Electoral history of Mackenzie Bowell
This article is the Electoral history of Sir Mackenzie Bowell, the fifth Prime Minister of Canada. A Conservative, he became prime minister upon the sudden death in office of Prime Minister Sir John Thompson in 1894. Bowell served a short term of just over one year as prime minister, until he was forced to resign over the Manitoba Schools Question, he never led his party in a general election. When he died in 1917, he was one of the last surviving members of the first House of Commons of Canada elected in 1867. Bowell ranks nineteenth out of twenty-three prime ministers for time in office, serving a short term of just over one year, he became prime minister upon the death in office of Sir John Thompson and was only in office for a total of 1 year and 128 days. Bowell was the third of five prime ministers from Ontario, the others being Sir John A. Macdonald, Alexander Mackenzie, William Lyon Mackenzie King, Lester B. Pearson. Although he was the leader of the combined Liberal-Conservative Party and the Conservative Party, he did not lead the party in a general election.
He resigned as Prime Minister after a Cabinet revolt over the Manitoba Schools Question. Bowell stood for election to the House of Commons of Canada eight times, all in the constituency of Hastings North, Ontario, he was elected all eight times, once by acclamation. In 1892, Prime Minister Thompson appointed Bowell to the Senate of Canada. Bowell is one of two prime ministers who sat in the Senate during his term in office, rather than in the House of Commons. Bowell was a member of the House of Commons for over 25 years, a member of the Senate for over 25 years, for a combined total service in Parliament of 50 years, 2 months, 4 days. Powell stood for election to the House of Commons eight times, winning all eight, in the riding of Hastings North, Ontario. 1 In the early years of Confederation, there was no requirement to declare party affiliation. Elected. 1 In the early years of Confederation, there was no requirement to declare party affiliation. Elected. X Incumbent. 1 In the early years of Confederation, there was no requirement to declare party affiliation.
Elected. X Incumbent. 1 In the early years of Confederation, there was no requirement to declare party affiliation. Elected. X Incumbent. Elected. X Incumbent. 1 In the early years of Confederation, there was no requirement to declare party affiliation. Elected. X Incumbent. 1 In the early years of Confederation, there was no requirement to declare party affiliation. Elected. X Incumbent. 1 In the early years of Confederation, there was no requirement to declare party affiliation. Elected. X Incumbent. In late 1892, Bowell was called to the Senate on the advice of Prime Minister Thompson, he was the second prime minister to serve. Following his resignation as prime minister in 1896, Bowell continued to serve in the Senate until his death in 1917, he was one of the last surviving members of the first House of Commons elected in 1867. Electoral history of John Sparrow David Thompson - Bowell's predecessor as prime minister. Electoral history of Charles Tupper - Bowell's successor as prime minister. History of Federal Ridings since 1867
Manitoba Schools Question
The Manitoba Schools Question was a political crisis in the Canadian Province of Manitoba that occurred late in the 19th century, involving publicly funded separate schools for Roman Catholics and Protestants. The crisis spread to the national level, becoming one of the key issues in the federal election of 1896 and resulted in the defeat of the Conservative government, in power for most of the previous thirty years; because of the close linkage at that time between religion and language, the Schools Question raised the deeper question whether French would survive as a language or a culture in Western Canada. The result of the crisis was that by the end of the 19th century, French was no longer supported as an official language in Manitoba or the neighbouring North-West Territories, which in turn led to a strengthening of French Canadian nationalism in Quebec. Manitoba became the first western province to join Confederation in 1870; the province was created through negotiations between Canada and the provisional Red River government of Louis Riel, following the Red River Resistance.
