Sorry, Steve Paikin, but Mackenzie King Is Not The Longest-Serving Prime Minister in the Commonwealth

Posted on 2025/01/23 by J.W.J. Bowden

The myth which holds that Mackenzie King holds the record of “Canada’s longest-serving Prime Minister” persists. Steve Paikin has outdone himself now by going so far as to claim Mackenzie King holds the record of not merely Canada’s longest-serving Prime Minister but also as “the longest-serving Prime Minister in the history of the British Empire or Commonwealth.”

This is false for two reasons. First, “Canada” as a polity extends all the way back to 1791 and not to 1867.[1] The Imperial Parliament established Upper Canada and Lower Canada in 1791, continued and combined them into the Province of Canada in 1841, and then made the Dominion of Canada the direct continuator and successor polity to the Province of Canada in 1867. Second, “Prime Minister” and “Premier” were used interchangeably in Canada to describe the head of either a federal or provincial ministry until the mid-20th century; not until Bill Davis adopted the title of “Premier of Ontario” instead of “Prime Minister of Ontario” in 1975 did the modern distinction between the federal Prime Minister and provincial Premiers emerge.[2] What we today call provincial premiers in Canada and state premiers in Australia should also count in the calculation of the “longest-serving prime minister in the history of British Empire or Commonwealth” because federated polities also matter.

And we must not forget the former British Crown colonies in the Pacific and Caribbean which achieved responsible government and gained independence as Commonwealth Realms in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, because they also count as and have made contributions to “the history of the British Empire and Commonwealth.” I have defined Paikin’s phrase to include only the properly democratic Commonwealth Realms and parliamentary republics within the Commonwealth of Nations. On that basis I exclude Fiji because of its multiple coups and suspensions from the Commonwealth of Nations, but I have kept Grenada in the dataset because it suffered one bloodless Marxist coup and then restored itself as a Realm under its original constitution four years later after the United States invaded and deposed the Marxist usurpers. I have also excluded Singapore and Lee Kuan Yew’s continuous premiership of 31 years from 1959 to 1990 because I share Freedom House’s doubts on that country’s liberal democratic bona fides. I have also excluded Ireland because it withdrew from the Commonwealth in 1949.

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Posted in Caribbean Realms, Comparative, History of British North America | 1 Comment

Why John Turner “Had No Option”

Posted on 2025/01/08 by J.W.J. Bowden

My hard copy of the latest issue of the Journal of Parliamentary and Political Law arrived in the mail yesterday – delayed, presumably, by the Newmans of the postal strike – including my article on why John Turner sincerely believed that he “had no option” in 1984. Our 2025 seems poised to become another Year of Three Prime Ministers like 1993, 1984, and 1896. (1926 gave us three ministries but only two prime ministers).

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Posted in Appointment of PM, Caretaker Convention & Government Formation, Confidence Convention, Constitutional Conventions, Crown (Powers and Office), My Published Works | 2 Comments

Justin Trudeau Had an Epiphany and Endorsed My Doctrine on Prorogation

Posted on 2025/01/06 by J.W.J. Bowden

CPAC cut off the rest of footage showing the rest of the papers blowing away before Trudeau emerged, but this portion at least remained visible as perhaps a bad omen equivalent to Rishi Sunak’s speech in the rain in 2024.

On the Twelfth Day of Christmas, the Prime Minister gave to me his second tactical prorogation and endorsed what I had written in 2011.

Introduction

At around 10:45 on the morning of 6 January 2025 – the Feast of Epiphany and the Day of the Three Kings – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau revealed that he had grappled with a personal epiphany of sorts over the weekend and announced that he had advised Her Excellency Mary Simon to prorogue the 1st session of the 44th Parliament until 24 March 2025 because he intended to resign as leader of the Liberal Party and as Prime Minister and wanted to give the Liberal Party time to hold a leadership election during the intersession.[1] The press had begun to report on 5 January that Trudeau would resign before meeting the Liberal caucus on Wednesday, 8 January,[2] because the Liberal parliamentary party’s regional caucuses for the Atlantic, Quebec, and Ontario had already all publicly announced over the holidays that Trudeau should resign.[3] The Liberals elected so few MPs west of Thunder Bay in 2021, but Ben Carr, MP for Winnipeg South Centre and chair of PROC, had also called upon Trudeau to resign.[4] All this turmoil followed Chrystia Freeland’s spectacular resignation as Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister on 16 December 2024, where she accused Trudeau in an open letter of pursuing “costly political gimmicks” in the face of President-elect Trump’s threats to impose tariffs against Canada.[5]

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Posted in Crown (Powers and Office), Prorogation | 3 Comments

My New Article on Canadian Sub-Imperialism in the Commonwealth Caribbean 

Posted on 2024/12/27 by J.W.J. Bowden

The Canadian Foreign Policy Journal pleasantly surprised me on 18 December by publishing the electronic version of my article “From Sea to Sea to the Caribbean Sea: Canadian Sub-Imperialism in the British West Indies and Commonwealth Caribbean, 1917-2014.” I had forgotten that Taylor and Francis’s journals tend to publish an article online separately before releasing it as part of its main issue in print and online later.

Now safely concealed within the fortress of Taylor and Francis, I can only provide a brief overview of the project.

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Posted in Caribbean Realms, Commonwealth Realms, Comparative, My Published Works | Leave a comment

Savoie ne sait pas: The Governor General of Canada Does Not Unadjourn the House of Commons

Posted on 2024/12/24 by J.W.J. Bowden

My copy of Governing from the Centre, which I read probably around 2010 or 2011.

The Governor General does not decide when the House of Commons or the Senate come out of an adjournment and resume sitting. The House of Commons and Senate vote to adjourn themselves and to resume sitting, but the Crown summons, prorogues, and dissolves Parliament on the Prime Minister’s advice. This really is not complicated.

Yet Donald Savoie just wrote this bizarre column for The Hill Times where he asks some rhetorical questions about when the Governor General should act on the advice of the Leader of the Opposition. The answer to that, in Canada, is never. Some of our other sister Realms, like Saint Kitts and Nevis, have codified in their constitutions that the Governor General appoints some Senators on the advice of the Prime Minister and others on the advice of the Leader of the Opposition, but no such provision exists here.[1]

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Posted in Crown (Powers and Office), Parliament, Prorogation, Speaker of the House of Commons | 3 Comments