1921 Canadian federal election
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The Canadian parliament after the 1921 election | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The 1921 Canadian federal election was held on December 6, 1921, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 14th Parliament of Canada. The Union government that had governed Canada through the First World War was defeated, and replaced by a Liberal government under the young leader William Lyon Mackenzie King. A new third party, the Progressive Party, won the second most seats in the election.
Since the
Meighen attempted to make the "Unionist" party a permanent alliance of Tories and Liberals by renaming it the National Liberal and Conservative Party, but the name change failed, and most Unionist Liberals either returned to the Liberal fold or joined the new Progressive Party. Besides the labour strife and farm tariffs in the Prairie provinces, the Conscription Crisis of 1917 had a lasting effect on Tory fortunes by making the party virtually unelectable in Quebec.
The election was the first in which the majority of Canadian women were allowed to vote, thanks to reforms passed by the Conservatives. Five women also ran for office. Agnes Macphail of the Progressive Party was elected as the first woman MP in Canada.
Parliament was split three ways by this election. King's Liberals won a
The Progressive Party, including the United Farmers of Alberta (UFA), won the second largest number of seats, dominating the West, and winning almost a third of the seats in Ontario. Liberal and Conservative candidates were shut out in Alberta, with 10 UFA and two Labour candidates taking the province's 12 federal seats. The party won only one seat east of Ontario, however. Despite winning the second most seats, it declined to form the official opposition. It would be the only Canadian federal election before 1993 in which a party other than the Liberals or the (Progressive) Conservatives won the second most seats.
The Conservatives lost the most seats up to that time of any governing party at the federal level. They won fewer seats than the Progressives (despite having more popular votes) but wound up forming the official opposition. The Conservatives won much of Ontario and had some support in the Maritimes and British Columbia but won no seats in the Prairies or in Quebec.
Three
Majority or minority?
The government that King formed in the parliament resulting from this election was a minority government. Although King's party won a slim majority of seats at the election, resignations changed the parliament from a small majority to minority.
The Liberal Party lost two by-elections to Conservative candidates, but had gained two seats from Progressives who
The Progressive caucus was less united than the Liberals or Conservatives, due to the formation of the
Electoral system
Most of the MPs were elected in single-winner
National results
Party | Party leader | # of candidates |
Seats | Popular vote | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1917 | Elected | % Change | # | % | pp Change
| ||||
Liberal | W. L. Mackenzie King | 204 | 82 | 118 | +43.9% | 1,285,998 | 41.15% | +2.34 | |
Conservative
|
Arthur Meighen | 204 | 153 | 49 | -68.0% | 935,651 | 29.95% | -26.98 | |
Progressive | T. A. Crerar
|
137 | * | 58 | * | 658,976 | 21.09% | * | |
Labour
|
J. S. Woodsworth | 28 | - | 3 | 85,388 | 2.73% | +0.90 | ||
Independent | 45 | - | 2 | 94,901 | 3.04% | +2.40 | |||
United Farmers of Alberta | 2 | * | 2 | * | 22,251 | 0.71% | * | ||
Unknown | 9 | - | - | - | 15,293 | 0.49% | +0.29 | ||
Independent Conservative | 2 | * | 1 | * | 12,359 | 0.40% | * | ||
United Farmers of Ontario | 1 | * | 1 | * | 3,919 | 0.13% | * | ||
Independent Progressive | 1 | * | 1 | * | 3,309 | 0.115% | * | ||
Socialist | 1 | * | - | * | 3,094 | 0.10% | * | ||
Independent Liberal | 1 | - | - | - | 2,764 | 0.09% | -0.32 | ||
Total | 635 | 235 | 235 | - | 3,123,903 | 100% | |||
Sources: http://www.elections.ca -- History of Federal Ridings since 1867 |
Note:
* not applicable - the party was not recognized in the previous election
Vote and seat summaries
Results by province
Party name | BC | AB | SK | MB | ON | QC | NB | NS | PE | YK | Total | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Liberal | Seats: | 3 | - | 1 | 3 | 21 | 65 | 5 | 16 | 4 | - | 118 | |
Popular vote (%): | 29.8 | 15.8 | 18.7 | 18.9 | 30.1 | 70.2 | 50.2 | 52.4 | 45.7 | 47.6 | 41.2 | ||
Progressive | Seats: | 3 | 8 | 15 | 11 | 20 | - | 1 | - | - | 58 | ||
Vote (%): | 11.7 | 39.6 | 61.7 | 41.9 | 25.6 | 3.1 | 8.7 | 10.2 | 12.3 | 21.1 | |||
Conservative | Seats: | 7 | - | - | - | 36 | - | 5 | - | - | 1 | 49 | |
Vote (%): | 47.9 | 20.3 | 16.3 | 24.4 | 38.8 | 18.5 | 39.4 | 32.3 | 37.2 | 51.1 | 30.0 | ||
Labour
|
Seats: | - | 2 | - | 1 | - | - | - | - | 3 | |||
Vote (%): | 6.8 | 11.1 | 0.8 | 5.7 | 2.3 | 0.7 | 3.5 | 4.8 | 2.7 | ||||
Independent | Seats: | - | - | 2 | - | - | - | 2 | |||||
Vote (%): | 3.5 | 7.4 | 1.9 | 6.6 | 1.7 | 1.3 | 3.0 | ||||||
United Farmers of Alberta | Seats: | 2 | 2 | ||||||||||
Vote (%): | 12.9 | 0.7 | |||||||||||
Independent Conservative | Seats: | 1 | - | 1 | |||||||||
Vote (%): | 0.9 | 0.3 | 0.4 | ||||||||||
United Farmers of Ontario | Seats: | 1 | 1 | ||||||||||
Vote (%): | 0.3 | 0.1 | |||||||||||
Independent Progressive | Seats: | 1 | 1 | ||||||||||
Vote (%): | 0.3 | 0.1 | |||||||||||
Total seats | 13 | 12 | 16 | 15 | 82 | 65 | 11 | 16 | 4 | 1 | 235 | ||
Parties that won no seats: | |||||||||||||
Other | Vote (%): | 0.4 | 0.2 | 2.4 | 0.6 | 1.6 | 5.2 | 1.0 | |||||
Socialist | Vote (%): | 1.8 | 0.1 | ||||||||||
Independent Liberal | Vote (%): | 0.2 | 0.1 |
See also
- List of Canadian federal general elections
- List of political parties in Canada
- 11th Canadian Parliament
- 14th Canadian Parliament
Notes
- ^ The United Farmers of Alberta, which at the time formed the government in that province, did not have a separate party leader at the federal level. At the time of this election, party leader Herbert Greenfield was the Premier of Alberta and the MLA for Peace River in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta.
- ^ The United Farmers of Ontario, which at the time formed the government in that province, did not have a separate party leader at the federal level. At the time of this election, party leader Ernest C. Drury was the Premier of Ontario and the MLA for Halton in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.
References
- ^ "Voter Turnout at Federal Elections and Referendums". Retrieved March 10, 2019.
- ^ Parliamentary Guide
Further reading
- Hopkins, J. Castell (1922). The Canadian Annual Review of Public Affairs, 1921. Toronto: The Annual Review Company.