The Balance of English & French Interests during the Conscription Crises of World War Two

 

By Michael Suddard

 

            On September 10^th of 1939, Canada officially declared war on Germany.  The declaration was in response to the German invasion of Poland that started at dawn of September 1^st.  The Soviet troops, as previously agreed with Germany, also invaded Poland.  With two forces invading, Poland surrendered.  Britain, France, and Canada honoured their pledge to Poland.[1]  The Second World War was now underway.

 

            During the Second World War, Canadian forces suffered heavy casualties resulting from the several battles including the loss of Hong Kong to the Japanese (2,000 casualties[2]) and the failed Dieppe raid (3,367 casualties[3]).  These casualties, in addition to the casualties from the other battles, needed to be replaced with new enlistments.  The Defence Minister, J.L. Ralston, called on the Prime Minister and Cabinet to impose conscription so that the remaining forces could easily be re-supplied.

 

            However, Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King decided against the option of conscription.  Conscription, King knew, was an issue that deeply divided the country along its linguistic lines of English and French.  This was because Conscription was instituted in 1917 during the First World War.  The French called the First World War ‘an English War’ that had no relevance to the Dominion of Canada.[4]  French-Canadians also viewed the war as being punishment to France for deserting “her Canadians a century and a half ago, had left them in the snow and ice along the Saint Lawrence surrounded by their enemies”.[5] Therefore, French-Canadians felt that they had no sense of duty in defending either England or France.  The English, however, were in favour of conscription.  They cited the fact that Great Britain was in trouble and needed assistance and as their largest supporter, Canada should assist.[6]  William Lyon Mackenzie King noticed this deep divide that could possibly re-ignite itself and deeply divide the country when he needed the country to be unified the most.  Therefore, King made a decision.

 

        King’s decision would be presented to the War Committee meeting of April 30, 1941 when he said “that ‘the present government could have no thought of conscription for overseas service, under any circumstances.’”[7]  This would be the thesis of the Mackenzie King Government during the Second World War.  This thesis lasted until the Minister of National Defence, J.L. Ralston, revealed “that there had been a miscalculation: 15,000 additional trained infantry would have to be sent from Canada before the new year to meet estimated demands in Northwest Europe and Italy”.[8]  The issue stunned the Liberal Cabinet.  William Lyon Mackenzie King had no other alternative but to impose conscription.  However, with his cabinet deeply divided, King realized that he had to balance the interests of both English and French Canadians over this divisive issue.  This balancing of interests is evident when we study the origins of the conscription question, the Plebiscite of 1942, the divide of the Liberal Cabinet, and the results of the introduction of the conscription bill.

 

        William Lyon Mackenzie King was not the first Canadian Prime Minister to face the problem of conscription and, therefore, could rely on Sir Wilfrid Laurier for some experience on how to solve the issue of conscription.  The Boer War that began in 1899 presented the first opportunity for conscription in Canadian history.  On October 9^th 1899 Great Britain, lead by Prime Minister Joseph Chamberlain, declared war on the Boers of South Africa.[9]  Canada would be drawn into this conflict because of its imperial connections that it maintained with Britain.  These imperial connections would cause a political problem for Canada’s Prime Minister, Sir Wilfrid Laurier.  Laurier’s problem is best described by Alvin Finkel and Margaret Conrad in their book the History of the Canadian Peoples:

 

When Britain declared war against Dutch settlers – called Boers – in South Africa in 1899, many Anglophone Canadians felt it was their war too.  Laurier faced enormous pressures to send a Canadian contingent to South Africa, not only from imperialist minded English Canadians, but also from the commander of the Canadian militia the British Colonial Secretary, [and British Prime Minister Joseph Chamberlain].[10]

 

Laurier was forced to consider the pressure and that he must act; however, he also felt opposition mainly from French-Canadian Nationalists who thought of the war as being only ‘England’s conflict’.[11]  Therefore, Laurier knew that if he were to survive politically beyond the next general election, he would have to find a political compromise.

 

        Laurier required a compromise to this situation because of the differences in political ideologies between the English and the French in Canada.  This conflict split the Liberal Party.  On one side Laurier had Henri Bourassa and other French-Canadian Nationalists who refused to let Canada become involved in the conflict because the Boer War had nothing to do with Canada’s interests.[12]  On the other side Laurier found the English Canadian Liberals who, if Laurier refused to act, would find themselves in political trouble in their English dominated ridings.

