This account of the meeting is based on MacDonald, Bourassa to Bourassa, 172ff., and on conversations with Jim Coutts, Eddie Goldenberg, and Jean Chrétien.

  26. MacDonald, Bourassa to Bourassa. The description of the rallies comes from websites where Lévesque’s and Ryan’s speeches are posted: http://archives.cbc.ca/on_this_day/05/20/776/ and http://archives.cbc.ca/on_this_day/05/20/5600/, respectively. Ryan’s aggressiveness contrasts sharply with Lévesque’s dejection. Trudeau’s description of his mood is from his Memoirs, 283–84.

  27. Gossage, Close to the Charisma, 198; Trudeau, Memoirs, 284.