One of the key issues in the negotiations was the question of control of education in the new province. There was considerable pressure for a system of denominational schools in the new province, for both Protestants and Roman Catholics. Although framed as a religious issue, there was a question of language politics involved, since at that time, most Protestants in Manitoba were anglophones and most Roman Catholics were francophones. Religious control over education thus related to the language of education; the Act of Parliament which created the province, the Manitoba Act, responded to these concerns by giving the province the power to pass laws relating to education, but by giving constitutional protection to denominational school rights which existed "...by Law or practice in the Province at the Union." The exact meaning of this provision, the scope of the constitutional protection it provided, subsequently became a matter of considerable political and legal debate. Soon before the Manitoba Act was passed to create the province, settlers from English Canada Ontario, began to arrive in greater numbers than they had come prior to the Red River Rebellion.
The Manitoba Act had given equal rights to Protestant and Roman Catholic schools, but by the 1880s this no longer reflected the linguistic makeup of the province. Many Métis had left, settlers from Quebec were not as numerous as those from Ontario; as the Canadian Pacific Railway was completed in 1886, many more English-speaking settlers had begun to arrive. Following the establishment of the Province, the new provincial government established a system of denominational schools funded by provincial taxes. However, in 1890, the Manitoba government of Premier Thomas Greenway passed the Public Schools Act, removing funding for Catholic and Protestant denominational schools and establishing a system of tax-supported, non-sectarian public schools; the question was. Two rounds of litigation were the result, in each case going to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, at that time the highest court in the British Empire; the legislation triggered considerable national political debate. The Manitoba Act of 1870 had provided that English and French be co-official languages in the newly created Province of Manitoba.
However, in 1890, at the same time as the enactment of the Public Schools Act, the Manitoba Legislature passed another act which made English the only official language in the Province. Although this Act did not directly relate to the education issue, it provided further controversy on the language issue. Two years in 1892, the neighbouring Northwest Territories abolished French as an official language. Although the abolition of French as an official language did not directly affect the Schools Question, it strengthened the controversy, given the ties between religious schools and the language of education; the first court case focussed on whether the Public Schools Act conflicted with the constitutional protection for denominational schools set out in s. 22 of the Manitoba Act, 1870. Catholics in Manitoba, encouraged by the federal government of Prime Minister John A. Macdonald, challenged the constitutionality of the 1890 Act in the Queen's Bench of Manitoba, arguing that the requirement to pay taxes to the new public school interfered with their rights under s.
22. The Manitoba Queen's Bench held; the challengers appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada, which allowed the appeal and held that the 1890 Act conflicted with s. 22 of the Manitoba Act. Based on the Supreme Court decision, another action was brought in the Manitoba Queen's Bench, which followed the Supreme Court decision and quashed a school tax assessment under the 1890 Act; the City of Winnipeg appealed both cases to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in Britain which overruled the Supreme Court and held that the 1890 Act was consistent with the Manitoba Act. The exact point in dispute was the meaning of the phrase "...by Law or practice in the Province at the Union," used in s. 22 of the Manitoba Act. The Judicial Committee held that this provision did not itself create a system of denominational schools. Rather, it gave constitutional protection to whatever rights existed with respect to denominational schools in Manitoba in 1870; the Judicial Committee reviewed the historical record and concluded that in 1870, all
Conservative Party of Canada (1867–1942)
The Conservative Party of Canada has gone by a variety of names over the years since Canadian Confederation. Known as the "Liberal-Conservative Party", it dropped "Liberal" from its name in 1873, although many of its candidates continued to use this name; as a result of World War I and the Conscription Crisis of 1917, the party joined with pro-conscription Liberals to become the "Unionist Party", led by Robert Borden from 1917 to 1920, the "National Liberal and Conservative Party" until 1922. It reverted to "Liberal-Conservative Party" until 1938, when it became the "National Conservative Party", it ran in the 1940 election as "National Government" though it was in opposition. The party was always referred to as the "Conservative Party" or Tories; the roots of the party are in the pre-Confederation coalition government of 1854 comprising the Parti bleu of George-Étienne Cartier, along with Ontario Liberals and Conservatives led by Sir John A. Macdonald, it was out of this coalition that the Liberal-Conservative Party was formed and it was this period that formed the basis for Confederation in 1867.
