1930 Canadian federal election

Last updated

1930 Canadian federal election
Canadian Red Ensign (1921-1957).svg
  1926 July 28, 1930 1935  

245 seats in the House of Commons
123 seats needed for a majority
Turnout73.5% [1] (Increase2.svg5.8pp)
 First partySecond party
  Richard Bedford Bennett (cropped2).jpg King1919HeadShot (cropped).jpg
Leader R. B. Bennett W. L. Mackenzie King
Party Conservative Liberal
Leader since 1927 1919
Leader's seat Calgary West Prince Albert
Last election91116
Seats won13789
Seat changeIncrease2.svg46Decrease2.svg27
Popular vote1,863,1151,716,798
Percentage47.79%44.03%
SwingIncrease2.svg3.08pp Increase2.svg1.13pp

 Third partyFourth party
  JohnEBrownlee (cropped).jpg
Leader John E. Brownlee None
Party United Farmers of Alberta Progressive
Leader's seatDid not run [2] None
Last election1111
Seats won93
Seat changeDecrease2.svg2Decrease2.svg8
Popular vote56,96870,822
Percentage1.46%1.82%
SwingDecrease2.svg0.55pp Decrease2.svg2.41pp

Canada 1930 Federal Election.svg

Chambre des Communes 1930.png
The Canadian parliament after the 1930 election

Prime Minister before election

William Lyon Mackenzie King
Liberal

Prime Minister after election

R. B. Bennett
Conservative

The 1930 Canadian federal election was held on July 28, 1930, to elect members of the House of Commons of the 17th Parliament of Canada. Richard Bedford Bennett's Conservative Party won a majority government, defeating the Liberal Party led by Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King. [3]

Contents

3,922,481 votes were cast in this election.

Background

The first signs of the Great Depression were clearly evident by the 1930 election, and Conservative party leader Richard Bennett campaigned on a platform of aggressive measures in order to combat it.

"I propose that any government of which I am the head will at the first session of parliament initiate whatever action is necessary to that end, or perish in the attempt."

Richard Bennett, June 9, 1930

Part of the reason for Bennett's success lay in the Liberals' own handling of the rising unemployment of 1930. Touting the Liberal formula as the reason for the economic prosperity of the 1920s, for example, left the Liberals carrying much of the responsibility, whether deserved or not, for the consequences of the crash of the American stock market.

Liberal election poster in French, showing King forging a chain link. WLMK hammer and tongs Votez Liberal poster 1930.jpg
Liberal election poster in French, showing King forging a chain link.

King was apparently oblivious to the rising unemployment that greeted the 1930s, and continued to laud his government's hand in Canada's prosperity. Demands for aid were met with accusations of being the part of a great "Tory conspiracy," which led King to make his famous "five-cent piece" outburst, alienating a growing number of voters. In retrospect, one can understand King's reasoning. Both the Western mayors and provincial Premiers who had visited King with requests of relief were overwhelmingly Conservative: in the Premiers' case, seven out of nine. King concluded in Parliamentary debates that though aid was a provincial jurisdiction, the fact that he believed there to be no unemployment problem meant that the requests from the provinces appeared to be nothing more than political grandstanding. The Federal Conservatives had certainly exaggerated the Depression in its early stages solely to attack King's government.

Several other factors entered into King's defeat. Although obtaining funds from sometimes dubious sources was not a problem, the Liberal election machine was not as efficient as it once was, primarily due to the cause of the age and poor health of many chief strategists. King's campaign was the epitome of Murphy's law: every campaign stop appeared to meet the Prime Minister with some kind of mishap.

By contrast, Bennett's Conservatives were electric. The self-made man who led them had practically rebuilt his party (a significant part of it with his own funds) and developed an election machine which could rival the Liberals'. Aside from superior party organization, the Tories used it. They bought out newspapers in key areas (notably the Liberal strongholds of the West, and Quebec) and ensured that pro-Tory slants were kept. In the first election where radio played an important role, Bennett's vibrant, zealous voice was extremely preferable to King's. (The Tory machine, of course, ensured that only the best radio spots were available to Bennett.)

