The Communist Party of Canada (french: Parti communiste du Canada) is a
federal political party in
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
, founded in 1921 under conditions of illegality. Although it does not currently have any parliamentary representation, the party's candidates have previously been elected to the
House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...
, the
Ontario legislature
The Legislative Assembly of Ontario (OLA, french: Assemblée législative de l'Ontario) is the legislative chamber of the Canadian province of Ontario. Its elected members are known as Members of Provincial Parliament (MPPs). Bills passed by ...
, the
Manitoba legislature
The Legislature of Manitoba is the legislature of the province of Manitoba, Canada. Today, the legislature is made of two elements: the King of Canada in Right of Manitoba, represented by the Lieutenant Governor of Manitoba, and the unicameral ...
, and various municipal governments across the country. The party has also made significant contributions to Canada's
trade union
A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits ( ...
, labour, and
peace movement
A peace movement is a social movement which seeks to achieve ideals, such as the ending of a particular war (or wars) or minimizing inter-human violence in a particular place or situation. They are often linked to the goal of achieving world peac ...
s.
The Communist Party of Canada is the second oldest active political party in Canada, after the
Liberal Party of Canada
The Liberal Party of Canada (french: Parti libéral du Canada, region=CA) is a federal political party in Canada. The party espouses the principles of liberalism,McCall, Christina; Stephen Clarkson"Liberal Party". ''The Canadian Encyclopedia'' ...
. In 1993 the party was de-registered and had its assets seized, forcing it to begin what would become a successful thirteen-year political and legal battle to maintain the registration of small political parties in Canada. The campaign culminated with the final decision of ''
Figueroa v. Canada (AG)'', changing the legal definition of a political party in Canada. Despite its status as a registered political party, the Communist Party of Canada places the vast majority of its emphasis on extra-parliamentary activity that it calls "the labour and people's movements", as reflected in its programme "Canada's Future is Socialism".
The Communist Party of Canada participates in the
International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties
The International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties (IMCWP) is an annual conference attended by communist and workers' parties from several countries. It originated in 1998 when the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) invited communist a ...
.
History
Origins (1921–1928)
Between May 23 and 25, 1921, local communists and socialists held clandestine meetings in a barn behind a farmhouse (owned by Elizabeth Farley) at 257 Metcalf Street, then in the outskirts of
Guelph
Guelph ( ; 2021 Canadian Census population 143,740) is a city in Southwestern Ontario, Canada. Known as "The Royal City", Guelph is roughly east of Kitchener and west of Downtown Toronto, at the intersection of Highway 6, Highway 7 and Wel ...
,
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
. An RCMP officer, working undercover, attended the meetings. His report states that delegates attended from "Winnipeg, Vancouver, Hamilton, Toronto, Montreal, Sudbury and Regina" and that the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
had offered to provide funding for the group. In addition to Guelph resident Fred Farley, a member of the United Communist Party of America, the attendees named in the RCMP report included Thomas J. Bell (a lithographer born in Ireland), Lorne Cunningham (an alderman), Trevor Maguire (one of the few in the group who was born in Canada) and Florence Custance (a teacher from Toronto). The group was "incessantly praising the Soviet Government of Russia, and urging the overthrow of the Government of Canada", according to the police report.
The Communist Party of Canada (CPC) was subsequently founded on May 28, 1921. Many of its founding members had worked as labour organizers and as anti-war activists and had belonged to groups such as the
Socialist Party of Canada
The Socialist Party of Canada (SPC) was a political party that existed from 1904 to 1925, led by E. T. Kingsley. It published the socialist newspaper ''Western Clarion''.
History
Establishment
The founding of the Socialist Party of Canada bega ...
,
One Big Union, the
Socialist Labour Party, the
Industrial Workers of the World
The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), members of which are commonly termed "Wobblies", is an international labor union that was founded in Chicago in 1905. The origin of the nickname "Wobblies" is uncertain. IWW ideology combines genera ...
, and other
socialist
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...
,
Marxist
Marxism is a Left-wing politics, left-wing to Far-left politics, far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a Materialism, materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand S ...
, or
Labour parties
Labour Party or Labor Party is a name used by many Political party, political parties. Many of these parties have links to the Trade union, trade union movement or organised labour in general. Labour parties can exist across the political spectrum, ...
or clubs and organizations. The first members felt inspired by the
Russian Revolution
The Russian Revolution was a period of Political revolution (Trotskyism), political and social revolution that took place in the former Russian Empire which began during the First World War. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and ad ...
, and radicalized by the negative aftermath of
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
and the fight to improve living standards and labour rights, including the experience of the
Winnipeg General Strike. The
Comintern
The Communist International (Comintern), also known as the Third International, was a Soviet Union, Soviet-controlled international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress to ...
accepted the party as its Canadian section in December 1921, and thus the CPC adopted an organizational structure and policy similar to other
communist parties
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...
at the time.
The party alternated between legality and illegality during the 1920s and 1930s. Because of the
War Measures Act
The ''War Measures Act'' (french: Loi sur les mesures de guerre; 5 George V, Chap. 2) was a statute of the Parliament of Canada that provided for the declaration of war, invasion, or insurrection, and the types of emergency measures that could t ...
in effect at its time of creation, the party operated as the "Workers' Party of Canada" in February 1922 as its public face, and in March began publication of a newspaper, ''The Worker''. When Parliament allowed the War Measures Act to lapse in 1924, the underground organization was dissolved and the party's name was changed back to the "Communist Party of Canada".
The party's first actions included establishing a youth organization, the
Young Communist League of Canada
The Young Communist League of Canada (YCL-LJC) is a Canadian Marxist–Leninist youth organization founded in 1922. The organization is ideologically aligned with, but organizationally independent from, the Communist Party of Canada. The orga ...
(YCL), and solidarity efforts with the Soviet Union. By 1923 the party had raised over $64,000 for the
Russian Red Cross
Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including:
*Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries
*Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...
, a very large sum of money at that time. It also initiated a Canadian component of the
Trade Union Educational League
The Trade Union Educational League (TUEL) was established by William Z. Foster in 1920 (through 1928) as a means of uniting radicals within various trade unions for a common plan of action. The group was subsidized by the Communist International ...
(TUEL) which quickly became an organic part of the labour movement with active groups in 16 of 60 labour councils and in mining and logging camps. By 1925 party membership stood at around 4,500 people, composed mainly of miners and lumber workers, and of railway, farm, and garment workers. Most of these people came from immigrant communities like Finns and Ukrainians.
The party, working with the TUEL, played a role in many bitter strikes and difficult organizing drives, and in support of militant
industrial unionism
Industrial unionism is a trade union organizing method through which all workers in the same industry are organized into the same union, regardless of skill or trade, thus giving workers in one industry, or in all industries, more leverage in ...
. From 1922 to 1929, the provincial sections of the WPC/CPC also affiliated with the
Canadian Labour Party
The Canadian Labour Party (CLP) was an early, unsuccessful attempt at creating a Labour candidates and parties in Canada, national labour party in Canada. Although it ran candidates in the federal elections of 1917 Canadian federal election, 1917, ...
, another expression of the CPC's "united front" strategy. The CLP operated as a federated labour party. The CPC came to lead the CLP organization in several regions of the country, including Quebec, and did not run candidates during elections. In 1925
William Kolisnyk became the first communist elected to public office in North America, under the banner of the CLP in Winnipeg. The CLP itself, however, never became an effective national organization. The CPC withdrew from the CLP in 1928–1929 following a shift in Comintern policy, and the CLP folded shortly afterwards.