Macdonald became the leader of the Conservative Party and formed the first national government in 1867. The party brought together ultramontane Quebec Catholics, pro-tariff businessmen, United Empire Loyalist Tories and Orangemen. One major accomplishment of Macdonald's first government was the creation of the Canadian Pacific Railway which led to the Pacific Scandal that brought down the government in 1873; the Conservatives under Macdonald returned to power in 1878 by opposing the Liberal Party's policy of free trade or reciprocity with the United States and promoting, the National Policy which sought to promote business and develop industry with high tariff protectionist measures as well as settle and develop the west. The principal difference between the Conservatives and the Liberals in this period and well into the twentieth century was that Conservatives were in favour of imperial preference and strong political and legal links with Britain while Liberals promoted free trade and continentalism and greater independence from Britain.
Macdonald died in 1891 and, without his leadership, the Conservative coalition began to unravel under the pressure of sectarian tensions between Catholic French Canadians and British imperialists who tended to be anti-French and anti-Catholic. The government's mis-handling of the grievances that aroused the Red River Rebellion and the North-West Rebellion, its hanging of their leader Louis Riel), the Manitoba Schools Question exacerbated tensions within the Conservative Party and suppressed much of the support among Quebecois for the Conservative party, a problem only smoothed over by the 1980s. Free trade between Canada and the U. S. was the major issue of the 1911 election. Sir Wilfrid Laurier's Liberals, in favour of increased trade with the U. S. were swept from power. Robert Borden led a new Tory administration that emphasised a revitalised National Policy and continued strong links to Britain. Borden had built a base in Quebec by allying with anti-Laurier Quebec nationalists, but, in government, tensions between Quebec nationalists and English Canadian imperialists made any grand coalition untenable.
World War I created a further strain as most Quebecers were unenthusiastic about Canadian involvement in what they saw as a foreign, British, while Borden's supporters, most living in English Canada, supported Canada's war effort and its policy of conscription of men for the war. The attempt to turn the Conservatives into a hegemonic party by merging with Liberal-Unionists failed as most Liberals either joined the new Progressive Party of Canada or rejoined the Liberals under its new leader William Lyon Mackenzie King. One critical issue in this split was free trade - farmers were hostile to Tory tariff policy and free trade was a key issue in the creation of the Progressives while the Conscription Crisis destroyed any remaining Conservative base in Quebec for generations leaving the Tories with less support than they had before the Union government. Borden's successor, Arthur Meighen formally attempted to make the Unionist coalition permanent by creating the "National Liberal and Conservative Party" but most Liberals ended up returning to their old party and some Conservatives balked at what they saw as an attempt to destroy the Conservative Party.
John Hampden Burnham, MP for Peterborough West, quit the government caucus to sit as an Independent Conservative and resigned his seat in order to contest it in a by-election on his position. Meighen's party was defeated by the Liberals in the election of 1921 coming in third behind the Progressives. At March 1922 caucus meeting the party voted to revert to its original name of the Liberal-Conservative Party; the Liberals were reduced to a minority government in the 1925 election. The Conservatives won a plurality of seats in the House of Commons, but King was able to stay in power with the support of the Progressives and form a minority government. King's government was defeated in a vote in the House of Commons within months and Prime Minister King asked Governor-General Byng to call a new election but Byng refused and asked Meighen to form a government. Meighen's government was defeated three days after taking office by a vote in the Commons, leaving no choice but a new election; the general election produced a Liberal victory.
Wiseman
Upper Canada
The Province of Upper Canada was a part of British Canada established in 1791 by the Kingdom of Great Britain, to govern the central third of the lands in British North America part of the Province of Quebec since 1763. Upper Canada included all of modern-day Southern Ontario and all those areas of Northern Ontario in the Pays d'en Haut which had formed part of New France the watersheds of the Ottawa River or Lakes Huron and Superior, excluding any lands within the watershed of Hudson Bay; the "upper" prefix in the name reflects its geographic position along the Great Lakes above the headwaters of the Saint Lawrence River, contrasted with Lower Canada to the northeast. It was the primary destination of Loyalist refugees and settlers from the United States after the American Revolution, who were granted land to settle in Upper Canada; the province was characterized by its British way of life, including bicameral parliament and civil and criminal law not mixed like in Lower Canada or elsewhere in the British Empire.
