1968 Canadian federal election
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The 1968 Canadian federal election was held on June 25, 1968, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 28th Parliament of Canada.
In April 1968,
Background
Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson had announced in December 1967 that he would retire early in the following year, calling a new leadership election for the following April to decide on a successor. In February 1968, however, Pearson's government nearly fell before the leadership election could even take place, when it was unexpectedly defeated on a tax bill. Convention dictated that Pearson would have been forced to resign and call an election had the government been defeated on a full budget bill, but after taking legal advice, Governor General Roland Michener decreed that he would only ask for Pearson's resignation if an explicit motion of no confidence were called in his government. Ultimately, the New Democratic Party and Ralliement créditiste were not willing to topple the government over the issue, and even had they done so, Pearson would have been entitled to advise Michener not to hold an election until after the new Liberal leader had been chosen, but the incident made it clear that Pearson's successor could not feasibly hope to hold out until the next statutory general election date of November 1970, and would in all likelihood be forced to call an election much sooner.[2]
Pierre Trudeau, who was a relative unknown until he was appointed to the cabinet by Pearson, won a surprise victory over Paul Martin Sr., Paul Hellyer and Robert Winters in the party's leadership election on April 6. He was sworn in as prime minister on April 20.
Parties and campaigns
Liberals
As had been widely expected, Trudeau called an immediate election after he was sworn in as prime minister. The charismatic, intellectual, handsome, single, and fully bilingual Trudeau soon captured the hearts and minds of the nation, and the period leading up to the election saw such intense feelings for him that it was dubbed "Trudeaumania." At public appearances, he was confronted by screaming girls, something never before seen in Canadian politics. The Liberal campaign was dominated by Trudeau's personality. Liberal campaign ads featured pictures of Trudeau inviting Canadians to "Come work with me", and encouraged them to "Vote for New Leadership for All of Canada". The substance of the campaign was based upon the creation of a "just society", with a proposed expansion of social programs.
Progressive Conservatives
The principal opposition to the Liberals was the Progressive Conservative Party (PC Party) led by Robert Stanfield, who had previously served as premier of Nova Scotia. The PCs started the election campaign with an internal poll showing them trailing the Liberals by 22 points.[3]
Stanfield proposed introducing guaranteed annual income, though failed to explain the number of citizens that would be covered, the minimum income level, and the cost to implement it. Due to concerns that the term "guaranteed annual income" sounded
New Democratic Party
On the left, former long-time Premier of Saskatchewan Tommy Douglas led the New Democratic Party, but once again failed to make the electoral break-through that was hoped for when the party was founded in 1960. Douglas gained a measure of personal satisfaction - the ouster of Diefenbaker had badly damaged the PC brand in Saskatchewan, and played a major role in allowing the NDP to overcome a decade of futility at the federal level in Saskatchewan to win a plurality of seats there. Nevertheless, these gains were balanced out by losses elsewhere in the country. Under the slogan, "You win with the NDP", Douglas campaigned for affordable housing, higher old age pensions, lower prescription drug prices, and a reduced cost of living. However, the NDP had difficulty running against the left-leaning Trudeau, who was himself a former supporter of the NDP. Douglas would step down as leader in 1971, but remains a powerful icon for New Democrats.
Leaders' debate
This was the first Canadian federal election to hold a
Electoral system
In this election, for the first time since Confederation, all the MPs were elected as the single member for their district, through First past the post. Previously some had always been elected in multi-member ridings through Block Voting. From here on, single-winner
National results
The results of the election were sealed when on the night before the election a riot broke out at the
The
Atlantic Canada bucked the national trend, with the Tories making large gains in that region and winning pluralities in all four Atlantic provinces. In that region, the Tory brand was strengthened by the leadership of former Nova Scotian premier Stanfield. Voters in Newfoundland, who were growing increasingly weary of their Liberal administration under founding Premier Joey Smallwood, voted PC for the first time since entering Confederation.
Party | Party leader | # of candidates |
Seats | Popular vote | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1965 | Dissolution | Elected | % Change | # | % | Change | ||||
Liberal | Pierre Trudeau | 262 | 131 | 128 | 154 | +18.3% | 3,686,801 | 45.37% | +5.18pp | |
Progressive Conservative | Robert Stanfield | 263 | 97 | 94 | 72 | -25.8% | 2,554,397 | 31.43% | -0.98pp | |
New Democratic Party
|
Tommy Douglas | 263 | 21 | 22 | 22 | +4.8% | 1,378,263 | 16.96% | -0.95pp | |
Ralliement créditiste | Réal Caouette | 72 | 9 | 8 | 14 | +55.6% | 360,404 | 4.43% | -0.22pp | |
Independent | 29 | 1 | 2 | 1 | - | 36,543 | 0.45% | -0.23pp | ||
Liberal-Labour
|
Pierre Trudeau[NB 1] | 1 | 1 | 10,144 | 0.12% | |||||
Social Credit | A.B. Patterson | 32 | 5 | 4 | - | -100% | 68,742 | 0.85% | -2.82pp | |
Independent Liberal | 11 | - | - | - | - | 16,785 | 0.21% | -0.01pp | ||
Communist | William Kashtan | 14 | - | - | - | - | 4,465 | 0.05% | x | |
Independent PC | 5 | 1 | - | - | -100% | 2,762 | 0.03% | -0.14pp | ||
Démocratisation Économique | 5 | - | 2,651 | 0.03% | ||||||
Franc Lib | 1 | - | 2,141 | 0.03% | ||||||
Independent Conservative | 1 | - | - | - | - | 632 | 0.01% | x | ||
Reform | 1 | - | 420 | 0.01% | ||||||
Rhinoceros
|
Cornelius I | 1 | - | 354 | x | x | ||||
Conservative | 1 | - | - | - | - | 339 | x | x | ||
Esprit social | H-G Grenier | 1 | - | - | - | - | 311 | x | x | |
Socialist Labour
|
1 | - | - | - | - | 202 | x | x | ||
Republican[NB 2]
|
1 | - | 175 | x | ||||||
New Canada | Fred Reiner | 1 | - | 148 | x | |||||
National Socialist
|
1 | - | 89 | x | ||||||
Vacant | 6 | |||||||||
Total | 967 | 265 | 265 | 264 | -0.4% | 8,126,768 | 100% | |||
Sources: http://www.elections.ca History of Federal Ridings since 1867, Toronto Star, June 24, 1968. |
Notes:
"% change" refers to change from previous election
x - less than 0.005% of the popular vote
"Dissolution" refers to party standings in the House of Commons immediately prior to the election call, not the results of the previous election.