 

        Wilfrid Laurier appeared to be stuck in a situation that appeared to have no answer.  This is because no matter what position Laurier assumes, one language group would be upset with him.  However, Laurier would surprise his critics by taking his usual “middle of the road”[13] approach.  Laurier proposed that instead of imposing conscription, that only voluntary enlistment would be necessary.  Voluntary enlistment, Laurier felt, would appease the French Canadians because they would not be forced into conscription for what they saw as ‘England’s War’.  However, Laurier’s solution would appease the English because they were able to support the ‘mother country’ if they wished.

 

        Laurier also proposed to pay the costs of transporting the voluntarily enlisted troops to the conflict and equip them.  Laurier, however, refused to pay the volunteers.  The wages of the volunteers would be left up to Great Britain to handle.  “On the grounds that the effort would lost little financially, he refused to debate the issue in the [House of] Commons”.[14]  Laurier decided not to debate the issue in the House of Commons because the offers of service were only considered to be from individuals to Great Britain and not in response to the pleas for assistance from Great Britain to the Government of Canada.  Laurier’s position is supported by British Prime Minister Joseph Chamberlain who issued a “dispatch…expressing thanks for individual offers of service, and stating that four units of one hundred and twenty-five men each would gladly be accepted, to be equipped and sent to Africa at their own…cost”.[15]  The agreement of the British, as mentioned in Chamberlain’s dispatch, to assume the costs of outfitting enlistments and assuming military command over the enlistments would further support Laurier’s argument for not recalling parliament.[16]  The actions by Laurier would appease both French and English Canadians.  The French Canadians would be satisfied because it could be viewed that Canada had little to no involvement in ‘England’s War’.  English Canadians would be satisfied with Laurier’s solution because of the fact that Laurier had provided an opportunity for them to support Great Britain’s cause if they so wished.

 

        William Lyon Mackenzie King would remember Laurier’s reasoning when the Robert Borden Government drafted the Military Service Act of 1917.  In the Military Service Act of 1917, Borden felt that conscription was necessary in order to ensure that Canadian troops overseas would be adequately reinforced when necessary.[17]  However, William Lyon Mackenzie King would not be able to voice his concerns over this bill considering he was defeated in the riding of York North in the election of 1917.  The Military Service Act of 1917 would cause rioting in the streets of Montreal and Quebec City.[18]  King realized that the issue of conscription would deeply divide the country when he needed national unity the most.  Therefore, King, in 1940, decided that overseas conscription would not be considered when he drafted the National Resources Mobilization Act. 

 

        On the morning of June 18, 1940, William Lyon Mackenzie King drafted the National Resources Mobilization Act aiming for a typical Laurier ‘middle of the road’ approach to the situation.  As J.L Granatstein writes in his book, Canada’s War: The Politics of the Mackenzie King Government, 1935-1945, “The Bill, he said would ‘confer upon the government special emergency powers to mobilize all our human material resources in the defence of Canada.’”[19]  To ensure that French-Canadians were satisfied, King said the bill “will relate solely and exclusively to the defence of Canada on our own soil and in our own territorial waters”.[20]  King said this because he realized that French-Canadians would never agree to conscription for overseas service, but would agree to conscription for the defence of the Dominion of Canada.  King was correct in this assumption because, as J.L. Granatstein writes in his book, Mackenzie King: His Life and World, “in Quebec the people accepted the idea that compulsion for the defence of the homeland was necessary”.[21]  Therefore, King had adequately satisfied the people of Quebec on the issue of conscription.

 

        English Canadians supported instituting conscription citing the fact that many of their sons had been killed or injured when they were conscripted for the First World War.  However, their feelings would change when Germany, on May 10^th 1940, launched “her blitzkrieg against Holland, Luxembourg, Belgium and France”.[22]  English Canadians felt that after Germany had completed the takeover of mainland Europe, the British Isles would be next.  Therefore, English Canadians called on the Mackenzie King government to institute full conscription for overseas service in order to ensure that Great Britain would be adequately defended.  King refused citing the fact that French Canadians would be against the issue of conscription, and, therefore, he did not want to jeopardize Canadian unity when he required it most.  King also responded that if they were interested in supporting Great Britain’s defences, Canadians were free to voluntarily enlist overseas service.  The voluntary enlistment idea was originally a part of the Laurier compromise during the Boer War.  King felt that he had solved the issue of conscription by referencing the experiences of his political predecessors. 

