From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Liberal-Progressive
Liberal-Progressive
Liberal-Progressive was a label used by a number of can- In the 1935 election, five Liberal Progressives ran in
didates in Canadian elections between 1926 and 1953. In Manitoba, four of whom were elected. One of these was
federal and Ontario politics, there was no formal Liberal- victorious over a Liberal candidate, while the defeated
Progressive party, but it was an alliance between two Liberal Progressive was defeated by a Liberal.
separate parties. In Manitoba, a party did exist with this In the 1940 election, two Liberal Progressives ran in
name. Manitoba, of whom one was elected. Two Liberal Progres-
sives ran in Ontario. Both of these were elected.
Federal politics William Gilbert Weir was the longest lasting Liberal
Progressive MP, winning his first election in the riding
With the Progressive Party of Canada’s 1921 electoral of Macdonald in Manitoba in 1930. He was re-elected as
breakthrough, Canadian federal politics operated under a Liberal Progressive in 1935 and 1940. In 1945, 1949 and
a "three party system" for the first time. The Liberal Par- 1953, he was elected as a Liberal Progressive for the rid-
ty of Canada under William Lyon Mackenzie King tried ing of Portage-Neepawa, and was the sole candidate to
to deal with this situation by co-opting the Progressives, run as under the Liberal Progressive label in those elec-
offering to form a coalition with them. The Progressive tions. Weir served as Chief Government Whip from 1945
Party itself refused. But by 1926, the party had split and to 1953 and parliamentary assistant to Prime Minister
some Progressives decided to support the Liberals, run- Louis St. Laurent from 1953 to 1957. He was defeated in
ning as Liberal Progressive or Liberal-Labour-Progressive the 1957 election, the first in which he ran as a Liberal.
candidates or similar variations. This phenomenon oc- Five MPs in all sat as Liberal-Progressives: Edgar Dou-
curred particularly in the 1925 election and the 1926 elec- glas Richmond Bissett, Robert Forke, James Allison Glen,
tion. A number of Liberal Progressive Members of Parlia- George William McDonald and William Gilbert Weir.
ment became full fledged Liberals in the 1930s. Forke and Glen both ultimately became ministers in Lib-
In the 1925 election, only one candidate ran under eral cabinets (Glen also served as Speaker of the Canadian
the Liberal Progressive banner. He was unsuccessful. House of Commons) while Weir served as government
In the 1926 election, a total of 11 candidates ran as whip for a number of years.
Liberal Progressive: eight in Manitoba (the entire Pro- Forke was elevated to the Canadian Senate in 1929
gressive contingent who had decided to nominate joint and was the sole Liberal-Progressive to ever sit in that
candidates with the Liberals), all of whom were elected, body.
and three unsuccessful candidates in Ontario. A ninth
Manitoba Liberal-Progressive, Robert Forke who was the
group’s leader, was acclaimed in a by-election later in the
Alberta
year and was appointed to the Cabinet. These candidates In Alberta, one candidate ran under the Liberal Progres-
were not opposed by the Liberal Party in the election and sive banner during the 1926 Alberta general election. Mr
ran with the understanding that they would sit with and A.D. Campbell achieved 252 votes, in the Camrose district
support the Liberals in the Parliament and attend Liberal coming in fourth place.
caucus meetings. Mackenzie King’s Liberals alone did not
have a majority of seats in the House of Commons after
the 1926 election, but were able to form a minority gov-
Ontario
ernment (that was for all intents and purposes a majori- In Ontario, an electoral coalition was formed in 1934 be-
ty government) with the support of the Liberal-Progres- tween the provincial Liberals under Mitchell Hepburn,
sives in the house. This government lasted for four years. and the Progressive bloc of Members of the Legislative
The Liberal-Progressives also had their own caucus meet- Assembly (MLAs) under Harry Nixon. Nixon had original-
ings (in addition to attending Liberal meetings) and de- ly been elected with the United Farmers of Ontario. In
veloped their own politics on certain issues, particularly this coalition, the Progressive group ran as Liberal-Pro-
in relation to agriculture. For example, they were critical gressives. They were eventually absorbed into the Ontario
of the 1927 federal budget for not reducing tariffs, a long Liberal Party. Even before 1934, several candidates ran
time Progressive demand. and were elected under the Liberal-Progressive banner
In the 1930 election, eight Liberal Progressives ran in (Frederick Sandy of Victoria South was first elected as
Manitoba, but only two were elected. One defeated can- a UFO MLA in 1919, was defeated in 1923 and returned
didate lost to a candidate running as a Liberal. to serve as a Liberal-Progressive from 1926-1929; Merton
1
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Liberal-Progressive
Elvin Scott of Oxford South served as a Liberal-Progres- gressives. Bracken continued as Premier until 1943, when
sive MLA from 1926 to 1929 and UFO MLA David Munroe he was replaced by Stuart Garson. In 1948, Garson was re-
Ross of Oxford North was re-elected as a Liberal-Pro- placed by Douglas Campbell.
gressive in 1926 and 1929), however it was only in the Although the party was dominated by its "Progres-
1934 election that a formal alliance between the Pro- sive" wing, it had become popularly known as the Liberal
gressives and Liberals began, returning four Liberal-Pro- Party by the 1940s. (The national Progressive Party had
gressive MLAs (Nixon, Douglas Campbell of Kent East, vanished by this time.) It formally changed its name to
Roland Patterson of Grey North and James Francis Kelly the Manitoba Liberal Party in 1961, against only scattered
of Muskoka). Liberal-Progressive leader Harry Nixon was objections from diehard Progressives.
provincial secretary in Liberal Premier Mitchell Hep-
burn’s cabinet from its inception. He and Kelly ran for re-
election as straight Liberals in the 1937 provincial elec-
See also
tion and were re-elected. Two remaining Liberal-Pro- • List of political parties in Canada
gressive MLAs were returned in that election, Campbell
and Patterson. Campbell was not returned in the 1943
election while Patterson was re-elected as a straight Lib-
External links
eral. • Parliament of Canada History of the Federal Electoral
Ridings since 1867
Manitoba
In Manitoba, the Progressives and Liberals merged in
1932 under Premier John Bracken and ran as Liberal-Pro-
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Liberal-Progressive&oldid=459316638"
Categories:
• Federal political parties in Canada
• Defunct political parties in Canada
This page was last modified on 6 November 2011 at 17:24. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-
ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. See Terms of use for details. Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of
the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization.Contact us
Privacy policy About Wikipedia Disclaimers Mobile view
2