Debates, arguments, and expulsions
From 1927 to 1929, the party went through a series of policy debates and internal ideological struggles in which advocates of the ideas of
Leon Trotsky
Lev Davidovich Bronstein. ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky; uk, link= no, Лев Давидович Троцький; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trotskij'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky''. (), was a Russian ...
, as well as proponents of what the party called "North American Exceptionism", were expelled. Expellees included
Maurice Spector
Maurice Spector (March 19, 1898 – August 1, 1968) was a Canadian politician who served as the chairman of the Communist Party of Canada and the editor of its newspaper, '' The Worker'', for much of the 1920s. He was an early follower of Leon Tro ...
, the editor of the party's paper ''The Worker'' and party chairman, and
Jack MacDonald (who had supported Spector's expulsion) who resigned as the party's general secretary for factionalism, and was expelled. The Secretary of the Women's Bureau and later, general editor of the ''Woman Worker'' (1926–1929) Florence Custance was only saved from expulsion from the Party due to her untimely death in 1929. Her feminism and advocacy of birth control, for example, were well known to the mainstream press, but her radical contemporaries questioned her political sympathies and gave her few chances to shine.
![Kamloops on to Ottawa](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Kamloops_on_to_Ottawa.jpg)
MacDonald, also sympathetic to
Trotskyist
Trotskyism is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Ukrainian-Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky and some other members of the Left Opposition and Fourth International. Trotsky self-identified as an orthodox Marxist, a rev ...
ideas, joined Spector in founding the
International Left Opposition (Trotskyist) Canada, which formed part of Trotsky's so-called Fourth International
Left Opposition
The Left Opposition was a faction within the Russian Communist Party (b) from 1923 to 1927 headed ''de facto'' by Leon Trotsky. The Left Opposition formed as part of the power struggle within the party leadership that began with the Soviet fou ...
. The party also expelled supporters of
Nikolai Bukharin
Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin (russian: Никола́й Ива́нович Буха́рин) ( – 15 March 1938) was a Bolshevik revolutionary, Soviet politician, Marxist philosopher and economist and prolific author on revolutionary theory. ...
and of
Jay Lovestone
Jay Lovestone (15 December 1897 – 7 March 1990) was an American activist. He was at various times a member of the Socialist Party of America, a leader of the Communist Party USA, leader of a small oppositionist party, an anti-Communist and Centr ...
's
Right Opposition
The Right Opposition (, ''Pravaya oppozitsiya'') or Right Tendency (, ''Praviy uklon'') in the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) was a conditional label formulated by Joseph Stalin in fall of 1928 in regards the opposition against certain m ...
, such as
William Moriarty
William "Bill" Moriarty (1890, London, United Kingdom – April 14, 1936) was a Canadians, Canadian Communism, Communist and Right Oppositionist. He was general secretary of the Communist Party of Canada from 1921 to 1923.
Moriarty was born i ...
. The CPC disagreed internally over strategy, tactics, the socialist identity of the Soviet Union, and over Canada's status as an imperialist power. While some communists like
J. B. Salsberg
Joseph Baruch (J.B.) Salsberg (November 5, 1902 – February 8, 1998) was a politician in Ontario, Canada. He was a Labor-Progressive member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1943 to 1955 who represented the riding of St. Andrew in dow ...
expressed sympathy with these positions, the vast majority of members had decided to continue with the party by the early 1930s, after debates that dominated party conventions for a couple of years.
Tim Buck
Timothy Buck (January 6, 1891 – March 11, 1973) was the general secretary of the Communist Party of Canada (known as the Labor-Progressive Party from 1943 to 1959) from 1929 until 1962. Together with Ernst Thälmann of Germany, Maurice Tho ...
was elected as party
general secretary
Secretary is a title often used in organizations to indicate a person having a certain amount of authority, power, or importance in the organization. Secretaries announce important events and communicate to the organization. The term is derived ...
in 1929. He remained in the position until 1962.
Great Depression (1929–1938)
The
stock market crash
A stock market crash is a sudden dramatic decline of stock
In finance, stock (also capital stock) consists of all the shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided.Longman Business English Dictionary: "stock - ''especia ...
in late 1929 signalled the beginning of a long and protracted economic crisis in Canada and internationally. The crisis quickly led to widespread unemployment, poverty, destitution, and suffering among working families and farmers. The
general election of 1930, brought to power the
R.B. Bennett Conservative government which attacked the labour movement and established "relief camps" for young unemployed men.
The CPC made a systemic critique of the depression as an alleged crisis of capitalism. It was also the first political party in Canada to call for the introduction of unemployment insurance, a national health insurance scheme, universally accessible education, social and employment assistance to youth, labour legislation including health and safety regulations, regulation of the working day and holidays, a minimum wage for women and youth, and state-run
crop insurance
Crop insurance is purchased by agricultural producers, and subsidized by the federal government, to protect against either the loss of their crops due to natural disasters, such as hail, drought, and floods, or the loss of revenue due to declines ...
and price control for farmers.
In 1931, eight of the CPC's leaders were arrested and imprisoned under
Section 98
Section 98 (s. 98) of the ''Criminal Code'' of Canada was a law enacted after the Winnipeg general strike of 1919 banning "unlawful associations." It was used in the 1930s against the Communist Party of Canada.
After the Winnipeg general strike ...
of Canada's
Criminal Code
A criminal code (or penal code) is a document that compiles all, or a significant amount of a particular jurisdiction's criminal law. Typically a criminal code will contain offences that are recognised in the jurisdiction, penalties that migh ...
, which outlawed advocacy of force or violence to bring about political change. The party continued to exist, but was under the constant threat of legal harassment, and was for all intents and purposes an underground organization. In 1934 a massive campaign pushed back against the imprisonment, which many characterized as political repression of the party. The prisoners were subsequently released. On the release of Tim Buck, a mass rally attended by a crowd of over 17,000 supporters and sympathizers was held in
Maple Leaf Gardens
Maple Leaf Gardens is a historic building located at the northwest corner of Carlton Street and Church Street in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The building was initially constructed in 1931 as an arena to host ice hockey games, though it has sinc ...
.
Although the party was banned, it organized large mass organizations such as the
Workers' Unity League
The Workers' Unity League (WUL) was established in January 1930 as a militant industrial union labour central closely related to the Communist Party of Canada on the instructions of the Communist International.
This was reflective of the shift in ...
(WUL) and the
Canadian Labour Defence League
The Canadian Labour Defence League (CLDL) was a legal defence organization founded and led by A. E. Smith. The league was in 1925 as a civil rights organization dedicated to protecting striking workers from persecution. It was allied with t ...
, which played an important role in historic strikes like that of miners in
Estevan
Estevan is the eighth-largest city in Saskatchewan, Canada. It is approximately north of the Canada–United States border. The Souris River runs by the city. This city is surrounded by the Rural Municipality of Estevan No. 5.
History
The ...
. From 1933 to 1936, the WUL led 90 percent of the strikes in Canada. Already, conditions had taught social democrats, reformists, and the communists important lessons of cooperation. In 1934, in accordance with the re-examined position of the Comintern, the CPC adopted a strategy and tactics based on a
united front
A united front is an alliance of groups against their common enemies, figuratively evoking unification of previously separate geographic fronts and/or unification of previously separate armies into a front. The name often refers to a political a ...
against fascism.
