Thomas Crerar

Thomas Crerar (1936)

Thomas Alexander Crerar , PC , CC (born June 17, 1876 in Molesworth , Ontario , † April 11, 1975 in Victoria ) was a Canadian politician . At the beginning of the 1920s he was the leader of the short-lived Progressive Party in the House of Commons , which represented the interests of agriculture in Western Canada . He later switched to the Liberal Party and was a minister in the cabinet of William Lyon Mackenzie King , who made him a senator in 1945 .

biography

Crerar was born in rural southwestern Ontario and moved to Manitoba at a young age . There he worked as a teacher and farmer . From 1907 he was chairman of the Manitoba Grain Growers , an influential wheat growers' cooperative. Although he had no previous experience in political office, Prime Minister Robert Borden appointed him Minister of Agriculture in his unionist coalition government in October 1917 . In the December 1917 election , he was elected MP for the constituency of Marquette .

In June 1919 Crerar left the cabinet in protest against the government's high tariff policy. The finance minister had submitted a budget that barely considered the concerns of farmers in western Canada. They advocated free trade with the US , as this would have given them advantages. The following year, on Crerar's initiative, the Progressive Party came into being , which was supposed to represent the various agricultural organizations at the federal level.

The new party won 58 seats straight away in the December 1921 election and became the second largest party. Crerar was not a national party leader, just a group leader in parliament. The media saw him as a leader of the party, although he held no official position outside of parliament. He failed in the attempt to transform the very decentralized political movement into a more effective party organization. Robert Forke appeared as the new chairman in 1922 and the Progressive Party quickly lost its importance as a result. In 1925 Crerar resigned as a member of the House of Commons and went into the private sector.

William Lyon Mackenzie King appointed Crerar Minister for Railways and Canals in December 1929 and moved back to the House of Commons as representative of the Liberals in February 1930 with victory in a by-election in Brandon . He lost his seat again in the June 1930 election. Five years later he ran again as a Liberal candidate and was elected to Churchill . From October 1935 to April 1945 he held various ministerial posts (Indian affairs, home affairs, mining, immigration). At King's request, the Governor General then appointed Crerar Senator . He was a member of this body until May 1966.

Web links

• Thomas Crerar - biographical information on the website of the Canadian Parliament (English)
• Thomas Crerar ( English, French ) In: The Canadian Encyclopedia .