Thomas D'Arcy Leonard (April 29, 1895 – May 25, 1977) was a Canadian Senator and corporate executive.
A lawyer by profession, Leonard was called to the bar in 1918. In the 1930s, he became solicitor for the Canada Permanent Mortgage Corporation and Canada Permanent Trust as well as legal counsel for Dominion Mortgage and Investment and the Trust Companies Association of Ontario. [1]
From 1951 to 1958, he served as president and general manager of Canada Permanent Trust and Continental Life Insurance and Triarch Corporation. [1]
He was president of the National War Finance Committee during World War II and was also president of the Toronto Community Chest on several occasions. [1]
The Community Chests in the United States and Canada were fund-raising organizations that collected money from local businesses and workers and distributed it to community projects. The first Community Chest, "Community Fund", was founded in 1913 in Cleveland, Ohio by the Federation for Charity and Philanthropy. The number of Community Chest organizations increased from 39 to 353 between 1919 and 1929, and surpassed 1,000 by 1948. By 1963, and after several name changes, the term "United Way" was adopted in the United States, whereas the United Way/Centraide name was not adopted in Canada until 1973–74.
Leonard was appointed to the Senate of Canada in 1955 by Louis St. Laurent. [2] He sat in the body as a Liberal until April 29, 1970, when he voluntarily retired at the age of 75.
The Senate of Canada is the upper house of the Parliament of Canada, along with the House of Commons and the Monarch. The Senate is modelled after the British House of Lords and consists of 105 members appointed by the Governor General on the advice of the Prime Minister. Seats are assigned on a regional basis: four regions—defined as Ontario, Quebec, the Maritime provinces, and the Western provinces—each receive 24 seats, with the remaining portions of the country—Newfoundland and Labrador receiving 6 seats and the three northern territories each assigned the remaining one seat. Senators may serve until they reach the age of 75.
Louis Stephen St. Laurent was the 12th prime minister of Canada, from 15 November 1948 to 21 June 1957. He was a Liberal with a strong base in the Catholic francophone community, from which base he had long mobilised support to Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King. His foreign policy initiatives transformed Canada from an isolationist ex-colony with little role in world affairs to an active "middle power". St. Laurent was an enthusiastic proponent of Canada's joining NATO in 1949 to fight the spread of Communism, overcoming opposition from some intellectuals, the Labor-Progressive Party, and many French Canadians. The contrast with Mackenzie King was not dramatic – they agreed on most policies. St. Laurent had more hatred of communism, and less fear of the United States. He was neither an idealist nor a bookish intellectual, but an "eminently moderate, cautious conservative man ... and a strong Canadian nationalist".
The Liberal Party of Canada is the oldest and longest-serving governing political party in Canada. The Liberals form the current government, elected in 2015. The party has dominated federal politics for much of Canada's history, holding power for almost 69 years in the 20th century—more than any other party in a developed country—and as a result, it is sometimes referred to as Canada's "natural governing party".
In the Senate, Leonard served as chairman of the Standing Committee on Finance and the Standing Committee on Transport and Communications in the mid to late 1960s. [3]
After retiring from the Upper House he served as chairman of St. Michael's Hospital's building fund campaign. [1]