In the prairies, communists organized the Farmers Unity League, which mobilized against farm evictions. They rallied hundreds or thousands of farmers into demonstration Hunger Marches that encountered police brutality. In 1936,
James Litterick
James Litterick (born 15 July 1901; date of death unknown) was a politician in Manitoba, Canada, and was the first member of the Communist Party of Canada to be elected to that province's legislature.
Biography
Early life
Litterick was born in ...
was elected as an MLA for Winnipeg, the first CPC member to be elected to Manitoba's legislature.
Party members were also active in the
Congress of Industrial Organizations
The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. Originally created in 1935 as a committee within the American Federation of ...
' attempt to unionize the auto and other industrial sectors including Steelworkers, the
Canadian Seamen's Union
The Canadian Seaman's Union was a trade union in Canada which organized among sailors. Affiliated with the Trades and Labor Congress of Canada, it was established in 1936 and gained prominence during World War II. After the war, it was red-baiting, ...
, the
Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers Union
The International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers (IUMMSW) was a labor union representing miners and workers in related occupations in the United States and Canada.
The union played an important role in the protection of workers and in d ...
, the
International Woodworkers of America
International Woodworkers of America (IWA) was an industrial union of lumbermen, sawmill workers, timber transportation workers and others formed in 1937.
History
The IWA was formed when members of the Sawmill and Timber Workers’ Union divis ...
, and the
United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America
The United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE), is an independent democratic rank-and-file labor union representing workers in both the private and public sectors across the United States.
UE was one of the first unions to be c ...
.
Among the poor and unemployed, communists organized groups like the left-wing Workers Sports Association, one of the few ways that working-class youth had access to recreational programmes. The
Relief Camp Workers' Union Relief Camp Workers' Union was a Canadian Great Depression era relief union in which the workers employed in the Canadian government relief camps organized themselves into in the early 1930s. The RCWU was established by the Workers' Unity League an ...
and the National Unemployed Workers Association played significant roles in organizing the unskilled and the unemployed in protest marches and demonstrations and campaigns such as the "
On-to-Ottawa Trek
The On-to-Ottawa Trek was a mass protest movement in Canada in 1935 sparked by unrest among unemployed single men in federal relief camps principally in Western Canada. Federal relief camps were brought in under Prime Minister R. B. Bennett’s ...
" and the 1938 Vancouver Post Office sit-down strike.
![Norman Bethune China 1938](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/18/Norman_Bethune_China_1938.jpg)
Internationally, the party initiated the mobilization of the over-1,500-person
Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion to fight in the
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, lin ...
as a part of the
International Brigade
The International Brigades ( es, Brigadas Internacionales) were military units set up by the Communist International to assist the Popular Front government of the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. The organization existed f ...
. Among the leading Canadian communists involved in that effort was Dr.
Norman Bethune
Henry Norman Bethune (; March 4, 1890 – November 12, 1939; zh, t=亨利·諾爾曼·白求恩, p=Hēnglì Nuò'ěrmàn Báiqiú'ēn) was a Canadian thoracic surgeon, early advocate of socialized medicine, and member of the Communist Party ...
, who is known for his invention of a mobile blood-transfusion unit, early advocacy of Medicare in Canada, and work with the
Chinese Communist Party
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victoriou ...
during the
Second Sino-Japanese War
The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) or War of Resistance (Chinese term) was a military conflict that was primarily waged between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. The war made up the Chinese theater of the wider Pacific Th ...
.
Solidarity efforts for the Spanish Civil War and many labour and social struggles during the Depression resulted in much cooperation between members of the CPC and the
Co-operative Commonwealth Federation
The Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF; french: Fédération du Commonwealth Coopératif, FCC); from 1955 the Social Democratic Party of Canada (''french: Parti social démocratique du Canada''), was a federal democratic socialism, democra ...
(CCF). After 1935 the CPC advocated electoral alliances and unity with the CCF on key issues. The proposal was debated in the CCF, with the 1936 BC, Alberta and Saskatchewan conventions generally supporting cooperation while the Ontario convention opposed. While the motion was defeated at the CCF's third federal convention, the CPC continued to call for a united front.
The call was particularly urgent in Quebec, where in 1937 the Duplessis government passed "an act to protect Quebec against communist propaganda", which gave the police the power to padlock any premises used by "communists" (which was undefined in the legislation).
World War II (1939–1945)
![Tim Buck at Maple Leaf Gardens](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cc/Tim_Buck_at_Maple_Leaf_Gardens.jpg)
Although the CPC had worked hard to warn Canadians about what it considered to be a growing fascist danger, the CPC saw the opening of World War II not as an anti-fascist war but a battle between capitalist nations. This was due to the Soviet Union having signed the
Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact
, long_name = Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
, image = Bundesarchiv Bild 183-H27337, Moskau, Stalin und Ribbentrop im Kreml.jpg
, image_width = 200
, caption = Stalin and Ribbentrop shaking ...
with Nazi Germany.
The CPC's opposition to World War II led to it being banned under the ''
Defence of Canada Regulations
The ''Defence of Canada Regulations'' were a set of emergency measures implemented under the ''War Measures Act'' on 3 September 1939, a week before Canada's entry into World War II.
The extreme security measures permitted by the regulations ...
'' of the ''
War Measures Act
The ''War Measures Act'' (french: Loi sur les mesures de guerre; 5 George V, Chap. 2) was a statute of the Parliament of Canada that provided for the declaration of war, invasion, or insurrection, and the types of emergency measures that could t ...
'' in 1940 shortly after Canada entered into the war. In many cases communist leaders were interned in camps, long before fascists. As growing numbers of CPC leaders were interned, some members went underground or exile in the United States. Conditions in the camps were harsh. A civil rights campaign was launched by the wives of many of the interned men for family visits and their release.
With Germany's
1941 invasion of the Soviet Union and the collapse of the
Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact
, long_name = Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
, image = Bundesarchiv Bild 183-H27337, Moskau, Stalin und Ribbentrop im Kreml.jpg
, image_width = 200
, caption = Stalin and Ribbentrop shaking ...
, the party argued that the nature of the war had changed to a genuine anti-fascist struggle. The CPC reversed its opposition to the war and argued the danger to the working class on the international level superseded its interests nationally.
During the
Conscription Crisis of 1944
The Conscription Crisis of 1944 was a political and military crisis following the introduction of forced military service for men in Canada during World War II. It was similar to the Conscription Crisis of 1917, but not as politically damaging.
...
, the banned CPC set up "Tim Buck Plebiscite Committees" across the country to campaign for a "yes" vote in the national referendum on
conscription
Conscription (also called the draft in the United States) is the state-mandated enlistment of people in a national service, mainly a military service. Conscription dates back to antiquity and it continues in some countries to the present day un ...
. Following the vote, the committees were renamed the
Dominion Communist–Labour Total War Committee and urged full support for the war effort, a no-strike pledge for the duration of the war and increased industrial production. The
National Council for Democratic Rights
National may refer to:
Common uses
* Nation or country
** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen
Places in the United States
* National, Maryland, ce ...
was also established with
A.E. Smith
Albert Edward Smith (October 20, 1871 – 1947), known as A. E. Smith, was a Canadian religious leader and politician. A social gospeller, Smith was for many years a minister in the Canadian Methodist Church before starting his own "People's ...
as chair in order to rally for the legalization of the CPC and the release of communists and anti-fascists from internment.
The party's first elected
Member of Parliament
A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...
