Donald C. MacDonald

Encyclopedia : D : DO : DON : Donald C. MacDonald

Donald MacDonald at Queen's Park.

Donald Cameron MacDonald (born December 7, 1913) is a long time Canadian politician. He served in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1955 to 1982, and from 1953 to 1970 was the leader of the Ontario Cooperative Commonwealth Federation and its successor, the New Democratic Party of Ontario.

Early life and career

MacDonald was born in Cranbrook, British Columbia, and moved with his family to Tullochgorum, Quebec in 1923. He supported the Conservative Party of Canada in his youth, but became a democratic socialist after witnessing the social problems of the Great Depression. He worked for several years as a teacher and journalist, and was employed by the Montreal Gazette in the mid-1930s.

Armed forces service

MacDonald joined the Royal Canadian Navy in 1942, and served in Canada during World War II as secretary of a top-secret intelligence committee, the main responsibility of which was to transmit enemy submarine positions to the Royal Canadian Air Force. He later became editor of Canadian Digest, a magazine published by the military that provided a cross section of articles from Canadian periodicals and newspapers, and was the host of Serviceman's Forum, a regular series of broadcasts on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that were also aired by the British Broadcasting Corporation. Members of the military and civilian experts discussed issues of concern in these broadcasts.

Political life

MacDonald joined the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation while serving in Ottawa, Ontario in 1942 . In 1946, he joined the national CCF staff and travelled the country as a party organizer. He was a candidate in the August 1953 federal election for the British Columbia riding of Kootenay East, and finished a strong third against Liberal Jim Byrne with 28% of the vote. He was persuaded to run for the Ontario CCF leadership later in the same year, and defeated Fred Young and Andrew Brewin for the position.

MacDonald took over the party in the middle of the Cold War and at the height of McCarthyism, when socialism was viewed with suspicion. The CCF had almost won power in Ontario ten years earlier, winning 34 seats in the 1943 provincial election, but by the time MacDonald became leader it held only two seats in the legislature. MacDonald was himself without a seat until the 1955 provincial election, when he defeated Progressive Conservative incumbent William Beech by 1,426 votes in York South. His victory increased the CCF's legislative standing to three seats, and MacDonald quickly became known as one of the most vocal members of the legislature. He fought for issues such as prison reform and universal public healthcare, and emphasised pragmatism over doctrinaire socialism as he tried to appeal to voters as a moderate reformer. Some Toronto newspapers described him as the de facto opposition leader against Leslie Frost's Progressive Conservative government.

MacDonald slowly rebuilt the party during his tenure as leader, and provided it with an avuncular public face. The CCF grew to five seats in the 1959 provincial election, and then followed the federal Cooperative Commonwealth Federation's example by changing its name to the "New Democratic Party" in 1961. The new party won seven seats in the 1963 election, and MacDonald later expressed disappointment that it a larger breakthrough did not occur.

As the province's population became more urban and as social issues came to the forefront of political discussion, the NDP had a major breakthrough in the 1967 election rising from seven seats to 20. This new success led to increasing pressure for new leadership, as the party was seen as a potential victor and many activists felt a younger leader was needed to catch the mood of the times. Jim Renwick challenged MacDonald for the party leadership in 1968, but lost. In 1970, Stephen Lewis was able to marshall support among the Steelworkers union with which his family had strong links. (His father, David Lewis, had represented the steelworkers as a labour lawyer for many years.) MacDonald decided not to seek re-election as leader in order to avoid a divisive fight. At the leadership convention that fall, Stephen Lewis defeated Walter Pitman and succeeded MacDonald as Ontario NDP leader.

MacDonald was officially neutral in the 1970 leadership contest, but tacitly favoured Pitman. In his autobiography, MacDonald notes that he was initially skeptical about the younger Lewis's leadership abilities, and believed that his election "fitted conveniently into the Tory plans" for the next election. (MacDonald, Happy Warrior, p. 172) The Progressive Conservative government was able to rally business support by depicting Lewis as dangerously left-wing, and the NDP did not gain seats in the 1971 election. MacDonald has also argued that the party's breakthrough under Lewis in the 1975 election was made possible by Lewis's decision to moderate his more strident views.

MacDonald supported Ian Deans's unsuccessful bid to replace Lewis as party leader in 1978, and helped to draft Bob Rae for the leadership in 1982. He then resigned as an MPP in 1982, to give Rae an opportunity to enter the legislature. MacDonald served as chair of the NDP caucus from 1982 to 1985, and was chair of the Ontario Election Finances Commission from 1986 to 1994.

MacDonald's autobiography, Happy Warrior: Political Memoirs, was published in 1988.

Preceded by: Ted Jolliffe

Ontario CCF/NDP leaders

Succeeded by: Stephen Lewis

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.