Also, Bennett's tariff policy, epitomized by his infamous promise to "blast" Canada's way into world markets, was extremely well received in the key Liberal strongholds of the West and Quebec. In the West, agricultural production had been hurt by worldwide overproduction, and certain agricultural groups in Quebec firmly endorsed Bennett's tariff policy. Bennett's Conservatives won much of the former Progressive and Farmers' vote in the West, and they were elected with 44% of the popular vote in Quebec as a protest vote.

All those factors led to Bennett's eventual election.

Canadian voters agreed with Bennett and the Conservatives were elected with a majority of 137 seats in the House Of Commons. The incumbent Liberals under William Lyon Mackenzie King became the official opposition after being reduced to 89.

The Progressives continued their decline, winning only three seats. The United Farmers of Alberta did somewhat better - despite finishing third place in the popular vote in that province they managed to hold on to nine of its seventeen seats (of which the UFA only contested ten). This would be the last federal election the Progressives or the UFA would win any seats.

Unfortunately for Bennett and the Conservatives, the Depression brought complex problems to politicians and extreme hardship for most Canadians. Bennett and the Conservatives lost the 1935 election to the Liberals under the previous Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, and the Conservatives would not return to government until 1957.

National results

1930 Canadian parliament English version.svg
PartyParty leader# of
candidates
SeatsPopular vote
1926 Elected% Change#% pp Change
  Conservative R. B. Bennett 22991137+69.6%1,863,11547.79%+3.07
  Liberal W. L. Mackenzie King 22611688-21.1%1,716,79844.03%+1.29
United Farmers of Alberta  10119-18.2%56,9681.46%-0.55
Progressive  15112-72.7%70,8221.82%-2.41
Liberal–Progressive  883-62.5%44,8221.15%-0.94
Labour J.S. Woodsworth 842-50.0%26,5480.68%-0.95
 Independent1122-21,6080.55%-0.30
  Progressive-Conservative  2-1 15,9960.41%+0.1
 Independent Labour 2*1*15,9880.41%*
 Independent Liberal81--100%14,4260.37%-0.25
  Farmer  5*-*11,9990.31%*
 Independent Conservative6---10,3600.27%-0.07
 Unknown2---7,4410.19%+0.08
  Liberal-Labour  1---7,1950.18%+0.05
Communist Tim Buck 6*-*4,5570.12%*
  Labour-Farmer  2---3,2760.08%+0.04
 Liberal-Protectionist  1*-*2,7230.07%*
  Farmer-Labour  1*-*2,0910.05%*
 Independent Progressive 1*-*1,2940.03%*
  Franc Lib  1*-*4290.01%*
  Prohibitionist  1*-*2660.01%*
Total546245245-3,898,722100% 
Sources: http://www.elections.ca -- https://web.archive.org/web/20090609211221/http://www2.parl.gc.ca/Sites/LOP/HFER/hfer.asp?Language=E History of Federal Ridings since 1867

https://www.ourcommons.ca/marleaumontpetit/DocumentViewer.aspx?DocId=1001&Language=E&Sec=Ch25&Seq=11

Note:

* The party did not nominate candidates in the previous election.

Vote and seat summaries

Popular vote
Conservative
47.79%
Liberal
44.03%
Progressive
1.82%
United Farmers
1.46%
Others
4.90%
Seat totals
Conservative
55.10%
Liberal
36.33%
United Farmers
3.67%
Progressive
1.22%
Others
3.67%