(MP) was
Dorise Nielsen
Dorise Winifred Nielsen (30 July 1902 – 9 December 1980) was a Canadians, Canadian communist politician, feminist and teacher.
Biography
Before politics
Born in London, England, Doris Webber arrived in Canada and settled in Saskatchewan in 1 ...
. Nielsen was elected in North Battleford, Saskatchewan in 1940 under the
popular front
A popular front is "any coalition of working-class and middle-class parties", including liberal and social democratic ones, "united for the defense of democratic forms" against "a presumed Fascist assault".
More generally, it is "a coalition ...
Progressive Unity label, with the support of many individual CCFers. Nielsen kept her membership in the party a secret until 1943.
Cold War era (1945–1991)
Party ban and the Labour-Progressives
![Fred rose2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/28/Fred_rose2.jpg)
The CPC remained banned, but with the entry of the Soviet Union into the war and the eventual release of the Canadian party's interned leaders, Canadian communists founded the Labour-Progressive Party (LPP) in 1943 as a legal front and thereafter ran candidates under that name until 1959. At its height in the mid-1940s, the party had fourteen sitting elected officials at the federal, provincial and municipal level. Several prominent elected party members were:
*
Dorise Nielsen
Dorise Winifred Nielsen (30 July 1902 – 9 December 1980) was a Canadians, Canadian communist politician, feminist and teacher.
Biography
Before politics
Born in London, England, Doris Webber arrived in Canada and settled in Saskatchewan in 1 ...
, a Saskatchewan MP elected as a
Unity
Unity may refer to:
Buildings
* Unity Building, Oregon, Illinois, US; a historic building
* Unity Building (Chicago), Illinois, US; a skyscraper
* Unity Buildings, Liverpool, UK; two buildings in England
* Unity Chapel, Wyoming, Wisconsin, US; a h ...
candidate in 1940, declared her affiliation with the LPP when it was formed in August 1943 and ran unsuccessfully for re-election as an LPP candidate.
*
Fred Rose was elected to represent a Montreal
riding in the
House of Commons of Canada
The House of Commons of Canada (french: Chambre des communes du Canada) is the lower house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Crown and the Senate of Canada, they comprise the bicameral legislature of Canada.
The House of Common ...
as an LPP MP, and was removed from office after being convicted of spying for the Soviet Union.
*
Mary Kardash Mary Kardash (born Mary Kostaniuk; 1913 – 1994) was a Communist and feminist activist in Canada. and
William Ross were LPP and then Communist school trustees in
Winnipeg
Winnipeg () is the capital and largest city of the province of Manitoba in Canada. It is centred on the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine rivers, near the longitudinal centre of North America. , Winnipeg had a city population of 749,6 ...
*
Jacob Penner
Jacob Penner (August 12, 1880 – August 28, 1965) was a popular international socialist politician in Canada. A founder of the Social Democratic Party of Canada and the Communist Party of Canada, Penner was elected to the Winnipeg city counci ...
and
Joseph Zuken
Joseph Zuken (December 12, 1912 – March 24, 1986) was a popular Communist politician in Winnipeg and the longest serving elected Communist party politician in North America. He served on the Winnipeg city council from 1961 to 1983.
Joe Zuk ...
were popular
aldermen
An alderman is a member of a municipal assembly or council in many jurisdictions founded upon English law. The term may be titular, denoting a high-ranking member of a borough or county council, a council member chosen by the elected members them ...
in Winnipeg. Zuken was an LPP school trustee before succeeding Penner on city council by which time the LPP had changed its name back to the Communist Party of Canada.
*
Bill Kardash
William Arthur Kardash (June 10, 1912 – January 17, 1997) was a politician and member of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba from 1941 until 1958. He served as Winnipeg MLA from 1941 to 1958, as Worker's Candidate at first, then as a represe ...
and
James Litterick
James Litterick (born 15 July 1901; date of death unknown) was a politician in Manitoba, Canada, and was the first member of the Communist Party of Canada to be elected to that province's legislature.
Biography
Early life
Litterick was born in ...
were
Manitoba
Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...
LPP
Members of the Legislative Assembly
A member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) is a representative elected by the voters of a constituency to a legislative assembly. Most often, the term refers to a subnational assembly such as that of a state, province, or territory of a country. S ...
(MLAs).
*
A.A. MacLeod
Alexander Albert "A. A." MacLeod (April 2, 1902 – March 13, 1970) was a political organizer and a prominent member of the Communist Party of Canada and, later, of its legal group, the Labor-Progressive Party. He was an elected Member of Provin ...
and
J.B. Salsberg
Joseph Baruch (J.B.) Salsberg (November 5, 1902 – February 8, 1998) was a politician in Ontario, Canada. He was a Labor-Progressive Party, Labor-Progressive member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1943 to 1955 who represented the ridi ...
were LPP members of the Ontario
legislature
A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make law
Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its p ...
.
*
Alexander A. Parent was an LPP member and president of UAW Local 195, elected as the
Liberal-Labour MPP for
Essex North in 1945. Broke with the Liberals in 1946 and spent the remainder of his term as a Labour MPP working with the two LPP MPPs, MacLeod and Salsberg. He did not run for re-election in 1948.
*
Stanley Bréhaut Ryerson,
Sam Carr
Sam Carr (July 7, 1906 – 1989) was an organizer for the Communist Party of Canada and its successor, the Labor-Progressive Party, in the 1930s and 1940s. He was born Schmil Kogan in Tomashpil, Ukraine, in 1906 and immigrated to Canada in 1924, ...
, Charles Simms and Norman Freed were LPP
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...
aldermen while
Stewart Smith was elected to the city's
Board of Control, Edna Ryerson, Elizabeth Morton and John Boyd were elected to the School Board in 1944.
*
Harry Rankin
Harry Rankin (May 8, 1920 – February 26, 2002) was a Vancouver lawyer and long term member of the Vancouver City Council.
Early years
Rankin was born Harry Riffkin in Vancouver to secular Jewish immigrants from Ukraine. His father worked at a ...
sat on
Vancouver
Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...
's
city council
A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, rural counc ...
on behalf of the
Committee of Progressive Electors which he helped found in the late 1960s. Though not officially a CPC member he was a
fellow traveller
The term ''fellow traveller'' (also ''fellow traveler'') identifies a person who is intellectually sympathetic to the ideology of a political organization, and who co-operates in the organization's politics, without being a formal member of that o ...
.
* James Wallace was a councillor in the village of
Long Branch, a
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...
suburb, from 1942 to 1952.
* The small rural municipality of Clayton, Saskatchewan elected a Communist mayor to one of its tiny towns
*
Blairmore, Alberta
Blairmore is a community in the Rocky Mountains within the Municipality of Crowsnest Pass in southwest Alberta, Canada. It was formerly incorporated as a town prior to 1979 when it amalgamated with four other municipalities to form Crowsnest Pas ...
elected a Communist majority town council and school board in 1933 and renamed the main street "Tim Buck Avenue" and the main park "Karl Marx Park"
In 1945,
Igor Gouzenko
Igor Sergeyevich Gouzenko (russian: Игорь Сергеевич Гузенко ; January 26, 1919 – June 25, 1982) was a cipher clerk for the Soviet embassy to Canada in Ottawa, Ontario, and a lieutenant of the GRU (Main Intelligence Direc ...
