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Fascism in Canada (French : Fascisme au Canada) consists of a variety of movements and political parties in Canada during the 20th century. Largely a fringe ideology, Fascism has never commanded a large following in Canada, however it was most popular during the Great Depression.
During the 1930s, the Canadian Union of Fascists (CUF) was founded. Based first in Winnipeg, then in Toronto, it was led by Chuck Crate and modelled on Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists. Around the same time, in February 1934 in Quebec, the Parti national social chrétien (transl. National Social Christian Party) was founded by journalist and self-proclaimed "Canadian Führer" Adrien Arcand. [1] The CUF split off of the Winnipeg-based Canadian Nationalist Party (CNP), led by William Whittaker. [2] [3] The CNP merged with Arcand's Parti national social chrétien du Canada in 1938, along with fascist groups based in Ontario and Quebec (many of whom were known as "swastika clubs"), to form the National Unity Party of Canada in July 1938. [4]
At the outbreak of World War II, most openly fascist organizations and political parties were banned and most Canadian fascist leaders were interned under the Defence of Canada Regulations. Arcand would spend the war under guard at the Petawawa military base alongside other 'enemy organization' leaders, while other members of the movement would be similarly interned in areas of New Brunswick. [5] In the post-war period, Fascism never recovered its former small influence. [6]
The Communist Party of Canada is a federal political party in Canada. Founded in 1921 under conditions of illegality, it is the second oldest active political party in Canada, after the Liberal Party of Canada. Although it does not currently have any parliamentary representation, the party's candidates have previously been elected to the House of Commons, the Ontario legislature, the Manitoba legislature, and various municipal governments across the country.
Adrien Arcand was a Canadian fascist politician, writer, and journalist. He founded and led the far-right National Unity Party of Canada from 1934 until his death in 1967. During his political career, he proclaimed himself as the "Canadian Führer".
The National Unity Party of Canada (NUPC) was a Canadian far-right political party which based its ideology on Adolf Hitler's Nazism and Benito Mussolini's fascism. It was founded as the Parti national social chrétien du Canada (PNSC) by Nazi sympathizer Adrien Arcand on February 22, 1934. The party's activities were originally limited to Quebec, but it later expanded to Ontario and Western Canada. Party membership swelled in the mid-to-late 1930s as the party absorbed smaller fascist groups across the country. Following the outbreak of World War II, the Canadian government banned the NUPC on May 30, 1940, under the Defence of Canada Regulations of the War Measures Act. Arcand and many of his followers were consequently arrested and interned for the duration of the war.
The Canadian Union of Fascists was a fascist political party based in the city of Toronto in the 1930s with its western Canadian office in Regina, Saskatchewan.
The Biographical Dictionary of the Extreme Right Since 1890 is a reference book by Philip Rees, on leading people in the various far right movements since 1890. It contains entries for what the author regards as "the 500 major figures on the radical right, extreme right, and revolutionary right from 1890 to the present" . It was published, as a 418-page hardcover, in New York by Simon & Schuster in 1990 (ISBN 0-13-089301-3).
Fascist symbolism is the use of certain images and symbols which are designed to represent aspects of fascism. These include national symbols of historical importance, goals, and political policies. The best-known are the fasces, which was the original symbol of fascism, and the swastika of Nazism.
John Ross Taylor was a Canadian fascist political activist and party leader prominent in white nationalist circles.
The Francist Movement was a French fascist and anti-semitic league created by Marcel Bucard in September 1933 that edited the newspaper Le Francisme. Mouvement franciste reached a membership of 10,000 and was financed by the Italian dictator, Benito Mussolini. Its members were deemed the francistes or Chemises bleues (Blueshirts) and gave the Roman salute.
François de La Rocque was the leader of the French right-wing league the Croix de Feu from 1930 to 1936 before he formed the more moderate nationalist French Social Party (1936–1940), which has been described by several historians, such as René Rémond and Michel Winock, as a precursor of Gaullism.
Henry Hamilton Beamish was a leading British antisemitic journalist and the founder of The Britons in 1919, the first organisation set up in Britain for the express purpose of diffusing antisemitic propaganda. After a conviction for libel the same year, Beamish fled Britain and began a career of touring speaker, travelling to Germany, Canada, the United States or Japan in order to promote antisemitic and fascist causes. In 1923, he spoke at one of Adolf Hitler's meetings in Munich, and met Julius Streicher in Nuremberg in 1937. Beamish settled in Southern Rhodesia in 1938, where he served as an independent member of the Southern Rhodesian Legislative Assembly between 1938 and 1940. During the Second World War, he was interned for three years due to his pro-Nazi sentiments. Upon his release, Beamish returned to England and died in March 1948, aged 74.
The Parti indépendantiste was a political party promoting the independence of Quebec from Canada.
Fascist movements in Europe were the set of various fascist ideologies which were practiced by governments and political organizations in Europe during the 20th century. Fascism was born in Italy following World War I, and other fascist movements, influenced by Italian Fascism, subsequently emerged across Europe. Among the political doctrines which are identified as ideological origins of fascism in Europe are the combining of a traditional national unity and revolutionary anti-democratic rhetoric which was espoused by the integral nationalist Charles Maurras and the revolutionary syndicalist Georges Sorel.
Fascist movements gained popularity in many countries in Asia during the 1920s.
Fascism has a long history in North America, with the earliest movements appearing shortly after the rise of fascism in Europe. Charles Derber, PhD, from Arizona State University says North American fascism may have inspired Hitler and started as early as 1918, with Hitler and Mussolini possibly able to simultaneously speak in 1919.
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 Canadian Nationalist Party was a fascist antisemitic party founded in Winnipeg, Manitoba by William Whittaker, a British ex-soldier who had served with the British Army in India, and a dozen Anglo-Saxon war veterans, in September 1933. The party initially claimed it was for equality of all citizens, but Whittaker was soon condemning Jews in his speeches at public rallies and in the party's newspaper, The Canadian Nationalist, and its other propaganda, leading to opponents confronting him at his rallies and being violently removed, often by police. The organization was modelled on Nazi stormtroopers and would march through Winnipeg's streets wearing khaki shirts, light brown breeches, and riding boots. Whittaker's lieutenant, Harry Simkins, and other CNP members dissatisfied with Whittaker's leadership, left to form the British Empire Union of Fascists in 1934.
The Canadian League for Peace and Democracy, founded in October 1934 as the Canadian League Against War and Fascism, was an anti-fascist mass organization chaired by A. A. MacLeod and allied with the Communist Party of Canada. It gained prominence as a leading organizer of opposition within Canada to Nazi Germany following Hitler's rise to power and as an opponent of fascist groups organizing within Canada in the years leading up to World War II. It was dissolved in 1940 following the implementation of the Defence of Canada Regulations.