Louis St. Laurent

Louis Stephen St. Laurent CC, PC (Saint-Laurent or St-Laurent in French) (February 1, 1882 – July 25, 1973) was the twelfth Prime Minister of Canada from November 15, 1948 to June 21, 1957.

He was born in Compton in Quebec's Eastern Townships to a French-Canadian father and Irish mother and grew up fluently bilingual.

He received degrees from St. Charles Seminary (B.A. 1902) and Laval University (LL.L. 1905). He was offered, but declined, a Rhodes Scholarship upon this graduation from McGill in 1905. In 1908 he married Jeanne Renault (1886-1966) with whom he had two sons and three daughters.

St. Laurent worked as a lawyer from 1905 to 1914, at which point he became a professor of law at Laval University. St. Laurent practised corporate and constitutional law in Québec and became one of the country's most respected counsels. He served as President of the Canadian Bar Association from 1930 to 1932.

St. Laurent's father, a Compton shopkeeper, was a staunch supporter of the Liberal Party of Canada and was particularly enamoured with Sir Wilfrid Laurier. Louis St. Laurent inherited his father's political affiliations but, while a Liberal supporter, remained aloof from active politics for much of his life focussing instead on his legal career and family. He became one of Quebec's leading lawyers and was so highly regarded that he was offered a position in the Cabinet of the eloquent Conservative Prime Minister Arthur Meighen in 1926.

It was not until he was nearly 60 that St. Laurent finally agreed to enter politics when [William Lyon Mackenzie King]] appealed to his sense of duty in late 1941.

Needing strong ministers from Quebec, Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King recruited St. Laurent to his wartime Cabinet as Minister of Justice following the death of his Quebec lieutenant, Ernest Lapointe. St Laurent agreed to go to Ottawa on the understanding that his foray into politics was temporary and that he would return to Quebec at the conclusion of the war.

St. Laurent supported King's decision to introduce conscription in 1944, despite the lack of support from other French Canadians (see Conscription Crisis of 1944). His support prevented more than a handful of Quebec Liberal MPs from leaving the party and was therefore crucial to keeping the government and the party united.

King came to regard St. Laurent as his most trusted minister and natural successor. He persuaded St. Laurent that it was his duty to remain in government following the war in order to help with the construction of a post war international order and promoted him to the position of Secretary of State for External Affairs (since 1993 known as Minister of Foreign Affairs (Canada)) in 1945, a portfolio King had previously always kept for himself. In this role he attended the Dunbarton Oaks Conference and San Francisco Conference that led to the founding of the United Nations representing Canada.

At the conferences, St. Laurent, compelled by his belief that the U.N. would be ineffective in times of war and armed conflict without some military means to impose its will, advocated the adoption of a U.N. military force. This force he proposed would be used in situations that called for both tact and might to preserve peace or prevent combat. In 1956 this idea was actualized by St. Laurent and his Secretary of State for External Affairs Lester B. Pearson in the development of U.N. 'Peacekeepers' that helped put an end to the Suez Crisis.

As he saw the end of his own leadership tenure approaching King persuaded St. Laurent that it was his duty to succeed himself as party leader and Prime Minister to ensure the unity of the party and country and maintain the Liberal Party's tradition of alternating between anglophone and francophone leaders.

In 1948 King retired, and quietly persuaded his senior ministers to support St. Laurent's selection as the new Liberal leader at the Liberal leadership convention of August 1948. St. Laurent won and became leader of the Liberal party and Prime Minister of Canada.

In the federal election that followed his ascention to the Liberal leadership many wondered, including Liberal party insiders, if this shy, reserved, dignified, grandfatherly man would appeal to the post-war populace of Canada. On the campaign trail St. Laurent's image was developed into somewhat of a 'character' and what is considered to be the first 'media image' to be used in Canadian politics. St. Laurent would chat with children, give speeches in his shirt sleeves and had a 'common touch' that turned out to be massively appealing. An event guring the '49 election campaign when he disembarked his train and gravitated to and began chatting with a group of children on the platform had a reporter penning 'Uncle Louis' can't lose! and earned him the nickname 'Uncle Louis' in the media. With this common touch and massive appeal, he subsequently led the party to victory in the 1949 Canadian election against the Conservatives led by George Drew.

His reputation as Prime Minister was impressive. He demanded hard work of all of his MPs and Ministers and worked hard himeself. He was reputed to be as knowledgeable on some ministerial portfolios as the ministers responsible themselves.