, a cipher clerk at the Soviet Embassy, defected to Canada and alleged that several Canadian communists were operating a spy ring which provided the Soviet Union with
top secret
Classified information is material that a government body deems to be sensitive information that must be protected. Access is restricted by law or regulation to particular groups of people with the necessary security clearance and need to know, ...
information. The
Kellock-Taschereau Commission
The Gouzenko Affair was the name given to events in Canada surrounding the defection of Igor Gouzenko from the Soviet Union in 1945 and his subsequent allegations regarding the existence of a Soviet spy ring of Canadian Communists. Gouzenko's d ...
was called by Prime Minister
William Lyon Mackenzie King
William Lyon Mackenzie King (December 17, 1874 – July 22, 1950) was a Canadian statesman and politician who served as the tenth prime minister of Canada for three non-consecutive terms from 1921 to 1926, 1926 to 1930, and 1935 to 1948. A Li ...
to investigate the matter. This led to the convictions of
Fred Rose and other communists.
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and chairman of the country's Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964. During his rule, Khrushchev s ...
's 1956
Secret Speech
"On the Cult of Personality and Its Consequences" (russian: «О культе личности и его последствиях», «''O kul'te lichnosti i yego posledstviyakh''»), popularly known as the "Secret Speech" (russian: секре ...
criticizing the rule of
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secreta ...
and the
1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary shook the faith of many communists around the world. The party was also riven by a crisis following the return of prominent party member
J.B. Salsberg
Joseph Baruch (J.B.) Salsberg (November 5, 1902 – February 8, 1998) was a politician in Ontario, Canada. He was a Labor-Progressive Party, Labor-Progressive member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1943 to 1955 who represented the ridi ...
from a trip to the Soviet Union where he found rampant party-sponsored antisemitism. Salsberg reported his findings but they were rejected by the party, which suspended him from its leading bodies. The crisis resulted in the departure of the
United Jewish Peoples' Order
The United Jewish People's Order is a secular socialist Jewish cultural, political and educational fraternal organization in Canada. The UJPO traces its history to the founding of the Jewish Labour League Mutual Benefit Society in 1926.
History ...
, Salsberg,
Robert Laxer
Robert Mendel Laxer (September 10, 1915 – October 24, 1998) was a Canadian psychologist, professor, author, and political activist.
Life and career
Laxer was born in Montreal, Quebec, in 1915 and graduated from McGill University with a Bachel ...
and most of the party's Jewish members in 1956. Many, perhaps most, members of the CPC left, including a number of prominent party members.
In the mid-1960s the
United States Department of State
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other n ...
estimated the party membership to be approximately 3,500. The Soviet Union's
1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia
The Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia refers to the events of 20–21 August 1968, when the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic was jointly invaded by four Warsaw Pact countries: the Soviet Union, the Polish People's Republic, the People's Rep ...
caused more people to leave the CPC. Many women were likewise deterred from engaging with the party as it was somewhat resistant to women's politics at the time. The party may have countered that the discussions of sex, gender, and women's politics held the potential to veer away from the overarching goal of class revolution, for example, many radical women recalled the hypocrisy of party men who refused to discuss sex despite carrying on numerous extramarital affairs.
The party was also active in indigenous people's struggles. For example,
James P. Brady
James Patrick Brady, better known as Jim Brady (March 11, 1908 – disappeared June 7, 1967), was a Canadian Métis political leader and activist in Saskatchewan and Alberta. Along with Malcolm Norris, he is generally regarded as one of the two ...
and Malcom Norris were founders of the Métis Associations of Saskatchewan and Alberta in the 1940s and 1950s.
Soviet Bloc collapse and party split
![William Kashtan](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e0/William_Kashtan.jpg)
In common with most communist parties, it went through a crisis after the
dissolution of the Soviet Union
The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the Sov ...
, and subsequently split. Under then general secretary
George Hewison
George Hewison (born 1944) is a Canadian folk singer, trade unionist and former politician. He was formerly a long-time member of the Communist Party of Canada and served as the party's general secretary from 1988 to 1992.
Early life
Hewison's ...
(1988–1991), the leadership of the CPC and a segment of its general membership began to abandon Marxism–Leninism as the basis of the party's revolutionary perspective, and ultimately moved to liquidate the party itself, seeking to replace it with a more moderate entity.
The protracted ideological and political crisis created much confusion and disorientation within the ranks of the Party, and paralysed both its independent and united front work for over two years. The Hewison-led majority in the party's central committee voted to abandon Marxism–Leninism. An orthodox minority in the central committee, led by
Miguel Figueroa
Miguel Figueroa (born July 29, 1952) is a Canadian political activist who was the leader of the Communist Party of Canada from 1992 to 2015. He is known for the landmark Figueroa case, which redefined the role of small parties and Canadian Parl ...
,
Elizabeth Rowley
Elizabeth Rowley (born c. 1949) is the current leader of the Communist Party of Canada. A long-time politician, writer, and political activist, Rowley served as a school trustee in the former Toronto borough of East York. Before becoming leader ...
and former leader
William Kashtan
William Kashtan (27 June 1909 – 1993) was the general secretary of the Communist Party of Canada for 23 years beginning in January 1965, several months following the death of Leslie Morris, until his retirement in 1988. The delay in his a ...
, resisted this effort. At the 28th Convention in the fall of 1990, the Hewison group managed to maintain its control of the central committee, but by the spring of 1991, the membership began to turn more and more against the reformist policies and orientation of the Hewison leadership.
Key provincial conventions were held in 1991 in the two main provincial bases of the CPC: British Columbia and Ontario. At the BC convention, delegates threw out Fred Wilson, one of the main leaders of the Hewison group. A few months later in June 1991, Ontario delegates rejected a concerted campaign by Hewison and his supporters, and overwhelmingly reelected provincial leader Elizabeth Rowley and other supporters of the Marxist–Leninist current to the Ontario Committee and Executive.
The Hewison group moved on August 27, 1991, to expel eleven of the key leaders of the opposition, including Rowley, Emil Bjarnason, and former central organizer John Bizzell. The Hewison-controlled Central Executive also dismissed the Ontario provincial committee.
The vast majority of local clubs and committees of the CPC opposed the expulsions, and called instead for an extraordinary convention of the party to resolve the deepening crisis in a democratic manner. There were loud protests at the central committee's October 1991 meeting, but an extraordinary convention was not convened. With few remaining options, Rowley and the other expelled members threatened to take the Hewison group to court. After several months of negotiations between the Hewison group and the opposition "All-Canada Negotiating Committee", an out-of-court settlement resulted in the Hewison leadership agreeing to leave the CPC and relinquish any claim to the party's name, while taking most of the party's assets to the Cecil-Ross Society, a publishing and educational foundation previously associated with the party.
Following the departure of the Hewison-led group, a convention was held in December 1992 at which delegates agreed to continue the CPC (thus the meeting was titled the 30th CPC Convention). Delegates rejected the reformist policies instituted by the Hewison group and instead reaffirmed the CPC as a Marxist–Leninist organization. Since most of the old party's assets were now the property of the Hewison-led Cecil Ross Society, the CPC convention decided to launch a new newspaper, the ''
People's Voice'', to replace the old ''Canadian Tribune''. The convention elected a new central committee with Figueroa as Party Leader. The convention also amended the party constitution to grant more membership control and lessen the arbitrary powers of the central committee, while maintaining democratic centralism as its organizational principle.
