War Measures Act

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The War Measures Act (enacted in August 1914, replaced by the Emergencies Act in 1988) was a Canadian statute that allowed the government to assume sweeping emergency powers. It was patterned after the British Defence of the Realm Act enacted about the same time. When the act was invoked, citizens could be arrested and imprisoned without the benefit of trial or even a stated explanation. Some wrongly claimed that it created a state of martial law throughout the country. Martial law is characterized by the assumption of powers of trial and punishment by the Armed Forces which did not apply under this act.

The Act compelled enemy aliens to register with the government and was used against Ukrainian Canadians, Germans and Slavs in World War I and Italian, German and Japanese Canadians in World War II (as well as, ironically, some Jews of German origin).

The act was invoked three times in Canadian history:

World War I

see main article: Ukrainian-Canadian internment

Thousands of Ukrainians and other Europeans were interned in 24 concentration camps across Canada as a result of the War Measures Act, issuing into Canada's first national internment operations of 1914-1920. These "enemy aliens" not only suffered imprisonment but many thousands more were forced to carry identity documents and report regularly to the authorities. Those who were jailed were forced to do heavy labour in locations far removed from their families and communities, for the profit of their gaolers. They also suffered the confiscation of what little wealth they had, a portion of which remains in Government of Canada coffers to this day. They were also subjected to various other state-sanctioned censures, including restrictions on their freedom of movement, association and free speech and, in 1917, to disenfranchisement. The internment operations continued until June 1920, nearly 2 years after the end of the war. Since the mid-1980s the Ukrainian Canadian community (www.uccla.ca) has called for an official recognition of the crippling legacy of the internment operations and a restitution of the contemporary value of the internees' confiscated wealth, those monies to be dedicated to various commemorative and educational projects that would ensure no other Canadian ethnic, religious or racial minority ever suffers as Ukrainian Canadians once did.

World War II

During the war there was widespread fear of foreign nationals spying and working against the country of Canada. Many Canadians felt that citizens were still loyal to original homeland. As a result the federal government used the act to implement Japanese Canadian internment. Any citizen of Japanese descent including children were sent to prison camps for the duration of the war.

The FLQ Crisis

In 1970, Quebec nationalists and FLQ members kidnapped British diplomat James Cross and Quebec provincial cabinet minister Pierre Laporte, who was later killed. What is now referred to as the October Crisis ( a.k.a Black October), raised fears in Canada of a militant terrorist faction rising up against the government. At the request of the government of the Province of Quebec, and in response to general threats and demands made by the FLQ, the federal Liberal government of Pierre Trudeau invoked the act. He did this so police had more power in arrest and detention, so they could find and stop the FLQ members. There was a large amount of concern about the act being invoked as it was a direct threat to civil liberties

External links

• [War Measures Act in the Canadian Encyclopedia]
• [Text of War Measures Act]

 

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