In foreign Affairs St. Laurent and his cabinet oversaw Canada's expanding international role in the postwar world. Canada supported the United Nations in the Korean War and committed troops, ships and aircraft to the conflict. Troops to Korea were selected on a voluntary basis, thus avoiding the French-English conflict that had plagued Canada's contribution to the two World Wars.

Under his leadership the country also proposed, helped establish and joined NATO in 1949 marking a departure from King who had been reticent about joining a military alliance. St. Laurent was an early supporter of British Prime Minister Clement Atlee's proposal to transform the British Commonwealth from a club of white dominions into a multi-racial partnership while the leaders of the other "white dominions" were less than enthusiastic. It was St. Laurent who proposed the formula of recognizing King George VI as Head of the Commonwealth as a means of allowing India to remain in the international association once it became a republic.

Lester Bowles Pearson, St. Laurent's Secretary of State for External Affairs, helped solve the Suez Crisis in 1956, for which Pearson won the Nobel Peace Prize. St. Laurent also welcomed Newfoundland into Confederation, and established new social and industrial policies.

Domestically, St. Laurent's government was modestly progressive, and fiscally conservative taking taxation surplusses no longer needed by the wartime military and establishing the Canada Council to support the arts, gradually expanding social welfare programs such as family allowances and old age pensions and bringing in an early form of hospital insurance that lay the groundwork for Pearson's later universal healthcare in the 60's. The government also engaged in massive public works and infrastructure projects such as building the Trans-Canada Highway, the St. Lawrence Seaway and the Trans-Canada Pipeline. It was this last project that was to sow the seeds that led to the downfall of the St. Laurent government.

St. Laurent was initially very well-received by the Canadian public, but by 1957 'Uncle Louis' and his government began to appear tired, old and out of touch. The government was percieved to have grown too close to business interests and the 1956 Pipeline Debate led to the widespread impression that the Liberals had grown arrogant in power when the government invoked closure on numerous occasions in order to curtail debate and ensure that its Pipeline Bill passed by a specific deadline. Western Canadians felt particularly alienated by the government with a feeling that the Liberals were kowtowing to interests in Ontario and Quebec. The ensuing uproar in Parliament had a lasting impression on the electorate and was a decisive factor in the Liberal government's defeat at the hands of John George Diefenbaker in the 1957 Canadian election in which Diefenbaker, the conservative had promised to outspend the incumbent Liberals who campaigned on plans to stay the course of fiscal conservatism they had followed through St. Laurent's term in the 40's and 50's.

The defeat in the 1957 was marked by controversy within the Liberal party and the Parliament. The Liberals had actually won more popular support (actual votes cast) than the Progressive Conservatives (40.75% Libs to 38.81% PC) but the Conservatives took the greatest number of seats with 112 PC candidates elected to serve out of the House of Commons 265 seats (42% of the House). The Liberals took 104 seats (39.2%), and some ministers wanted St. Laurent to stay on and offer to form a minority government, following the logic that the popular vote had supported them and even though their Parliamentary minority was smaller than the Conservatives, the Liberals more recent governmental experience would make them a more effective minority. Another option circulated within the party saw the the balance of power to be held by either the Canadian Commonwealth Federation (CCF) and their 25 seats or Social Credit with their 15. St. Laurent was encouraged by others to reach out to the CCF and at least 4 of 6 independent/small party MPs to form a coalition majority government (which would have held 134 of the 265 or 50.1% of the seats in Parliament). St. Laurent, however, decided that the nation had passed a verdict against his government and his party and he resigned as Prime Minister rather than be seen as clinging to office.

After a short period as Leader of the Opposition and now more than 75 years old, St. Laurent's motivation to be involved in politics was gone and he announced his intention to retire from politics and as Liberal leader. St. Laurent was succeeded as Liberal Party Leader by his former Secretary of State for External Affairs and representative at the United Nations, Lester Pearson at the party's leadership convention in 1958.

After his political retirement, he returned to practicing law and living quietly and privately with his family, enjoying spending many happy hours with his grandchildren, living true to the image of 'Uncle Louis' Canadians had come to know and love. During his retirement he was called in the the public spotlight one final time in 1967 on the inception of the award, he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada the highest civilian honour Canadians are eligible for.

Louis Stephen St. Laurent died on July 25, 1973, in Quebec City, Quebec and was laid to rest at St. Thomas Aquinas Cemetery in his hometown of Compton, Quebec.

External links

• Biography at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online