Results by province

Party name BC AB SK MB ON QC NB NS PE YK Total
  Conservative Seats:747105924101031135
 Popular vote (%):49.3%35.0%33.6%44.1%53.9%43.7%59.3%52.5%50.0%60.3%47.8%
  Liberal Seats:531212240141-89
 Vote:40.9%30.0%48.4%19.6%42.4%53.2%40.7%47.5%50.0%39.7%44.0%
  UF Alberta Seats: 9        9
 Vote: 28.4%        1.5%
  Progressive Seats: -2-1     3
 Vote: 1.9%8.1%6.4%1.8%     1.8%
  Liberal-Progressive Seats:  -3      3
 Vote:  2.1%16.2%      1.2%
  Labour Seats: - 2-     2
 Vote: 3.0 8.40.1     0.7
 IndependentSeats:1 - -1    2
 Vote:2.6 3.5 0.10.3    0.6
  Progressive-Conservative Seats:   1 -    1
 Vote:  2.7 1.0    0.4
 Independent Labour Seats:1  -      1
 Vote:6.5  0.1      0.4
Total Seats141621178265111441245
Parties that won no seats:
 Independent LiberalVote:   0.4 1.3    0.4
  Farmer Vote:  3.6       0.3
 Independent ConservativeVote:   1.20.50.1     
 UnknownVote:   0.5     0.2
  Liberal-Labour Vote:    0.5     0.2
Communist Vote:0.4  0.90.1     0.1
  Labour-FarmerVote : 0.6        0.1
  Liberal-Protectionist Vote:     0.3    0.1
 Farmer-Labour Vote:  0.6       0.1
 Independent Progressive Vote:     0.1    xx
  Franc Lib Vote:0.2         xx
  Prohibitionist Vote:0.1         xx

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">R. B. Bennett</span> Prime Minister of Canada from 1930 to 1935

Richard Bedford Bennett, 1st Viscount Bennett was a Canadian lawyer, businessman, philanthropist, and politician who served as the 11th prime minister of Canada from 1930 to 1935.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Lyon Mackenzie King</span> Three-time Canadian prime minister (1874–1950)

William Lyon Mackenzie King was a Canadian statesman and politician who was the tenth prime minister of Canada for three non-consecutive terms from 1921 to 1926, 1926 to 1930, and 1935 to 1948. A Liberal, he was the dominant politician in Canada from the early 1920s to the late 1940s. King is best known for his leadership of Canada throughout the Great Depression and the Second World War. In August 1944, he ordered the displacement of Japanese Canadians out of the British Columbia Interior, mandating that they either resettle east of the Rocky Mountains or face deportation to Japan after the war. He played a major role in laying the foundations of the Canadian welfare state and establishing Canada's international position as a middle power. With a total of 21 years and 154 days in office, he remains the longest-serving prime minister in Canadian history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Stewart (premier)</span> Canadian politician (1868–1946)

Charles Stewart, was a Canadian politician who served as the third premier of Alberta from 1917 until 1921. Born in Strabane, Ontario, in then Wentworth County, Stewart was a farmer who moved west to Alberta after his farm was destroyed by a storm. There he became active in politics and was elected to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta in the 1909 election. He served as Minister of Public Works and Minister of Municipal Affairs—the first person to hold the latter position in Alberta—in the government of Arthur Sifton. When Sifton left provincial politics in 1917 to join the federal cabinet, Stewart was named his replacement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1993 Canadian federal election</span> Selection of the 35th Parliament

The 1993 Canadian federal election was held on October 25, 1993, to elect members to the House of Commons of the 35th Parliament of Canada. Considered to be a major political realignment, it was one of the most eventful elections in Canada's history. Two new regionalist parties emerged, finishing second and third in seat count. Most notably, the election marked the worst defeat for a governing party at the federal level and among the worst ever suffered by a governing party in the Western democratic world. In a landslide, the Liberal Party, led by Jean Chrétien, won a majority government.

The Progressive Party of Canada, formally the National Progressive Party, was a federal-level political party in Canada in the 1920s until 1930. It was linked with the provincial United Farmers parties in several provinces, and it spawned the Progressive Party of Saskatchewan, and the Progressive Party of Manitoba, which formed the government of that province. The Progressive Party was part of the farmers' political movement that included federal and provincial Progressive and United Farmers' parties.

The Ontario Liberal Party is a political party in the province of Ontario, Canada. The party has been led by Bonnie Crombie since December 2023.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1921 Canadian federal election</span>

The 1921 Canadian federal election was held on December 6, 1921, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 14th Parliament of Canada. The Union government that had governed Canada through the First World War was defeated, and replaced by a Liberal government under the young leader William Lyon Mackenzie King. A new third party, the Progressive Party, won the second most seats in the election.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Politics of Alberta</span>

The politics of Alberta are centred on a provincial government resembling that of the other Canadian provinces, namely a constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy. The capital of the province is Edmonton, where the provincial Legislative Building is located.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1972 Canadian federal election</span>

The 1972 Canadian federal election was held on October 30, 1972, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 29th Parliament of Canada. It resulted in a slim victory for the governing Liberal Party led by Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, which won 109 seats, compared to 107 seats for the opposition Progressive Conservatives led by Robert Stanfield. Trudeau's Liberals experienced a decline in support as a result of rising unemployment.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Conservative Party of Canada (1867–1942)</span> Right-of-centre political party in Canada

The Conservative Party of Canada was a major federal political party in Canada that existed from 1867 to 1942. The party adhered to traditionalist conservatism and its main policies included strengthening relations with Great Britain, nationalizing industries, and promoting high tariffs.

The Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta was a provincial centre-right party in the Canadian province of Alberta that existed from 1905 to 2020. The party formed the provincial government, without interruption, from 1971 until the party's defeat in the 2015 provincial election under premiers Peter Lougheed, Don Getty, Ralph Klein, Ed Stelmach, Alison Redford, Dave Hancock and Jim Prentice. At 44 years, this was the longest unbroken run in government at the provincial or federal level in Canadian history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1957 Canadian federal election</span>

The 1957 Canadian federal election was held June 10, 1957, to select the 265 members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 23rd Parliament of Canada. In one of the greatest upsets in Canadian political history, the Progressive Conservative Party, led by John Diefenbaker, brought an end to 22 years of Liberal rule, as the Tories were able to form a minority government despite losing the popular vote to the Liberals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Bracken</span> Canadian politician

John Bracken was a Canadian agronomist and politician who was the 11th and longest-serving premier of Manitoba (1922–1943) and later the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada (1942–1948).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United Farmers of Alberta</span> Association of Alberta farmers

The United Farmers of Alberta (UFA) is an association of Alberta farmers that has served different roles in its 100-year history – as a lobby group, a successful political party, and as a farm-supply retail chain. As a political party, it formed the government of Alberta from 1921 to 1935.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1925 Canadian federal election</span>

The 1925 Canadian federal election was held on October 29, 1925 to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 15th Parliament of Canada. The Conservative party took the most seats in the House of Commons, although not a majority. Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King's Liberal Party was invited to form a minority government. Unlike the Conservative party, King's Liberals had the conditional support of the many Farmer/Progressive MPs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1945 Canadian federal election</span>

The 1945 Canadian federal election was held on June 11, 1945, to elect members of the House of Commons of the 20th Parliament of Canada. Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King's Liberals won a third term. The party fell five seats short of a majority but was able to rule as a majority government with the support of Independent Liberal MPs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1935 Canadian federal election</span>

The 1935 Canadian federal election was held on October 14, 1935, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 18th Parliament of Canada. The Liberal Party of William Lyon Mackenzie King won a majority government, defeating Prime Minister R. B. Bennett's Conservatives.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1926 Canadian federal election</span>

The 1926 Canadian federal election was held on September 14, 1926, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 16th Parliament of Canada. The election was called after an event known as the King–Byng affair.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arthur Meighen</span> Prime Minister of Canada (1920–1921; 1926)

Arthur Meighen was a Canadian lawyer and politician who served as the ninth prime minister of Canada from 1920 to 1921 and from June to September 1926. He led the Conservative Party from 1920 to 1926 and from 1941 to 1942.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Premiership of John Edward Brownlee</span> 1925–1934 premiership of Alberta, Canada

John Edward Brownlee was Premier of Alberta, Canada, from 1925 to 1934 as leader of the United Farmers of Alberta (UFA) caucus in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta. After a number of early successes, his popularity and his government's suffered from the hardships of the Great Depression. In 1934, he was embroiled in a sex scandal when a family friend sued him for seduction. Though Brownlee denied the events she alleged, when the jury found in her favour he announced his resignation as premier.

References

  1. "Voter Turnout at Federal Elections and Referendums". Elections Canada. Retrieved March 10, 2019.
  2. The United Farmers of Alberta, which at the time formed the government in that province, did not have a separate party leader at the federal level. At the time of this election, party leader John E. Brownlee was the Premier of Alberta and the MLA for Ponoka in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta.
  3. Soward, Frederic H. (1930). "The Canadian Elections of 1930". American Political Science Review. 24 (4): 995–1000. doi:10.2307/1946756. ISSN   0003-0554.

Further reading