Meanwhile, the former Communists retained the
Cecil-Ross Society
The Communist Party of Canada (french: Parti communiste du Canada) is a federal political party in Canada, founded in 1921 under conditions of illegality. Although it does not currently have any parliamentary representation, the party's can ...
as a political foundation to continue their political efforts. They also sold off the party's headquarters at 24 Cecil Street, having earlier liquidated various party-related business such as Eveready Printers (the party printshop) and Progress Publishers. The name of the Cecil-Ross Society comes from the intersection of Cecil Street and Ross Street in
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...
where the headquarters of the party was located. The Cecil-Ross Society took with it the rights to the ''Canadian Tribune'', which had been the party's weekly newspaper for decades, as well as roughly half of the party's assets. The Cecil-Ross Society ended publication of the ''Canadian Tribune'' and attempted to launch a new broad-left magazine, ''New Times'' which failed after a few issues and then ''Ginger'' which was only published twice.
Recent history (1992–present)
The renovated party, although with a much smaller membership and resources, now faced further challenges and threats to its existence. Changes to the ''
Canada Elections Act
The ''Canada Elections Act'' (french: Loi électorale du Canada; full title: ''An Act respecting the election of members to the House of Commons, repealing other Acts relating to elections and making consequential amendments to other Acts'', full ...
'', introduced by the Mulroney Conservative government and passed by Parliament in the spring of 1993, required that any political party which failed to field 50 candidates in a general federal election would be automatically de-registered and its assets seized. The CPC was not in a position to run 50 candidates in the 1993 federal election (it fielded only eight candidates during that election), and therefore its assets were seized and the party was de-registered. The CPC had sought an interim injunction to prevent its imminent de-registration, but this legal action failed.
A prolonged ten-year political and legal battle, ''
Figueroa v. Canada (AG)'' ensued, which won the support of widespread popular opinion, reflected in a number of members of parliament openly supporting the challenge and other small political parties joining the case, most notably the
Green Party
A green party is a formally organized political party based on the principles of green politics, such as social justice, environmentalism and nonviolence.
Greens believe that these issues are inherently related to one another as a foundation ...
. Never before had a single court challenge resulted in legislative action on three separate occasions to amend a standing law. Bill C-2 (2000) amended the ''Canada Elections Act'' to (among other things) remove the unconstitutional seizure of party assets for failure to field 50 candidates in a general election and provided for the full refund of candidates' deposits. The party had its deregistration overturned and its seized assets restored. Bill C-9 (2001) reduced the threshold from 50 to 12 candidates for the party identifier to appear on the ballot. After the Supreme Court of Canada ruled unanimously to strike down the 50-candidate threshold as unconstitutional, the Chretien government was forced to introduce and pass Bill C-3 (2003), which scrapped the rule altogether for party registration. This victory was celebrated by many of the other small parties – regardless of political differences – on the principle that it was a victory for the people's right to democratic choice.
During this time the CPC began to reorganize its Quebec section, the
Communist Party of Quebec
The Communist Party of Quebec (french: Parti communiste du Québec, PCQ-PCC) is a communist provincial political party in Quebec. It is affiliated with, but officially independent from, the Communist Party of Canada.
In 2005, a sovereigntis ...
( or PCQ). The CPC also began periodically publishing ''Spark!'', a journal for Marxist theory and discussion. In 2001 the party adopted a comprehensive update to its party programme and renamed it "Canada's Future is Socialism".
![YCL-LJC central convention in Toronto, 2007](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d9/YCL-LJC_central_convention_in_Toronto%2C_2007.jpg)
The CPC reinvigorated its long-standing involvement in and contribution to the labour movement and support of
trade union
A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits ( ...
organizing and campaigns, in the civic reform movement, and in a number of social justice, anti-war and international solidarity groups and coalitions. The YCL was reestablished in 2007 and has since set up local branches in a number of cities across Canada and held several central conventions.
The CPC held its 37th Central Convention in February 2013 in Toronto. According to a ''Toronto Star'' article the assembly drew 65 delegates most of whom were from Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec with a few from Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Nova Scotia. Party leader Miguel Figueroa called for the CPC to field 25 candidates in the upcoming federal election.
Owing to his declining health, Miguel Figueroa stepped down as central party leader in 2015 after serving in the position for 23 years. Elizabeth Rowley subsequently became the first woman leader of the party after being elected central party leader by the central committee on January 31, 2016. Under Rowley's leadership, the party ran 30 candidates in the
2019 Canadian federal election
The 2019 Canadian federal election was held on October 21, 2019. Member of Parliament (Canada), Members of the House of Commons of Canada, House of Commons were elected to the 43rd Canadian Parliament. In keeping with the Fixed election dates in ...
and finished in twelfth, receiving 3,905 votes and a total of 0.02 percent of the popular vote.
The CPC held its 38th Central Convention in May 2016, again in Toronto. The meeting drew about 70–80 delegates from Ontario, British Columbia, Quebec, Manitoba, Alberta, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and New Brunswick, in order of delegation size. The party held a special tribute to outgoing leader Miguel Figueroa.
Quebec and the national question
The Communist Party of Canada began organizing in Quebec upon its founding. Many important leaders of the CPC including
Annie Buller
Annie Buller (9 December 1895 – 19 January 1973), also known as Annie Buller-Guralnick, was a union organizer as well as co-founder of the Communist Party of Canada (CPC) and manager of many CPC publications.
Background
Annie S. Buller was b ...
,
William Kashtan
William Kashtan (27 June 1909 – 1993) was the general secretary of the Communist Party of Canada for 23 years beginning in January 1965, several months following the death of Leslie Morris, until his retirement in 1988. The delay in his a ...
,
Fred Rose,
Madeleine Parent, and
Léa Roback
Léa Roback (3 November 1903 – 28 August 2000) was a Canadian trade union organizer, social activist, pacifist, and feminist. She campaigned against exclusion, violence, racism and injustice. A polyglot and a suffragist, she was a pioneer of ...
hailed from Montreal, and
Norman Bethune
Henry Norman Bethune (; March 4, 1890 – November 12, 1939; zh, t=亨利·諾爾曼·白求恩, p=Hēnglì Nuò'ěrmàn Báiqiú'ēn) was a Canadian thoracic surgeon, early advocate of socialized medicine, and member of the Communist Party ...
joined the party in Montreal. The Quebec district fought hard battles against the
Duplessis
Duplessis may refer to:
* Duplessis (surname)
**Maurice Duplessis (1890–1959), the 16th premier of Quebec
***'' Duplessis (TV series)'', a historical television series about Maurice Duplessis that aired in Québec in 1978
***Duplessis Orphans s ...
regime, which made the party illegal using the
Padlock Law
The ''Act to Protect the Province Against Communistic Propaganda'' (french: Loi protégeant la province contre la propagande communiste), commonly known as the "Padlock Law" or "Padlock Act" (french: La loi du cadenas), was a law in the province ...
, and to organize the unorganized. The election of Fred Rose in
Cartier Cartier may refer to:
People
* Cartier (surname), a surname (including a list of people with the name)
* Cartier Martin (born 1984), American basketball player
Places
* Cartier Island, an island north-west of Australia that is part of Australia' ...
was a major boost to the Quebec communists and reflected the support of the CPC among working-class people in the city.
For some time the party had been struggling to develop its policy on the national question in Canada, which had changed considerably since the party's formation. As early as the 1930s the CPC recognized Quebec was a nation and by the late 1940s the party began to advocate for Quebec's right to self-determination. In the 1950s and 1960s the party clarified this position, becoming the first party to advocate for a democratic solution to the national question and a new "made-in-Canada" constitution that would guarantee sovereignty for Quebec, up to and including separation. While supporting the right to separate, the communists opposed the succession of Quebec from Canada, proposing a new equal and voluntary partnership between what was then commonly called French and English Canada.