 

        William Lyon Mackenzie King would be correct that he solved the issue of conscription.  However, in 1942 the issue would once again come to the forefront.  In 1942, King would be forced to re-evaluate his position when the Defence Minister, “Colonel Ralston, pressed for the further expansion of the army overseas”.[23]  King realized that any further expansion of the army overseas would require the possibility of conscription.  Conscription would be required because voluntary enlistment had only given the military 609,000 men that were still left in Canada who could “conceivably be called to the colours”.[24]  However, Ralston had laid out a plan that would require the use of more men then were currently available.  Ralston’s plan:

 

hoped to expand…into a five-division army of two corps, an army that would undoubtedly require extraordinary effort to maintain at full strength with reinforcements once the hard fighting had began.  The difficulty, as a Cabinet manpower study clearly demonstrated, was that only 609,000 men were left in Canada who could conceivably be called to the colours.  Of that number untold thousands were required to fill the jobs in industry while the navy

and air force programs would take at least 175,000.[25]

 

This was not the only problem for the King administration.  Hong Kong had already fallen to the Japanese on Christmas Day of 1941.  Therefore, King feared the Japanese might look at invading North America.  He also knew that Pearl Harbour had occurred the day before the attack on Hong Kong had been launched.  Therefore, the Americans would be requesting the Canadian government to help defend North American from the Japanese.

 

        King knew that without a national recruiting campaign that Ralston’s plans would never work.  The Prime Minister also had reports coming in saying that the war was not going well in Europe, France had fallen and Great Britain was under siege from the air.  King knew that it was only a matter of time before a land invasion into Great Britain by the Germans would occur.  King decided to call a national plebiscite to occur on April 27^th of 1942 in order to delay his decision just a little bit longer. 

 

        William Lyon Mackenzie King feared what French-Canadians would think of the plebiscite.  Therefore, the plebiscite question did not have the word ‘conscription’ within it.  The question, as the voters would have found it in the polling booth, was: “Are you in favour of releasing the Government from any obligations arising from military service?”[26]  In other words, the plebiscite was asking Canadians whether they agreed or disagreed on letting the government institute whatever means necessary in order to support the war, including the possibility of conscription.  The word conscription, King felt, was not necessary because it was associated with sending men overseas.  Mackenzie King felt, as he says in one of his speeches to Canada on the CBC, “the way conscription was introduced [in previous wars], and the way it was enforced, gave rise to bitter resentment”.[27]  King addressed the fact that there were other issues that required manpower in order to supply the war effort.  These come out in Angus Macdonald’s notes of the interview that Ralston, King, and himself had over the issue of the plebiscite.  In the conversation King said, according to Macdonald’s notes,:

 

We must be sure we would get more men under conscription than without it.  We must fill the needs of industry, farming, home defence, as well as the needs of the armed forces…Conditions in this country might get so bad that no-one could govern the country.  If you use machine guns, what would be the use of conscription?[28]

 

King addressed the plebiscite in this way in order to not offend French-Canadians.  He also recognized the fact that if conscription needed to be instated, the requirements of supporting the military cause would not just be in sending men overseas, but would also require men to labour in Canada in order to supply the forces overseas.  Supplying the extra forces overseas would require increased food production, munitions production, and providing men for defending the homeland.

 

        Mackenzie King also recognized the fact that the average Canadian could not decide whether if conscription was necessary.  This is because “the question of conscription…is a military question”.[29]  William Lyon Mackenzie King felt that the only place was to discuss the issue of conscription was in Parliament.  Parliament was the institution that needed to debate the issue “in the light of all national considerations”.[30]  King was referring again to the fact that conscription would be required to ensure that food production and munitions production was increased and not just for sending men overseas to war.  Therefore, he was requesting the people of Canada not to vote whether they wanted conscription instituted, but whether Parliament could use the option of conscription when it was absolutely necessary.

 

        The results of the plebiscite had both positive and negative aspects.  The results display the differences in support of conscription between the English and the French.  “Overall 64 percent of Canadians voted ‘yes’, at least 85 percent of Quebec Francophones demanded that King honour his original promise”[31] of no conscription.  The results of the plebiscite only confirmed King’s thesis that conscription was still a very divisive issue no matter what terms were associated with it.  Therefore, “King continued to resist imposing conscription”.[32]  However, he could only resist for so long.