The division was created to ensure the exercise of the same rights and privileges enjoyed by loyal subjects elsewhere in the North American colonies. In 1812, war broke out between Great Britain and the United States, leading to several battles in Upper Canada; the US had hoped to capture Upper Canada. The government of the colony came to be dominated by a small group of persons, known as the "Family Compact", who held most of the top positions in the Legislative Council and appointed officials. In 1837, an unsuccessful rebellion attempted to overthrow the undemocratic system. Representative government would be established in the 1840s. Upper Canada existed from its establishment on 26 December 1791 to 10 February 1841 when it was united with adjacent Lower Canada to form the Province of Canada; as part of the 1763 Treaty of Paris which ended the Seven Years' War global conflict and the French and Indian War in North America, Great Britain retained control over the former New France, defeated in the French and Indian War.
The British had won control after Fort Niagara had surrendered in 1759 and Montreal capitulated in 1760, the British under Robert Rogers took formal control of the Great Lakes region in 1760. Fort Michilimackinac was occupied by Roger's forces in 1761; the territories of contemporary southern Ontario and southern Quebec were maintained as the single Province of Quebec, as it had been under the French. From 1763 to 1791, the Province of Quebec maintained its French language, cultural behavioural expectations and laws; the British passed the Quebec Act in 1774, which expanded the Quebec colony's authority to include part of the Indian Reserve to the west, other western territories south of the Great Lakes including much of what would become the United States' Northwest Territory, including the modern states of Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and parts of Minnesota. After the American War of Independence ended in 1783, Britain retained control of the area north of the Ohio River; the official boundaries remained undefined until the Jay Treaty.
The British authorities encouraged the movement of people to this area from the United States, offering free land to encourage population growth. For settlers, the head of the family received 100 acres and 50 acres per family member, soldiers received larger grants; these settlers are known as United Empire Loyalists and were English-speaking Protestants. The first townships along the St. Lawrence and eastern Lake Ontario were laid out in 1784, populated with decommissioned soldiers and their families."Upper Canada" became a political entity on 26 December 1791 with the Parliament of Great Britain's passage of the Constitutional Act of 1791. The act divided the Province of Quebec into Upper and Lower Canada, but did not yet specify official borders for Upper Canada; the division was effected so that Loyalist American settlers and British immigrants in Upper Canada could have English laws and institutions, the French-speaking population of Lower Canada could maintain French civil law and the Catholic religion.
The first lieutenant-governor was John Graves Simcoe. The 1795 Jay Treaty set the borders between British North America and the United States north to the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River. On 1 February 1796, the capital of Upper Canada was moved from Newark to York, judged to be less vulnerable to attack by the Americans; the Act of Union 1840, passed 23 July 1840 by the British Parliament and proclaimed by the Crown on 10 February 1841, merged Upper Canada with Lower Canada to form the short-lived United Province of Canada. Upper Canada's constitution was said to be "the image and transcript" of the British constitution, based on the principle of "mixed monarchy" – a balance of monarchy and democracy; the Executive arm of government in the colony consisted of a lieutenant-governor, his executive council, the Officers of the Crown: the Adjutant General of the Militia, the Attorney General, the Auditor General of Land Patents for Upper Canada, the Auditor General, Crown Lands Office, Indian Office, Inspector General, Kings' Printer, Provincial Secretary & Registrar's Office, Receiver General of Upper Canada, Solicitor General, & Surveyor General.
