Progressive Party of Canada
The Progressive Party of Canada (English: Progressive Party of Canada; French: Parti progressiste du Canada ) was a political party in Canada that existed in the 1920s and 1930s. After the formed during the First World War Unionist coalition had failed at the task of reforming harmful for agriculture system of export duties, to radicalized various peasant movements and were politically active at the provincial level. At the federal level, the Progressive Party served as a loose clamp these organizations. Politically closely linked progressives were with the movement of the United Farmers, the ideological divisions were mostly fluent.
History
Origin
The emergence of the Progressive Party is due to the economic policies of the federal government. The main concern of the farmers of Western Canada at that time was free trade with the United States. Introduced by John Macdonald at the beginning of the 1890s National Policy, a protectionist course in economic policy, forced the farmers to pay higher prices for their equipment while they received in return for their products less. After the First World War, however, neither of the two major parties advocated free trade.
After the turn of the century developed in Western Canada radical political ideas. From the USA came progressivism, from Great Britain the ideas of the Fabian Society. This mixture of ideology and discontent led to the founding agrarian- populist organizations. Immediately after the end of the First World War, the Canadian farmers' organizations have become increasingly politically active and celebrated at the provincial level first electoral success.
Thomas Crerar, Minister of Agriculture of the Unionist coalition government of Prime Minister Robert Borden, left in June 1919 to protest the Cabinet as Minister of Finance Thomas White had submitted a budget that took into account the concerns of farmers hardly. 1919 and 1920 gained independent farmer candidates several elections. In 1920 took place on Crerars initiative the foundation of the Progressive Party, which should represent the various organizations at the federal level.
Electoral success
In the general election, 1921, the new party won 58 seats right away and was the second strongest. However, the distribution of seats was unbalanced. While the progressives won in Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan over half of the seats are to be distributed, they were not represented in the Maritime provinces with only one deputy and in Québec. The share of the vote ranged from 3.1 per cent in Quebec to 61.7 % in Saskatchewan; the national average was 21.1 %.
The Progressive Party had a very decentralized structure. Thomas Crerar was not a national party chairman, but only party leader in Parliament. The media saw him as a leading figure in the party, although he held no official position outside parliament. The party also did not have a national organization, but used to coordinate the structures of the Canadian Council of Agriculture. Each candidate was free to represent his own political views. The support of the customs reform was a unifying element, but even this concern was not at all popular.
The Liberal Party won the most seats but fell short of an absolute majority and formed under the leadership of William Lyon Mackenzie King a minority government. The progressives disagreed, how they should proceed. A significant group of former liberal, among them Crerar, supported the formation of a coalition government. In contrast, both turned the Liberals from Montréal and radical progressive. The latter wanted to maintain the decentralized structure in which a deputy simply represented his constituency. The two currents of the Progressive Party agreed to leave the role of the official opposition to the third- largest party, the Conservative Party.
Decline
Crerar tried to make the progressive deputies with the introduction of elements of a traditional party like whips and a national party organization to a more effective group. These efforts, however, met with resistance, whereupon Crerar resigned in 1922. He was replaced by Robert Forke, also a former liberal who had agreed with his predecessor in many ways. In Parliament, the progressives proved largely unsuccessful and the already low level of support in eastern Canada continued to decline since Forke limited his work to the Western Canadian provinces. In the general election, 1925, the progressives won only 22 seats; with the exception of two constituencies in Ontario they were no longer represented in the east of the country.
Then the radical wing of Alberta began to dominate the party. On June 30, 1926 Robert Forke resigned, a day after King's resignation as prime minister. Fork and progressives from Manitoba met with the Liberal Party an agreement and stood as candidates in the general election in 1926, which had been proclaimed by Arthur Meighen because of the failure of conservative transitional government as Liberal Progressive. The Liberals were able, with the support of eight liberal- progressive deputies form a stable minority government and fork was appointed Immigration Minister in Cabinet Kings.
The progressives in Alberta constituted themselves as a new representative of the United Farmers of Alberta ( UFA). 1926 were eleven candidates successfully, 1930 nine candidates. Most of these delegates were members of the socialist Ginger Group, which also included Labour MPs and the United Farmers. After the elections of 1930 remained only three MPs of the Progressive Party, including Agnes Macphail, the first woman who was elected to the House.
Aftereffect
After the collapse of the party's most progressive voters returned to the Liberal Party. The Liberals had the progressives always regarded themselves as "liberals in a hurry ," which pursued the same goals basically, but had been simply impatient. So Thomas Crerar belonged for decades to the most important liberal personalities, first as the lower house deputy, later as a senator.
The more radical progressives split into two movements. From the Ginger Group, the social democratic Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, the forerunner of today's New Democratic Party was formed. Populist parties turned to the ideology of Social Credit.
Election results
Party chairman
- Thomas Crerar (1920-1922)
- Robert Forke (1922-1926)