Richard Bedford Bennett

See also: Bennett

the very honourable Richard Bedford Bennett , 1st Viscount Bennett, C.P., C.R., K.G.St.J, LL.B, C.R. (born the July 3rd 1870 and dead the June 26th 1947) was the 11th Prime Minister of Canada, station which it occupied of the August 7th 1930 with the October 23rd 1935.

It was born with Hopewell Hill, the New Brunswick, and made its studies with the Université Dalhousie, finishing in 1893 with a diploma in right. Bennett was professor, principal, lawyer and business man before launching out in local policy. Before moving in Alberta, he was partner at a lawyer firm with Chatham, in New Brunswick. max Aitken (known later under the name of Lord Beaverbrook) was its boy of office. It was also alderman of the town of Chatham for a certain time.

In 1905, Bennett was the first chief of the Conservative party of Alberta and, in 1909, gained a seat with the législatitive Assemblée before making the jump in federal policy. He was elected with the House of Commons of Canada in 1911, was appointed Minister for Finance in 1926 and became conservative leader in 1927 with the first congress with the direction of the party.

He was elected Prime Minister of Canada in 1930, demolishing William Lyon Mackenzie King. This arrived at the same moment that the worst economic depression of the century struck the country. Bennett tried to fight the depression by increasing the trade with the British Empire and by imposing tariffs on the importation of the not-imperial products, promising that these measurements would propel the Canadian products on the worldwide markets. However, it had a limited success, and its impersonal style and its reputation of richness helped it to alienate good number of Canadian to the catches with poverty.

When its policy preferably imperial did not give the anticipated results, the Bennett government did not have any plan of replacement. Their inclination pro-businesses, pro-banks did not create any relief for the million unemployed whose despair and agitation were growing. The conservatives seemed undecided and unable to leave themselves there, and lost the confidence of Canadian quickly, becoming on the contrary an object of hatred, ridiculous and contempt. The motorists who could not pay any more for their gasoline were to make draw their cars by horses; have gave to these vehicles the name of Bennett buggies .

R.B. Bennett faced pressures as much of the interior that outside of its party:

the Co-operative the Commonwealth Federation, founded in 1932, prepared to dispute its first elections on a socialist platforme .
the movement of the social Crédit attracted itself supports in the Western and a shock wave shook the whole country when they gained the provincial elections albertaines and formed the government in September 1935.
Its own government undergoes the defection of the commercial Minister, Henry Herbert Stevens, who left the conservatives to found the Party of the rebuilding of Canada when Bennett refused to implement the plans of Stevens for a drastic economic reform and economic interventionism governmental to manage the crisis.

Reacting to fears of communist subversion , Bennett used discussed section 98 of the Canadian criminal Code. This section allowed the imprisonment of any person member of an organization which officially aimed at reversing the government by violence, even if the person in question had never made violent action where even did not preach such actions personally. Thanks to this law, leaders of the Communist party of Canada, whose Tim Buck, was stopped and put in prison due to sedition. However, this strategy appeared strong embarrassing for the government when Buck was victim of apparent attempt at assassination when, lasting a riot in the prison, one drew to him above even if it did not take part in any way in the riot. The Bennett government was forced to acknowledge that it had ordered the shootings, supposedly with an aim of making fear with Buck. Bennett lost any credibility vis-a-vis Buck and its strategy was turned over against him; Buck soon was slackened and accommodated as hero by the population which saw in him a defender of the civil liberties.

Bennett tried to prevent the social disorder by evacuating the unemployed in camps of help far from the cities, but this did nothing but exacerbate the social strains; the unemployed organized a demonstration ( One to Ottawa Trek , walk towards Ottawa) and hoped to go by train Vancouver to Ottawa, gathering new demonstrators in way, in order to complain in Bennett in person. Walk ended with Regina on July 1st 1935 when the royal Gendarmerie of Canada, on order of the Prime Minister, tackled a public meeting of 3000 people, making a death and tens of casualties.

According to the setting in motion of the New Deal of the US president Franklin D. Roosevelt, Bennett changed tactic and proposed its clean New Deal , including/understanding public expenditure of funds and the intervention of the state in the economy. Bennett proposed graduated incomes on the income, a Minimum wage, a maximum of work hours per week, a Insurance-employment, a Insurance-health, a program of the pensions widened and subsidies with the farmers. The conversion of the conservatives to the concept of the welfare state came too late to prevent their defeat with the hands of the liberal of Mackenzie King with the federal election in October 1935. The liberals gained 173 seats, against only 40 for the conservatives.

Richard Bennett took his retirement in England in 1938, and, in 1941, was the first (and the last) former Canadian Prime Minister with being named with the British House of Lords, becoming the 1st Vicomte Bennett, of Mickleham, Surrey.

He died the June 26th 1947 with Mickleham, in England, and was buried in the cemetery St Michael' S Churchyard. He is the only former Prime Minister buried out of the country.

External bonds

Biography on the '' biographical Dictionnaire of Canada in line
federal political Experiment, of the library of the Parliament

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