Armstrong, pp. 8–12 The Executive Council of Upper Canada had a similar function to the Cabinet in England but was not responsible to the Legislative Assembly. They held a consultative position, ho
Queen's Privy Council for Canada
The Queen's Privy Council for Canada, sometimes called Her Majesty's Privy Council for Canada or the Privy Council, is the full group of personal consultants to the monarch of Canada on state and constitutional affairs. Responsible government, requires the sovereign or her viceroy, the Governor General of Canada, to always follow only that advice tendered by the Cabinet: a committee within the Privy Council composed of elected Members of Parliament; those summoned to the QPC are appointed for life by the governor general as directed by the Prime Minister of Canada, meaning that the group is composed predominantly of former cabinet ministers, with some others having been inducted as an honorary gesture. Those in the council are accorded the use of an honorific style and post-nominal letters, as well as various signifiers of precedence; the government of Canada, formally referred to as Her Majesty's Government, is defined by the Canadian constitution as the sovereign acting on the advice of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada.
The group of people is described as "a Council to aid and advise in the Government of Canada, to be styled the Queen's Privy Council for Canada," though, by convention, the task of giving the sovereign and governor general advice on how to exercise the Royal Prerogative via Orders in Council rests with by the Cabinet—a committee of the Privy Council made up of other ministers of the Crown who are drawn from, responsible to, the House of Commons in the parliament. This body is distinct but entwined within the QPC, as the President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada customarily serves as one of its members and cabinet ministers receive assistance in the performance of their duties from the Privy Council Office, headed by the Clerk of the Privy Council. While the Cabinet deals with the regular, day-to-day functions of the Crown-in-Council, occasions of wider national importance—such as the proclamation of a new Canadian sovereign following a demise of the Crown or conferring on royal marriages—will be attended to by more senior officials in the QPC, such as the prime minister, the Chief Justice of Canada, other senior statesmen.
The quorum for Privy Council meetings is four. The Constitution Act, 1867, outlines that persons are to be summoned and appointed for life to the Queen's Privy Council by the governor general, though convention dictates that this be done on the advice of the sitting prime minister; as its function is to provide the vehicle for advising the Crown, the members of the QPC are predominantly all living current and former ministers of the Crown. In addition, the chief justices of Canada and former governors general are appointed. From time to time, the leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition and heads of other opposition parties will be appointed to the QPC, either as an honour or to facilitate the distribution of sensitive information under the Security of Information Act, it is required by law that those on the Security Intelligence Review Committee be made privy councillors, if they are not already. To date, only Prime Minister Paul Martin advised that Parliamentary Secretaries be admitted to the QPC.
Appointees to the Queen's Privy Council must recite the requisite oath: I, do solemnly and sincerely swear that I shall be a true and faithful servant to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, as a member of Her Majesty's Privy Council for Canada. I will in all things to be treated and resolved in Privy Council and declare my mind and my opinion. I shall keep secret all matters committed and revealed to me in this capacity, or that shall be secretly treated of in Council. In all things I shall do as a faithful and true servant ought to do for Her Majesty. Provincial premiers are not appointed to the QPC, but have been made members on special occasions, such as the centennial of Confederation in 1967 and the patriation of the constitution of Canada in 1982. On Canada Day in 1992, which marked the 125th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, Governor General Ramon Hnatyshyn appointed eighteen prominent Canadians to the Privy Council, including former Premier of Ontario David Peterson, retired hockey star Maurice Richard, businessman Conrad Black.