In the late 1950s the party finally overturned the Padlock Law, giving new energy and hope to the party despite difficult times with the
Khrushchev revelations and the continued pressure of the Cold War. Moving to better put into practice what it saw as a deeper political understanding of the national question, the CPC in Quebec re-organized as the Communist Party of Quebec ( or PCQ) in November 1965, reflecting what it now termed the
multi-national reality of Canada as "a state with more than one nation within its borders". The PCQ emerged as a "distinct entity" of the CPC, with shared membership and, at the same time, full control over its policies and administration including its own constitution.
With the
Quiet Revolution
The Quiet Revolution (french: Révolution tranquille) was a period of intense socio-political and socio-cultural change in French Canada which started in Quebec after the election of 1960, characterized by the effective secularization of govern ...
,
Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism
The Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism (french: Commission royale d’enquête sur le bilinguisme et le biculturalisme, also known as the Bi and Bi Commission and the Laurendeau-Dunton Commission) was a Canadian royal commissio ...
and later the
October Crisis
The October Crisis (french: Crise d'Octobre) refers to a chain of events that started in October 1970 when members of the Front de libération du Québec (FLQ) kidnapped the provincial Labour Minister Pierre Laporte and British diplomat James C ...
the party's position on the national question became the subject of broad debate across the country, and influenced the agreement of the
Canadian Labour Congress
The Canadian Labour Congress, or CLC (french: Congrès du travail du Canada, link=no or ) is a national trade union centre, the central labour body in Canada to which most Canadian labour unions are affiliated.
History Formation
The CLC was ...
to work with the
Quebec Federation of Labour
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
on an equal and voluntary basis. The communists called for workers sympathetic with independence movements to unite on a common, immediate class-based programme of common struggle with English-speaking Canadian workers. The PCQ helped re-launch Montreal's mass May Day demonstrations and advanced many unique policies including the idea of a federated party of labour, which proved its prescience with the formation of
Québec solidaire
Québec solidaire (QS; ) is a democratic socialist and sovereigntist political party in Quebec, Canada. The party and media outlets in Canada usually use the name "Québec solidaire" in both French and English, but the party's name is sometimes ...
. The federated party of labour proposal was endorsed by the late 1960s by most trade union centrals, but the project was eclipsed by the emergence of the
Parti Quebecois
Parti may refer to:
*Parti (surname), a Hungarian surname, and a list of people with the name
* ''Parti'' (architecture), the organizing concepts behind an architect's design
*
*, a lake in Russia
See also
*Partie (disambiguation)
*Party (disambi ...
.
By the 1980s the CPC and PCQ were calling for "a new, democratic constitutional arrangement based on the equal and voluntary union of Aboriginal peoples, Québec, and English-speaking Canada" replacing the Senate with a house of nations. In this context the PCQ and CPC critically supported the first referendum question on sovereignty association, while later the CPC advocated voting No on the second referendum in 1995.
During the crisis in CPC during the 1990s, the PCQ became disorganized, closed its offices, and its remaining members drifted apart from the CPC, with many in the leadership adopting positions sympathetic to nationalism. It was not until 1997 that a range of communists and communist groups came together to re-organize the PCQ. A few years later the party helped bring together different tendencies in the left to form the
Union of Progressive Forces (UFP) which became
Québec solidaire
Québec solidaire (QS; ) is a democratic socialist and sovereigntist political party in Quebec, Canada. The party and media outlets in Canada usually use the name "Québec solidaire" in both French and English, but the party's name is sometimes ...
.
The UFP agreed to place the question of Quebec independence as secondary to social or class issues. This was hotly debated as the party transformed into
Québec solidaire
Québec solidaire (QS; ) is a democratic socialist and sovereigntist political party in Quebec, Canada. The party and media outlets in Canada usually use the name "Québec solidaire" in both French and English, but the party's name is sometimes ...
. The debate moved over into the PCQ as well. These positions were questioned by the Quebec leader of the party, André Parizeau, who formulated a series of amendments in support of immediate independence in 2004 which were rejected by both the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the Quebec party (by a vote of 4–2) and by the Central Executive Committee of the Canadian party (by a vote of 7–1). In January 2005, Parizeau wrote a letter to PCQ members declaring that the party was in crisis and, describing the four NEC members who opposed his amendments as a pro-federalist "Gang of Four", he summarily dismissed them. Although his Quebec nationalist point of view held a slim majority at the PCQ's convention of April 2005, the delegate selection process was highly disputed. Parizeau was subsequently expelled by the Central Committee of the CPC for factionalism and actions harmful to the Party. Around the same time, his group announced their withdrawal from the CPC.
Élections Québec Élections Québec is the independent office of the National Assembly of Quebec that oversees the administration of the electoral and referendum system in Quebec, Canada. It is led by the Chief Electoral Officer of Quebec (french: Directeur généra ...
continued to recognize Parizeau as holding the electoral registration for the name "", prompting the PCQ to begin using the abbreviation PCQ-PCC to distinguish itself from Parizeau's group.
The party's central committee affirmed the authority of the previous PCQ National Executive Committee on June 18–19, 2005. The PCQ-PCC then held a new convention which resulted in the revival of the French-language communist periodical ''Clarté'', the opening of a new office and reading room, the launch of a new website, and the party's reaffiliation with Quebec Solidaire. The PCQ-PCC works closely with the youth organization Ligue de la jeunesse communiste du Quebec. The CPC's account of this situation is available online, as is the letter from Parizeau's PCQ group.
Membership
The CPC had a membership of about 4,500 people in 1925, consisting mainly of miners, lumberers, railway workers, farmers, and garment workers. Party membership soared in the 1940s, peaking at just under 20,000 in January 1946. However, during this time the CPC's membership in Quebec only amounted to several hundred members.
Women made up 12 to 15 percent of the CPC's membership from 1934 to 1938, rising to 28 percent by 1951.
According to Canadian historian
Ivan Avakumović, the CPC had 1,500 to 3,000 members during the 1960s. However, the
United States Department of State
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other n ...
estimated the CPC's membership to be approximately 3,500 in the mid-1960s.
The party's current membership has not been publicly disclosed.
Publications
The CPC publishes the biweekly newspaper ''
People's Voice'', which has been in circulation since 1993. The party's previous newspapers include ''The Worker'', ''Canadian Tribune'', and ''The Tribune''.
Additionally, the CPC's
British Columbia section published many newspapers of its own, such as the ''B.C. Worker's News'' (1935–1937), ''People's Advocate'' (1937–1940), ''Vancouver Clarion'' (1940–1941), ''Pacific Advocate'' (1942–1945), and ''Pacific Tribune'' (1946–1992).
Allied organizations
Historically, the CPC has had allied organizations which were affiliated with the party until the late-1920s, when these affiliates were hitherto understood to be largely following the party's direction. These groups often originated from left-wing labour and socialist movements that existed prior to the creation of the Communist Party and operated political and cultural activities amongst various immigrant groups, published magazines and operated their own cultural centres and meeting halls. From the 1920s through the 1950s the largest immigrant groups represented in the party were Finns, Ukrainians and Jews who were organized in the
Finnish Organization of Canada Finnish Organization of Canada (FOC, fi, Kanadan Suomalainen Järjestö) is a Finnish Canadian cultural organization. It was established in 1911 as the Finnish Socialist Organization of Canada (''Kanadan Suomalainen Sosialistinen Järjestö''). FOC ...
