Alexander Mackenzie (politician)

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Alexander Mackenzie Alexander Mackenzie Signature-rt.svg

Alexander Mackenzie PC (born January 28, 1822 in Logierait , Perthshire , Scotland , † April 17, 1892 in Toronto ) was a Canadian building contractor and politician. He was the country's second prime minister and ruled from November 7, 1873 to October 8, 1878.

family

Mackenzie was born the third of ten children of Alexander Mackenzie and his wife Mary Stewart Flemming in Logierait, Scotland. His paternal great-grandfather, Donald Mackenzie, was from Ross-shire . From there he moved to Perthshire and married Mackenzie's great-grandmother Margaret Ferguson. In 1742 his grandfather Malcolm Mackenzie was born. This was given by John Murray, 3rd Duke of Atholl, the mill of Kincraigie and the associated mill rights. In 1784 Mackenzie's father was born there, who, after training as a carpenter , first found work as a shipbuilder in Portsmouth . After the Battle of Waterloo , the demand for warships fell sharply and he returned to his homeland, where he worked in house building. In 1817 he married Mary Stewart Flemming. Mackenzie's mother was the fourth of seven children to Donald Fleming and Jean Stewart. His maternal grandfather taught and was an elder in the Presbyterian Church . His maternal grandmother came from a wealthy Strathtay family . His great-grandfather Adam Stewart, a regimental commander , owned two large estates there. Mary Stewart Flemming died in Sarnia in 1861 . The family moved to Perth in 1827 , from there to Pitlochry two years later, and finally settled in Dunkeld in 1834 . Mackenzie's father died there in 1836 at the age of 52. Of Mackenzie's nine brothers, two died in infancy. His brother Hope completed his training as a doctor, but never practiced. Rather, he took a job with the British East India Company and came to some influence in the Madras presidency . In 1841, while working in Irvine , he met the family of his future wife, Helen Neil. Like Mackenzie, Helen's father and eldest brother were stonemasons . She also had an older sister. Mackenzie became a member of the Neils' family and when they decided to immigrate to Canada in 1842, he joined them. There he finally married Helen on March 28, 1845, with whom he had two daughters and a son, but only one daughter of whom survived infancy. She later married the pastor of the Presbyterian community of Sarnia. After the death of his first wife on January 4, 1852, Mackenzie married Jane Sym on June 17, 1853, the eldest daughter of the farmer Robert Sym and his wife Agnes Wylie. The family of his second wife, like the Mackenzies, came from Perkshire in Scotland, had emigrated to Canada in 1821 and initially settled near Perth before moving to Lambton County in 1837 . This second marriage remained childless.

Professional career and political career

After the father's death, Mackenzie and two brothers had to provide for the family's support. At 16 he was able to begin an apprenticeship as a stonemason with a Mr. Ireland in Dunkeld. Before his twentieth birthday, he finished his apprenticeship and started looking for work. Since the prospects in Dunkeld were not very good, Mackenzie went to Irvine, where he found a job as a stonemason building a railway bridge as part of the construction of the railway line from Ayr to Glasgow . In 1842 he emigrated to Canada. His brothers followed him in 1843 and 1847 with their mother. After a short stay in Montreal , where he turned down a job as a stonemason, he moved to Kingston . Despite disappointing expectations that inland labor demand would be much higher than in a coastal city like Montreal, he quickly found work. Since the limestone processed in Kingston was too hard, he could not work with his tools as a stonemason, but specialized in 1842 as a building craftsman . At the end of the summer of 1842, however, his employer was over-indebted and could not pay him any wages. He then leased a small farm with the Neil family not far from Loughborough Lake . The landlord was the father of the future Prime Minister of Ontario, Oliver Mowat . However, since no member of the family had any experience as a farmer, the successes were very modest. At the end of winter, Mackenzie left the farm and never returned. From the spring of 1843 he worked on the construction of Fort Henry and was so successful that he was able to hire several employees and found a small construction company. So he was involved with his men in the construction of the Welland Canal and was responsible for the construction of various courthouses. In November 1846 he moved with his wife to Sarnia, where his brothers and mother also settled.

Mackenzie converted from Presbyterianism to Baptism and became involved in the abstinence movement .

Soon after emigrating to Canada, Mackenzies became politically active and held several public offices in Lambton County . He was the representative for censuses, a member of the fire brigade, the dialectical society, the abstainer society and the school council. He also organized election campaigns for liberal politicians at the provincial level, e.g. B. for his brother Hope Mackenzie. In 1861 he was elected to the parliament of the province of Canada , in 1867 to the newly created Canadian lower house .

After Governor General Lord Dufferin dissolved the Conservative government of John Macdonald because of the Pacific scandal , he looked for someone who could form a new government. There was no clear leader among the Liberals ; it was only after three other politicians had refused that Mackenzie was appointed prime minister. Mackenzie took office on November 7, 1873, formed a new government and asked the Governor General to schedule a new election on January 22, 1874. The general election in 1874 ended with a victory for the Liberal Party.

Mackenzie's main concern during his reign was to reform and simplify state administration. He abolished public electoral meetings and instead instituted secret elections , created the Supreme Court and founded the Royal Military Academy of Canada . However, the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway came to a standstill, as the financing at that time was almost exclusively with public funds. After the defeat in the general election in 1878 by Macdonald's Conservative Party , Mackenzie resigned on October 8, 1878, and remained leader of the opposition until 1880.

At the time, it was customary for the British monarch to knight all outgoing Canadian Prime Ministers , but Mackenzie always refused. He died at the age of 70 of a heart attack caused by a serious fall. He remained a member of parliament until his death. He is buried in the Lakeview Cemetery in Sarnia.

See also

literature

Web links

Commons : Alexander Mackenzie  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Mackenzie, Alexander
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Canadian contractor and politician
DATE OF BIRTH January 28, 1822
PLACE OF BIRTH Logierait , Perthshire , Scotland
DATE OF DEATH April 17, 1892
Place of death Toronto