 

        The Defence Minister, J.L. Ralston, did not interpret the results of the plebiscite as being an order by Quebec to resist conscription.  In fact, Ralston believed, “the results…were a clear go-ahead signal”.[33]  Ralston questioned if the overall results were not important, then “what other purpose had the plebiscite had?”[34]  However, Ralston failed to notice the differences in results when contrasting along linguistic lines.  Mackenzie King had done this and realized, as Sir Wilfrid Laurier had during the Boer War, that the English were still interested in supporting the mother country, whereas the French were only interested in protecting Canada from invasion.  Because Ralston failed to see the results of the plebiscite from King’s angle, Ralston would continue with his campaign to increase the military’s forces through the use of conscription.

 

        William Lyon Mackenzie King would be able to avoid the issue of conscription until the month of October 1944.  After returning from an inspection of the troops in Great Britain, the Defence Minister met with the Prime Minister. The discussion is best outlined by J.W. Pickersgill and D. F. Forster in their book The Mackenzie King Record, when Ralston said: “that the fighting had been more intense than had been anticipated. [Ralston] spoke of the numbers in the reserve being considerably less than had been anticipated when the estimate was made”.[35]  After Ralston had finished delivering his message to Mackenzie King, King responded by asking Ralston how, after the allied forces were liberating one country after another, “the people of Canada would understand why [the government] should resort to conscription?”[36]  King figured that if conscription were imposed when the Allied forces were making so much progress with the resources that they already had, why would the Allied forces require more men?  King also questioned why Canada needed to increase its support of the war when “our war effort had been larger in proportion than that of any other country”.[37]  King also feared the demand for more men to be sent overseas would split his Cabinet.

 

        Mackenzie King was correct in this assumption.  Ralston delivered his findings to the Cabinet meeting.  Ralston said:

 

I must say to Council, that while I am ready to explore the situation further, as I see it at the moment, I feel that there is no alternative but for me to recommend the extension of service of NRMA personnel to overseas.[38]

 

In other words, Ralston recommended to Cabinet that some of the men that were conscripted for the defence of Canada, should be sent overseas.  The Prime Minister responded by saying that he disagreed with Ralston, citing the fact that the allied forces were progressing well and that the voluntary enlistments for overseas use had more than adequately replaced the casualties in the past five years of the war.

 

        King, however, wanted to see the response of the Cabinet.  “Three-quarters supported [King’s] position, but those opposed included some of the most important English-speaking ministers.  The French-speaking cabinet members, of course, supported King against Ralston”.[39]  King had won again.  The Prime Minister was not willing to side with English Canadians and loose the support of French-Canadians.  This was true considering not one of his French-speaking cabinet members had supported Ralston’s plea for conscription.  Mackenzie King thought that conscription would be unnecessary because the war was practically over.  This thought is supported by King’s diary entry:

 

I believe that we shall get through without conscription and that the same power which has guided me in the past will continue to guide me through another very difficult period.[40]

 

King thought that God was on his side and that God would guide him through the problem of conscription.  King believed that Ralston was the one behind the move towards conscription.[41]  Therefore, on November 1^st of 1944, “Ralston was replaced…by General A.G.L. McNaughton, an artillery commander in the First World War and King’s choice in 1939 to command the army overseas”.[42]

 

        McNaughton promised William Lyon Mackenzie King that “the reinforcements could be obtained on a voluntary basis.”[43]  Obviously this statement pleased King.  The Prime Minister thought he had overcome the slide towards conscription by replacing his Defence Minister with an experienced general who had a first hand encounter with the front lines in Europe.  King figured that he would not have to worry about the issue of conscription because McNaughton would be able to find enough voluntary enlistments both from the general public and the Canadian conscripts.  King thought he, like Laurier, had balanced the ideologies of both the English and the French on the issue of conscription.

 

        However, this would not be the case because McNaughton failed in his attempt to recruit enough voluntary enlistments that were required to be sent overseas.  In fact, McNaughton was not even close to the quota of 15,000.[44]  McNaughton, “between November 1 and 18, only [found] 549 men…for overseas service”.[45]  The Defence Minister phoned King with the news.  The Prime Minister had to face the consequences and upset national unity.

