Canadian Federal Election, 1949 on:
[Wikipedia]
[Google]
[Amazon]
The 1949 Canadian federal election was held June 27, 1949 to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 21st Parliament of
Notes:
* The party did not nominate candidates in the previous election.
x - less than 0.005% of the popular vote
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 ...
.
The Liberal Party of Canada was re-elected with its fourth consecutive government, winning 191 seats (73 percent of the seats in the House of Commons), with just under 50 percent of the popular vote.
It was the Liberals' first election in almost thirty years not under the leadership 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 L ...
. King had retired in 1948, and was replaced as Liberal leader and Prime Minister
A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...
by Louis St. Laurent.
It was the first federal election with Newfoundland voting, having joined Canada in March of that year. It was also the first election since 1904
Events
January
* January 7 – The distress signal ''CQD'' is established, only to be replaced 2 years later by ''SOS''.
* January 8 – The Blackstone Library is dedicated, marking the beginning of the Chicago Public Library syst ...
in which part of the remaining parts of the Northwest Territories were granted representation, following the partitioning off of the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan.
The Liberal Party victory was the largest majority in Canadian history to that point. , it remains the third largest majority government in Canadian history, and the largest in the party's history (the Progressive Conservative Party won larger seat majorities in 1958
Events
January
* January 1 – The European Economic Community (EEC) comes into being.
* January 3 – The West Indies Federation is formed.
* January 4
** Edmund Hillary's Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition completes the third ...
and 1984
Events
January
* January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888.
* January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeas ...
).
The Progressive Conservative Party, led by former Premier of Ontario George Drew, gained little ground in this election. The party lost over a third of their seats.
Smaller parties, such as the social democratic Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, and Social Credit
Social credit is a distributive philosophy of political economy developed by C. H. Douglas. Douglas attributed economic downturns to discrepancies between the cost of goods and the compensation of the workers who made them. To combat what he ...
, a party that advocated monetary reform, lost support to the Liberals and, to a lesser extent, the Conservatives.
National results
Notes:
Results by province
*xx - less than 0.05% of the popular voteSee also
*List of Canadian federal general elections
This article provides a summary of results for Canadian general elections (where all seats are contested) to the House of Commons, the elected lower half of Canada's federal bicameral legislative body, the Parliament of Canada. The number of ...
*List of political parties in Canada
This article lists political parties in Canada.
Federal parties
In contrast with the political party systems of many nations, Canadian parties at the federal level are often only loosely connected with parties at the provincial level, despite ha ...
* 21st Canadian Parliament
References
Further reading
* * {{election canada 1949 Federal electionCanadian federal election
This article provides a summary of results for Canadian general elections (where all seats are contested) to the House of Commons, the elected lower half of Canada's federal bicameral legislative body, the Parliament of Canada. The number of s ...