(founded in 1911 as the Finnish Socialist Organization of Canada), the
Association of United Ukrainian Canadians
The Association of United Ukrainian Canadians (AUUC; uk, Товариство Об'єднаних Українських Канадтсив) is a national cultural-educational non-profit organization established for Ukrainians in Canada. With ...
(known as the Ukrainian Labour Farmer Temple Association until 1946) and the
United Jewish Peoples' Order
The United Jewish People's Order is a secular socialist Jewish cultural, political and educational fraternal organization in Canada. The UJPO traces its history to the founding of the Jewish Labour League Mutual Benefit Society in 1926.
History ...
(known as the Labour League until 1945) respectively.
Also active in the 1930s and 1940s were the
Hungarian Workers Clubs Hungarian may refer to:
* Hungary, a country in Central Europe
* Kingdom of Hungary, state of Hungary, existing between 1000 and 1946
* Hungarians, ethnic groups in Hungary
* Hungarian algorithm, a polynomial time algorithm for solving the assignme ...
, the
Polish People's Association (formerly the Polish Workers' and Farmers' Association and later known as the Polish Democratic Association after World War II), the
Serbian People's Movement and
Croatian Cultural Association
Croatian may refer to:
*Croatia
*Croatian language
*Croatian people
*Croatians (demonym)
See also
*
*
* Croatan (disambiguation)
* Croatia (disambiguation)
* Croatoan (disambiguation)
* Hrvatski (disambiguation)
* Hrvatsko (disambiguation)
* Se ...
(formerly the Jugoslav Workers' Clubs) and the
Carpatho-Russian Society Carpatho-Russian or Carpathian Russian may refer to:
* American Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Diocese, an Eastern Orthodox ecclesial body
* Russians in Ukraine, Russian minority in Carpathian regions of modern Ukraine
* As a dated term for Rusyns
See ...
. The
Russian Farmer-Worker Clubs were formed in the early 1930s but closed by the government under the
Defence of Canada Regulations
The ''Defence of Canada Regulations'' were a set of emergency measures implemented under the ''War Measures Act'' on 3 September 1939, a week before Canada's entry into World War II.
The extreme security measures permitted by the regulations ...
at the outbreak of World War II. When the Soviet Union became Canada's ally in 1942, they re-appeared as the
Federation of Russian Canadians The Federation of Russian Canadians is a left-leaning cultural organization for Russian immigrants to Canada and their descendants.
It is the successor of the Russian Farmer-Worker Clubs which were closed by the government at the beginning of World ...
. The German Canadian Federation was formed during World War II and the
Canadian Slav Committee
Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...
was formed in 1948 in an attempt to put party-aligned cultural associations for Ukrainians, Russians, Poles, Slovaks, Bulgarians, Macedonians, Yugoslavs and Carpatho-Rusyns under one umbrella.
The Society of Capartho-Russian Canadians re-formed and, in 1950, acquired a hall at 280 Queen Street West in Toronto which it continues to operate into the twenty-first century.
The UJPO broke with the party in 1956 during the period of the "Khrushchev revelations" and allegations of antisemitism in the Soviet Union.
Later allied organizations include the
Greek Canadian Democratic Organization
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
formed by leftists emigres who had fled the
Greek military junta of 1967–1974
The Greek junta or Regime of the Colonels, . Also known within Greece as just the Junta ( el, η Χούντα, i Choúnta, links=no, ), the Dictatorship ( el, η Δικτατορία, i Diktatoría, links=no, ) or the Seven Years ( el, η Ε ...
and the
Portuguese Canadian Democratic Association
Portuguese may refer to:
* anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal
** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods
** Portuguese language, a Romance language
*** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language
** Portu ...
which was formed by left-wing emigres who had left Portugal in the 1960s and early 1970s when it was still ruled by a right wing dictatorship. The Portuguese association was outspoken in its support of the 1974
Carnation Revolution
The Carnation Revolution ( pt, Revolução dos Cravos), also known as the 25 April ( pt, 25 de Abril, links=no), was a military coup by left-leaning military officers that overthrew the authoritarian Estado Novo regime on 25 April 1974 in Lisbo ...
.
Provincial sections
The Communist Party of Canada has provincial sections which contest general elections at the provincial level. In most provinces the provincial section's name is in the format "Communist Party of Canada (
rovince". Active provincial sections exist in
Alberta
Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...
,
British Columbia
British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...
,
Manitoba
Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...
,
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
, and
Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
; the party was previously active in Saskatchewan as well.
Denotes a defunct provincial section.
Leadership
Party leaders
The General Secretary of the Communist Party of Canada was the title of the party leader from 1921 to 1992. The following is list of party leaders since 1921.
Chairmen
The Chairman of the Communist Party of Canada was a largely ceremonial position which existed from 1921 to 1973. The following is a list of known party chairmen.
Central convention
The party holds a central convention in
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...
every three years, in which delegates from party clubs across Canada elect the party leadership. Delegates elect the members of the Central Committee who in turn nominate the members of the Central Executive Committee (CEC). The composition of the CEC is then ratified by the delegates to the convention through a simple majority.
Election results
At its height in the mid-1940s, the CPC had fourteen sitting elected officials at the federal, provincial and municipal levels, including federal
Member of Parliament
A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...
Fred Rose, who was elected in 1945, the year in which the CPC's proportion of the federal election vote was its highest ever at 2.13 percent. In the 1953 federal election the CPC ran one hundred candidates, its most ever, but received only 1.06 percent of the national vote. Those one hundred candidates encompassed seven provinces and included 22 women, as well as 11 "youth candidates".
; Notes:
; Percentage of the popular vote
; Average number of votes per candidate
See also
*
Notable members of the Communist Party of Canada
*
Organization for Jewish Colonization in Russia
The Organization for Jewish Colonization in Russia ( yi, ייִדישע קאָלאָניזאַציע אָרגאַניזאַציע אין רוסלאַנד, ), commonly known by its transliterated acronym of ICOR, was a Communist-sponsored mass orga ...
*
PROFUNC
PROFUNC, an acronym for "PROminent FUNCtionaries of the communist party", was a Classified information, top secret Government of Canada project to identify and observe suspected Communism in Canada, Canadian communists and Crypto-communism, crypto ...
* ''
Rebel Youth
''Rebel Youth'' (french: Jeunesse militante) is the bilingual magazine of the Young Communist League of Canada (YCL), published beginning in the late 1980s and relaunched in 2005. It seeks to " fferweekly pan-Canadian socialist perspectives on th ...
''
Notes
References
Citations
Sources
Books
*
*
*
*
*
*
Journal articles and dissertations
*
*
*
*
News and magazine articles
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Communiqués
*
*
*
Websites
*
*
*
External links
*
Communist Party of Canada fondsat
Library and Archives Canada
Library and Archives Canada (LAC; french: Bibliothèque et Archives Canada) is the federal institution, tasked with acquiring, preserving, and providing accessibility to the documentary heritage of Canada. The national archive and library is th ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Communist Party Of Canada
1921 establishments in Canada
Canada–Soviet Union relations
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
Communist parties in Canada
Far-left politics in Canada
Federal political parties in Canada
Formerly banned communist parties
Political parties established in 1921
International Meeting of Communist and Workers Parties