Rodney Young (March 21, 1910 − January 1, 1978) was a lawyer and Canadian

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 o ...

. Young was born in

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

and emigrated to Canada in 1926 at the age of 16 setting in

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 ...

. He was a

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 ...

activist during the Great Depression and did political work in the

unemployment Unemployment, according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), is people above a specified age (usually 15) not being in paid employment or self-employment but currently available for work during the refere ...

relief camps that were set up during the

Great Depression in Canada The worldwide Great Depression of the early 1930s was a social and economic shock that left millions of Canadians unemployed, hungry and often homeless. Few countries were affected as severely as Canada during what became known as the "Dirty Thirt ...

. Young was a member of the Socialist Party of Canada's British Columbia section and was one of the party's two candidates in the dual member constituency of

Vancouver Centre Vancouver Centre (french: Vancouver-Centre) is a federal electoral district in British Columbia, Canada, that has been represented in the House of Commons of Canada since 1917. It is the riding with the biggest Japanese community in Canada. As ...

for the 1933 provincial election garnering 64 votes. In 1934, the Socialist Party in BC joined the fledgling Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and Young joined the youth wing of the fledgling

democratic socialist Democratic socialism is a left-wing political philosophy that supports political democracy and some form of a socially owned economy, with a particular emphasis on economic democracy, workplace democracy, and workers' self-management within ...

political party. He joined the

Royal Canadian Corps of Signals The Royal Canadian Corps of Signals (RCCS or RC Sigs; french: links=no, Corps des transmissions royal du Canada, CTRC) is a component within the Canadian Armed Forces' Communications and Electronics Branch, consisting of all members of that perso ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, serving in the

Canadian Army The Canadian Army (french: Armée canadienne) is the command responsible for the operational readiness of the conventional ground forces of the Canadian Armed Forces. It maintains regular forces units at bases across Canada, and is also res ...

from 1940 until 1946. Following demobilization, he enrolled in the

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a public research university with campuses near Vancouver and in Kelowna, British Columbia. Established in 1908, it is British Columbia's oldest university. The university ranks among the top thre ...

's law school. While still a law student in 1948, he contested a

by-election A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...

on behalf of the CCF and was elected to the House of Commons of Canada. He only served for a year before being defeated in his attempt to retain his seat in the 1949 federal election. His attempt to regain the seat in the

1953 Events January * January 6 – The Asian Socialist Conference opens in Rangoon, Burma. * January 12 – Estonian émigrés found a government-in-exile in Oslo. * January 14 ** Marshal Josip Broz Tito is chosen President of Yug ...

resulted in a third-place finish. Young was a

and on the left-wing of the CCF. His involvement with Marxist activists resulted in his expulsion from the British Columbia wing of the CCF by the party's executive in 1954 in what was called the "Rod Young Affair".

Electoral record

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Young, Rodney 1910 births 1978 deaths Military personnel from Liverpool Canadian Army personnel of World War II Royal Canadian Corps of Signals soldiers Canadian socialists Co-operative Commonwealth Federation MPs 20th-century Canadian politicians Members of the House of Commons of Canada from British Columbia Canadian people of English descent