Macdonald resigned in November after being accused of taking bribes from railway companies, and Alexander Mackenzie's Liberals formed the government for the next five years. John A. Macdonald and his Conservative Government were returned to power in the General Election: and he remained Prime Minister until He finally delivered on a long standing dream, and promise, to link the entire nation of Canada together when the Canadian Pacific Railway was completed in , despite huge costs.
In the same year he put down the Saskatchewan Rebellion of separatists led by Louis Riel. However he then suffered a severe stroke, and died a week later on 6 June Their first child, John Alexander, died tragically after 13 months. Their second son, Hugh John Macdonald, would go on to become premier of Manitoba. Macdonald was a charismatic leader and a dedicated politician.
His political rise was swift. He was a moderate conservative during a time when provincial politics were very unstable and parliamentary gridlock led to frequent elections. In John Alexander Macdonald became the elected member for Kingston in the Legislative Assembly of Canada Ontario and Quebec , beginning a distinguished year political career during which he would become the first prime minister of Canada in In this context Macdonald's political views proved cautious; he defended the imperial prerogative and state support of denominational education, and opposed the abolition of primogeniture which stipulated that when a property owner died without leaving a will, his eldest son would inherit everything.
Above all, he emerged as a shrewd political tactician who believed in the pursuit of practical goals by practical means. This is a daguerreotype portrait of John A. Macdonald cased in a gold locket which was possibly carried by Macdonald himself. The locket also contains portraits of his first wife Isabella and his son Hugh John, both copied from oil paintings.
When this portrait was made, John Alexander Macdonald was the newly elected member for Kingston in the Legislative Assembly of Canada Ontario and Quebec , just beginning a distinguished year political career during which he would become the first prime minister of Canada in Macdonald is often seen as the principle architect of Confederation, having drafted 50 of the 72 resolutions that established the framework for a united Canada.
He used persuasion and compromise to get the delegates to agree on the terms of Confederation. It may be said without any exaggeration whatever, that the life of Sir John A.
This photo was likely taken in , shortly after Sir John was returned to power after leading the Opposition from to He would remain Prime Minister for the rest of his life.
Sir John A. By the standards of any age, Macdonald was a good-humored, tolerant, liberal-minded man. He was legendary for his indulgence of criticism, for the charm of his personality. In , he introduced a law that would have extended suffrage to property-owning unmarried women and widows. As attorney general of the pre-confederation province of Canada, he battled to protect escaped American slaves from extradition.
His government persuaded the British government in to pass a new habeas corpus act that imposed new restrictions on cooperation with U. He welcomed Jewish immigration to Canada and for a long time strenuously but unsuccessfully resisted efforts to exclude Chinese immigrants he later flip-flopped when he saw that the cause was lost. Macdonald shared many of the prejudices of his time—as you and I share the prejudices of ours.
Perhaps not. Read: What is Canada? Why is Macdonald suddenly so beleaguered? Why does a motivated minority want to erase the honors paid to his memory? Macdonald stands accused by his detractors less of things he did than of things he failed to do. He failed to provide sufficient aid to Indigenous people impoverished by the disappearance of the buffalo from the western prairies. He failed to anticipate the abuses that would arise in the residential schools his government created for Native students.
More fundamentally, Macdonald set his face against the attempt to preserve Native societies as independent sovereignties within Canada. He wanted to bring them into Canada as farmers, citizens, and voters. Public meetings in Canada regularly open by acknowledging that they occur on historic lands of Indian nations. M acdonald is probably not well known outside Canada. In fact, Canada stands out from all the other states between Patagonia and the 49th parallel for its purely civilian origins.
Macdonald was a politician, not a hero. Back in the s, the idea of stringing together into a single country the British colonies north of the 49th parallel seemed illusory, if not preposterous. It was not just expansion-minded Americans who expected to unite the continent from the North Pole to the Rio Grande under the Stars and Stripes. Civil War. Yet, Macdonald also tried to extend the federal vote to all Indigenous males, as long as they met the same conditions as other British subjects.
Under his proposal, they would not have to give up Indian status in order to vote as was the case under previous legislation. However, it excluded all Indigenous men in the West — this was likely influenced by the North-West Resistance of In , the legislation was repealed and many Indigenous men were again disqualified.
Although Macdonald proposed extending the vote to all Indigenous males, he at the same time passed legislation to exclude those of Chinese origin.
In the s, around 15, Chinese labourers helped to build the Canadian Pacific Railway — working in harsh conditions for little pay, they suffered greatly and historians estimate that at least died. Their employment had caused controversy, particularly in British Columbia , where politicians worried about the potential economic and cultural impact of this influx of Chinese workers. Macdonald, however, defended their employment in constructing the railway.
While some have accused him of racism , others argue that he was quite progressive by the standards of the time. One of the most influential and important Canadians of all time, Macdonald was not without flaws. New generations and scholars continue to examine and debate his political ruthlessness, as well as his Indigenous policies and his approach to Chinese immigration.
For good and ill, Macdonald helped make Canada what it is today. Creighton, John A. Macdonald , 2 vols —55 ; Patrice Dutil and Roger Hall, eds. Macdonald and his Family ; P. Waite, Macdonald Sir John A. From the Empire Club of Canada. Macdonald This book is the first-ever selected collection of his most important and defining speeches. Find out more at indigo. Richard Gwyn on Sir John A. From the Library of Parliament website. Macdonald and George Brown. From the CBC website. From the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online.
From Historica Canada. John A. From Google Books. Search The Canadian Encyclopedia. Remember me. I forgot my password. Why sign up?
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