 

        First, King had to convince the French-speaking members in his party to support him on the introduction of the bill for conscription.  The Prime Minister would rise in the House of Commons to deliver his speech in order to introduce the conscription bill.  As J.L. Granatstein writes in his book, Conscription in the Second World War 1939-1945, “When he rose to address the House of Commons on November 27, King turned his back on the opposition benches and spoke directly to his own French-Canadian M.P.’s”.[46]  The biggest plea for support from his French-speaking Cabinet Ministers comes at the end of his lengthy speech when King, as quoted from the Hansard of that day, said:

 

If there is anything to which I have devoted my political life, it is to try to promote unity, harmony and amity between the diverse elements of this country.  My friends can desert me, they can remove their confidence from me, they can withdraw the trust they have placed in my hands, but never shall I deviated from that line of policy.  Whatever may be the consequences, whether loss of prestige, loss of popularity, or loss of power, I feel that I am in the right, and I know that a time will come when every man will render me a full justice on that score.[47]

 

The speech was a success. “Of the fifty-seven French-Canadian members of parliament voting on the government’s policy, twenty-three supported King, a striking high number in view of the opposition to conscription in Quebec”.[48]  Mackenzie King had successfully balanced the interests of both the English and the French over the issue of conscription.  King had shown to French-Canadians that he had tried every alternative but conscription.  Therefore, the Prime Minister hoped, that French-Canadians would support his decision.  Canada would only send 16,000 conscripts overseas immediately.[49]

 

        The issue of conscription in the Second World War, King feared, would deeply divide the country along its linguistic lines.  However, in the end William Lyon Mackenzie King was able to show French-Canadians that the Liberal Government had tried everything in its power to avoid conscription.  The plebiscite, King had hoped, was to show his Cabinet how divisive the issue of conscription really was between English and French Canadians.  The plebiscite was a success.  The result showed just how divisive the issue was.  The results displayed that eighty-five percent of the Quebec francophone population was against conscription.  However, by politically manoeuvring his way through the situation, King was successfully able to balance the interests of both French and English Canadians.  William Lyon Mackenzie King would be the last Canadian Prime Minister to have to balance the issue of the French and English interests over the topic of conscription.

 

 

Bibliography

 

Primary Sources

 

Dominion of Canada Official Report of Debates House of Commons. Volume VI (1944). Ottawa: Edmond Cloutier, Printer to the King’s Most Excellent Majesty, 1945.

 

King, William Lyon Mackenzie.  King and the Fight for Freedom. New York: Hawthorn books, Inc., 1972.

 

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Behiels, Michael. “The Bloc Populaire Canadien and the Origins of French-Canadian Neo-nationalism, 1942-8.”  The Canadian Historical Review.  Volume 63, No. 4 (December 1982): 487-512.

 

Behiels, Michael. “The New Imperialism:  Colonialism or British Canadian Nation.” University of Ottawa.  Ottawa, 12 October 1999.

 

Behiels, Michael. “W.L.M. King and the spectre of conscription.” University of Ottawa. Ottawa, 13 January 2000.

 

“Conscription.” The War Amps of Canada.  Online. Internet. 25 Feb. 2001 Available: http://www.waramps.ca/Operation/wa-consr.html.

 

Dawson, R. MacGregor.  The Conscription Crises of 1944. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1961.

 

Finkel, Alvin, and Margaret Conrad.  History of the Canadian Peoples, 1867 to Present. Volume II.  2^nd ed.  Toronto: Copp Clark Ltd., 1998.

 

Granatstein, J.L. Canada’s War: The Politics of the Mackenzie King Government, 1939-1945. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990.

 

Granatstein, J.L. Conscription in the Second World War 1939-1945.  Toronto: The Ryerson Press, 1969.

 

Granatstein, J.L. Mackenzie King: His Life and World. Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson Limited, 1977.

 

Keshen, Jeff. “Canada in World War II: 1939-1945.” University of Ottawa. Ottawa, 12 March 1999.

 

Pickersgill, J.W. The Mackenzie King Record. Volume I. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1960.

 

Pickersgill, J.W. and D.W. Forester. The Mackenzie King Record. Volume II. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1968.

 

Skelton, Oscar Douglas.  Life and Letters of Sir Wilfrid Laurier. Toronto: McLelland and Stewart Ltd., 1965.

 

Skelton, Oscar Douglas. The Day of Sir Wilfrid Laurier: A Chronicle of Our Times.  Glasgow: Brook & Company, 1916.

 

“The Raid on Dieppe.”  Veterans Affairs Canada. 1998.  Online. Internet. 20 February 2001.  Available: http://www.vac-acc.gc.ca/general/sub.cfm?source=history/secondwar/canada2/dieppe.

 

“The War Begins.” Veterans Affairs Canada. 1998. Online. Internet. 20 February 2001.  Available: http://www.vac-acc.gc.ca/general/sub.cfm?source=history/secondwar/canada2/warbeg.  

 

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