The use of Privy Council appointments as purely an honour was not employed again until 6 February 2006, when Harper advised the Governor General to appoint former Member of Parliament John Reynolds along with the new Cabinet. Harper, on 15 October 2007 advised Governor General Michaëlle Jean to appoint Jim Abbott. On occasion, non-Canadians have been appointed to the QPC; the first non-Canadian sworn of the council was Billy Hughes, Prime Minister of Australia, inducted on 18 February 1916 at the request of Robert Borden—to honour a visiting head of government, but so that Hughes could attend Cabinet meetings on wartime policy. Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, was inducted during a visit to Canada on 29 December 1941. Privy councillors are entitled to the style The Honourable or, for the prime minister, chief justice, or certain other emine
Prime Minister of Canada
The Prime Minister of Canada is the primary minister of the Crown, chairman of the Cabinet, Canada's head of government. The current, 23rd, Prime Minister of Canada is the Liberal Party's Justin Trudeau, following the 2015 Canadian federal election. Canadian prime ministers are styled as The Right Honourable, a privilege maintained for life; the Prime Minister of Canada is in charge of the Prime Minister's Office. The Prime Minister chooses the ministers that make up the Cabinet; the two groups, with the authority of the Parliament of Canada, manage the Government of Canada and the Canadian Armed Forces. The Cabinet and the Prime Minister appoint members of the Senate of Canada, the judges of the Supreme Court of Canada and federal courts, the leaders and boards, as required under law, of various Crown Corporations, selects the Governor General of Canada. Under the Canadian constitution, all of the power to exercise these activities is vested in the Monarchy of Canada, but in practice the Canadian monarch or their representative, the Governor General of Canada approves them and their role is ceremonial, their powers are only exercised under the advice of the Prime Minister.
Not outlined in any constitutional document, the office exists only as per long-established convention that stipulates the monarch's representative, the governor general, must select as prime minister the person most to command the confidence of the elected House of Commons. The position of prime minister is not outlined in any Canadian constitutional document and is mentioned only in passing in the Constitution Act, 1982, the Letters Patent, 1947 issued by King George VI; the office and its functions are instead governed by constitutional conventions and modelled on the same office in the United Kingdom. The prime minister, along with the other ministers in cabinet, is appointed by the governor general on behalf of the monarch. However, by the conventions of responsible government, designed to maintain administrative stability, the governor general will call to form a government the individual most to receive the support, or confidence, of a majority of the directly elected members of the House of Commons.
While there is no legal requirement for the prime minister to be a member of parliament, for practical and political reasons the prime minister is expected to win a seat promptly. However, in rare circumstances individuals who are not sitting members of the House of Commons have been appointed to the position of prime minister. Two former prime ministers—Sir John Joseph Caldwell Abbott and Sir Mackenzie Bowell—served in the 1890s while members of the Senate. Both, in their roles as Government Leader in the Senate, succeeded prime ministers who had died in office—John A. Macdonald in 1891 and John Sparrow David Thompson in 1894; that convention has since evolved toward the appointment of an interim leader from the commons in such a scenario. Prime ministers who are not Members of Parliament upon their appointment have since been expected to seek election to the commons as soon as possible. For example, William Lyon Mackenzie King, after losing his seat in the 1925 federal election "governed from the hallway" before winning a by-election a few weeks later.
John Turner replaced Pierre Trudeau as leader of the Liberal Party in 1984 and subsequently was appointed prime minister while not holding a seat in the House of Commons. Turner was the last serving prime minister to not hold a commons seat. Should a serving prime minister today lose his or her seat in the legislature, or should a new prime minister be appointed without holding a seat, the typical process that follows is that a junior member in the governing political party will resign to allow the prime minister to run in the resulting by-election. A safe seat is chosen. However, if the governing party selects a new leader shortly before an election is due, that new leader is not a member of the legislature, he or she will await the upcoming election before running for a seat in parliament. In a poll conducted by Ipsos-Reid following the first prorogation of the 40th parliament on December 4, 2008, it was found that 51% of the sample group thought the prime minister was directly elected by Canadians.
The Canadian prime minister serves at Her Majesty's pleasure, meaning the post does not have a fixed term. Once appointed and sworn in by the governor general, the prime minister remains in office until he or she resigns, is dismissed, or dies; the lifespan of parliament was limited by the constitution to five years, though the governor general may still, on the advice of the prime minister, dissolve parliament and issue the writs of election prior to the date mandated by the Canada Elections Act. As of 2007, with an amendment to the Elections Act, Section 56.1 was changed
.jpg)
