Critics call him a lightweight and a poseur of sunniness, socks and celebrity, and reliably underestimate him. In office, Mr. Trudeau is erratic. He fulfills some promises, discards others and suffers self-inflicted scandals and missteps. When he loses his majority in , as his father did in his second election, in , the comparison is irresistible. Can Justin regain his majority, as Pierre did in ? In , Justin tries and falters.
After a near-death experience in August, he shrewdly exploits the inconsistencies of the Conservatives. On Sept. Pearson was a strategist, Mr. Trudeau is a tactician. Which leads to the third act of the stunning ascent, fitful stewardship and uncanny resilience of Justin Trudeau. Now, though, the story is no longer how Justin Trudeau became Pierre Trudeau in , survived and lasted another 10 years.
It is how Justin Trudeau became Lester Pearson in , succeeded and left. Lester Pearson? In temperament, intellect and experience, could two prime ministers a half-century apart be more different? Mike was cerebral, enigmatic and shy. He was a soldier, a professor, a cosmopolitan, a Nobel laureate; as a diplomat, he was the best-known Canadian in the world. He was born a Victorian and raised an Edwardian. Born a year before Mr.
Pearson died, young Justin was impulsive, adventurous and gregarious. He was a teacher, actor and outdoorsman, a dilettante. He loves politics and plays it masterfully; since arriving in Parliament in , he has never lost an election.
His tenure as Prime Minister, which began when he was 44, is already longer than Mr. Funny thing about Mr. Pearson and the Trudeaus. Had Mike never been prime minister, nor might they. It was Mr. Pearson who made Pierre Trudeau in Ottawa. As his political godfather, he recruited him in , named him his parliamentary secretary and then minister of justice, advanced his reforms in divorce, abortion and homosexuality and gave him license to challenge the Quebec separatists.
And, quietly, he made him his successor. If Pierre had not been philosopher king, would Justin have become crown prince? Would Justin have risen if his name were Justin Tardiff?
And now, would he be channelling Mr. Pearson in this, likely his last act in politics? Justin had tried being his father, the strong man and nation builder. In , after two years in minority championing an economic nationalism supported by David Lewis and the NDP, the Liberals engineered their own defeat in Parliament. The architect, again, was Keith Davey, who would now become the most gifted political strategist of his time.
His plan was implemented, and as a reward he received the Nobel Peace Prize in By , Pearson was no longer in office. He and the St-Laurent government were widely blamed for not standing by Britain in The Liberals were defeated and St-Laurent resigned as leader. The Liberals faced a Conservative minority government under John Diefenbaker. In his first act as leader of the Opposition , Pearson challenged Diefenbaker to resign and turn the government over to him.
Diefenbaker ridiculed the idea; in the subsequent general election, the Liberals were reduced to 49 of the seats in the House of Commons. See also Elections of and Pearson began the slow task of rebuilding the party. With the assistance of parliamentary debaters such as Paul Martin and J. Pickersgill , as well as party workers such as Walter Gordon , Mitchell Sharp and Maurice Lamontagne, Pearson re-established the Liberals as a national party.
In , the Diefenbaker government collapsed over the issue of nuclear weapons. See Cuban Missile Crisis. In the election that February, the Liberals won seats to form a minority government.
Pearson took office on 22 April In , Pearson called a general election but again failed to secure a majority. In the next year, the Munsinger scandal erupted with even more partisan bitterness. In December , Pearson announced his intention to retire.
In April , a Liberal convention picked Pierre Trudeau as his successor. For all its superficial chaos, the Pearson government left behind a notable legacy of legislation: a Canada Pension Plan ; a universal medicare system; a unified Armed Forces ; and a new national flag. Not all of these initiatives proved fruitful and some were costly; but they represented the high point of the Canadian welfare state that generations of social thinkers had dreamed about.
In retirement, Pearson worked on his memoirs and on a study of international aid for the World Bank. From the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online. From the Nobel Foundation. After Pearson with the assistance of Gordon and Kent drew up an activist program of government. In the fall of that year, the Conservative government began to crumble. Pearson moved quickly to take advantage of the situation by changing Liberal policy and support- ing nuclear warheads for Bomarc and Honest John missiles that Canada had earlier purchased.
The minor- ity government fell, and the election on April 8, returned a Liberal minority government. The next two years were filled with scandals, espe- cially involving francophone minis- ters. Pearson himself seemed an ineffective leader, and rancour marked parliamentary debate. Diefenbaker pri- vately accused Pearson of being a communist mole, while Pearson in return threatened Diefenbaker with revela- tions about the sexual involvement of Tory ministers with Soviet agents.
Separatist bombs exploded in Montreal just as Pearson took office, and the challenge of Quebec national- ism became ever more intense. Tom Kent produced a stream of memoranda telling the cabinet how its program could be realized, and Walter Gordon as finance Minister gave his strong sup- port. Pearson himself took leadership in two areas. The first was the adoption of the new Canadian flag. Despite the doubts of his Cabinet colleagues, Pearson told the annual meeting of the Canadian Legion in that Canada must have a new flag.
On December 15, the maple leaf design won parliamentary approval, and eventually became the badge of Canadian backpackers and the symbol of a new Canada. The second area of leadership was policy towards Quebec. In opposition, Pearson had proposed a royal commis- sion on the French presence in Canada even though several of his advisers, including Gordon, thought it politically unwise. He kept the promise and estab- lished a Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism, one of the very few royal commissions that fun- damentally affected Canada.
Its hearings compelled all Canadians to consider what the transformation in Quebec soci- ety meant for Canadian confederation. Simultaneously, Pearson expanded the role of francophones in the government and, more importantly, in the public service of Canada.
He constantly searched for new voices to speak to and for Quebec and for policies that would make francophones a more integral part of the Canadian political process. When his first francophone min- isters stumbled, he took a chance. In , he decided to call an election for November 8, mainly to secure a majority, partly to reorganize his government. He did not win a majority government, but the three Quebec recruits won and profoundly influ- enced the final two years of the Pearson government.
Walter Gordon, who had urged an election, left the government, and the focus of the gov- ernment turned away from the social programs to the challenge of Quebec nationalism and separatism. His back stiffened; de Gaulle went home. In December Pearson announced his resignation.
He quietly encouraged francophones to seek the leadership, and Pierre Trudeau finally accepted. Donald Creighton gave Pearson poor marks for his work. Biculturalism was a historical myth, Canadian cultural duality a chimera.
His achievement in government was to respond to the challenge of French Canada, a society about which he knew little and whose language he did not speak. Nevertheless, he took the French language from the Ottawa elevators to the Cabinet table, fash- ioned symbols for a new Canadian nationality, and kept Canadians talk- ing about common purposes. You are welcome to republish this Policy Options article online and in print periodicals.
We ask that you follow these guidelines. Please attribute the author s and mention that the article was originally published by Policy Options magazine. Editing the piece is not permitted, but you may publish excerpts. Originally published on Policy Options June 1,
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