- Liberal-Labour candidate but remained a member of the Liberal Party caucus, led by Pierre Trudeau.
- ^ The Republican Party also took credit for a second candidate, who received 420 votes. (Vancouver Sun, June 26, 1968, "Republicans Claim Win", p. 15)
Vote and seat summaries
Results by province
Party name | BC | AB | SK | MB | ON | QC | NB | NS | PE | NL | NT | YK | Total | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Liberal | Seats: | 16 | 4 | 2 | 5 | 63 | 56 | 5 | 1 | - | 1 | 1 | - | 154 | |
Popular vote: | 41.8 | 35.7 | 27.1 | 41.5 | 46.2 | 53.6 | 44.4 | 38.0 | 45.0 | 42.8 | 63.8 | 47.0 | 45.4 | ||
Progressive Conservative | Seats: | - | 15 | 5 | 5 | 17 | 4 | 5 | 10 | 4 | 6 | - | 1 | 72 | |
Vote: | 18.9 | 51.0 | 37.0 | 31.4 | 32.0 | 21.4 | 49.7 | 55.2 | 51.8 | 52.7 | 23.4 | 48.0 | 31.4 | ||
New Democratic
|
Seats: | 7 | - | 6 | 3 | 6 | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | 22 | |
Vote: | 32.6 | 9.4 | 35.7 | 25.0 | 20.6 | 7.5 | 4.9 | 6.7 | 3.2 | 4.4 | 12.8 | 5.0 | 17.0 | ||
Ralliement créditiste | Seats: | 14 | - | 14 | |||||||||||
Vote: | 16.4 | 0.7 | 4.4 | ||||||||||||
Independent | Seats: | - | - | - | - | 1 | - | - | 1 | ||||||
Vote: | 0.1 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.3 | 0.6 | 0.6 | 0.2 | 0.4 | |||||||
Liberal-Labour
|
Seats: | 1 | 1 | ||||||||||||
Vote: | 0.3 | 0.1 | |||||||||||||
Total seats: | 23 | 19 | 13 | 13 | 88 | 74 | 10 | 11 | 4 | 7 | 1 | 1 | 264 | ||
Parties that won no seats: | |||||||||||||||
Social Credit | Vote: | 6.4 | 1.9 | 1.5 | xx | 0.1 | 0.8 | ||||||||
Independent Liberal | Vote: | 1.5 | 0.1 | 0.2 | 0.2 | ||||||||||
Communist | Vote: | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.2 | 0.1 | xx | 0.1 | |||||||
Independent PC | Vote: | 0.2 | xx | xx | 0.1 | 0.1 | xx | ||||||||
Démocratisation Écon. | Vote: | 0.1 | xx | ||||||||||||
Franc Lib | Vote: | 0.1 | xx | ||||||||||||
Independent Cons. | Vote: | 0.2 | xx | ||||||||||||
Reform | Vote: | 0.1 | xx | ||||||||||||
Rhinoceros
|
Vote: | xx | xx | ||||||||||||
Conservative | Vote: | xx | xx | ||||||||||||
Espirit social | Vote: | xx | xx | ||||||||||||
Socialist Labour
|
Vote: | xx | xx | ||||||||||||
Republican
|
Vote: | xx | xx | ||||||||||||
New Canada | Vote: | xx | xx | ||||||||||||
National Socialist
|
Vote: | xx | xx |
Notes
xx - less than 0.05% of the popular vote.
- Voter turnout: 75.7% of the eligible population voted.
See also
- List of Canadian federal general elections
- List of political parties in Canada
- 28th Canadian Parliament
References
- ^ Pomfret, R. "Voter Turnout at Federal Elections and Referendums". Elections Canada. Elections Canada. Retrieved January 11, 2014.
- ^ Robertson, Gordon; Memoirs of a Very Civil Servant; pp299-301
- ^ Stevens (1973), p. 213.
- ^ Stevens (1973), p. 216–221.
- ^ CBC Archives
- ^ Parliamentary Guide 1969, p. 333-334; Parliamentary Guide 2011, p. 432-433
- ^ Only contested seats in Quebec and Restigouche—Madawaska in New Brunswick.
Further reading
- Argyle, Ray (2004). Turning Points: The Campaigns that Changed Canada 2004 and Before. Toronto: White Knight Publications. ISBN 978-0-9734186-6-8.
- Beck, James Murray (1968). Pendulum of Power; Canada's Federal Elections. Scarborough: Prentice-Hall of Canada. ISBN 978-0-13-655670-1.
- Peacock, Donald (1968). Journey to Power: The Story of a Canadian Election. Toronto: The Ryerson Press. ISBN 978-0-7700-0253-4.
- ISBN 978-0-8020-1649-2.
- Stevens, Geoffrey (1973). Stanfield. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart. ISBN 9780771083587.
- Sullivan, Martin (1968). Mandate '68: The Year of Pierre Elliott Trudeau. Toronto: Doubleday.