HOUSE OF COMMONS, OTTAWA, ONTARIO
FEBRUARY 25, 1919
Hon. Sir Thomas White:197 Mr. Speaker; I rise to refer to that sad occurrence, the sudden and lamented death of Right Honourable Sir Wilfrid Laurier which has cast a pall over the proceedings attending the opening of this session of Parliament, touched the hearts of all his fellow members, and created a profound and melancholy impression throughout the entire Canadian community. In years Sir Wilfrid Laurier had considerably exceeded the allotted span, yet such was the vigour of his mind, the animation of his appearance, the freshness of his interest in affairs, the charm and vivacity of his manner, and above all the great and conspicuous place which he had so long occupied in the minds and affections of his countrymen, that we had almost come to look upon him as immune from the vicissitudes of human infirmity, and, in a measure exempt from the conditions of our common mortality. For this reason the news of his departure has come with a sense of shock as well as of grief to all.
His death removes a most distinguished and commanding personality from the stage of Canadian public life. How considerable a part he played, we may realize when we reflect that he was actively engaged in national affairs at a period before many of us were born, that he was for almost half a century a legislative representative of the people, and for forty-five years a member of this House. He has been leader of the Liberal Party for more than thirty years, of which he was for fifteen years Prime Minister of Canada. During his long career he has been identified with all the great political controversies since the period of Confederation. His fame has carried far beyond the boundaries of Canada, and in Britain, France and the United States, as well as in other countries; the name of Sir Wilfrid Laurier has long been known, respected and admired as one of the outstanding statesmen of the age.
With such a career, with such titles to distinction, we of this House, who, next to his own immediate family and intimate personal circle, knew him best, may well upon this occasion, with profit to ourselves and in appreciation of him, examine as to the nature of the political principles to which he subscribed, his characteristics as a statesman, the personal qualities and attributes of the man himself, and the sources of the great power and influence which he exercised within and without the halls of Parliament. I am deeply conscious that there are many within sound of my voice who through longer association and acquaintance with him are much better qualified for this task than myself. Particularly do I wish that the head of the Government, the Prime Minister of Canada, the Right Honourable Sir Robert Borden, could be here to bear eloquent tribute to his great political opponent and warm personal friend.
It is not my intention to refer to the various controversies in which Sir Wilfrid Laurier during his long career was so actively engaged. Those controversies divided and some of them still divide the people and public men of this country. That is the natural and inevitable result of opposing views, opinions and convictions strongly and honourably held in a self-governing community such as ours. It is not my purpose to attempt to pass judgment upon the attitude of the dead leader towards these great questions. Even if it would be fitting and proper to do so, which it is not, we are too close to the events to make any contemporary opinion conclusive. The ultimate place and fame of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, will, like that of other statesmen, be determined by the impartial and impassionate judgment of history.
What were the foundations of this man’s political creed, the principles which guided his political action? Without pretending to be exhaustive, two or three outstanding facts emerge. Firstly, the man was strongly attached and devoted to the ideals of freedom and liberty, personal, civil and religious. He believed in freedom of opinion, liberty in its expression – that is to say, free speech, freedom of conscience – that is to say, religious liberty. That these were his views may be gathered not only from his own speeches but from the names of those whom he most admired, Fox, Gladstone, Bright, Lincoln. These names were often on his lips and he had diligently studied their careers and utterances.
From this starting point of attachment to these ideals of liberty and freedom, to which I think most in this country and all in this House now subscribe, he was led to greatly admire the British political system and the security and guarantees for liberty which it embodies and affords. Owing to the influences surrounding him in that troubled period, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, then but a young man, appears not to have realized, at least in its fullness, the vision of Confederation. It is, however, to his great and lasting credit that once it was accomplished he accepted the new conditions with whole-heartedness, and in his subsequent career did much in collaboration with other political leaders to develop its structure, interpret its meaning and mould it to the purposes for which it was designed.
He became a strong Federationist, a great admirer, exponent and champion of the Confederation pact and no question interested him quite so much as one relating to or affecting the Constitution. He was a great constitutionalist, an ardent upholder of the principles of free government with all that it involves. As nearly all questions arising out of our constitution have long since been settled and acquiesced in by all political parties, it seemed to me at times that in his character of constitutionalist and in his continued interest in the Constitution he was the dignified and solitary survivor of that great group of statesmen, giants in their day, who after prolonged and fiery discussion and controversy laid broad and deep the constitutional foundation of Canada’s national life. In this connection, and as again emphasizing the part played by Sir Wilfrid Laurier in Canadian affairs and the length of years spanned by his career, let us recall that he was minister in the Government of Alexander Mackenzie, served as lieutenant to Edward Blake, succeeded him as leader of the Liberal Party, and became the opponent of Sir John A. Macdonald, with whom he contended politically for many years.
Sir Wilfrid Laurier was an intense and ardent Canadian. He was a firm believer in Canada and its destiny, which he did much to mould. Particularly did he desire to harmonize the various nationalities of Canada with their conflicting ideals and aspirations. National unity he regarded as of paramount importance in a country of mixed races and diverse creeds such as Canada. He was regardful of the rights of minorities and a strong advocate of tolerance towards the opinions and convictions of others upon all questions, whether civil, racial or religious. He was a believer in democracy, but there was always in him a moderating and restraining influence, a pragmatical respect for experience and for the past which disinclined him to sudden or violent change and exercised a steadying influence in the determination of his policies.
For the British constitution and for the autonomy, freedom and security which it affords to all within the range of its beneficent sway, he had the greatest regard and admiration. In my last conversation with him he spoke in terms of highest eulogy of British administration in Egypt and said that he would have no fear for the mandatory system proposed at the Peace Conference if it would be carried out in accordance with the British mode of government in protectorates.
I am glad that he lived to see the end of the war and the triumph of the Allies – particularly Britain and France.
Coming now to the man himself and the sources of his personal power we find less difficulty in reaching conclusions. He was endowed by nature with a singularly graceful, picturesque and commanding personality, a stately bearing, a most gracious manner and rare charm of disposition. He had high intellectual culture and much personal kindliness of heart. The combination made him a great gentleman, whose distinction and individuality wrought an indelible impression upon all with whom he was brought in contact. While conciliatory and always a believer in persuasion rather than in compulsion, he had a firm will and strong tenacity of his settled views, opinions and policies. This gave him strength which always of itself attracts. He had in marked degree that mystic quality, that innate attribute called personal magnetism or personality, which is really the totality of excellence, physical, mental and moral, in its fortunate possessor.
His power of command over men was great. He was a natural leader because of his ascendancy in the realm of intellect and of will. When all we can say has been said, there still remains an indefinable, elusive and baffling something which we cannot express, but which gave him an amazing power in attracting and retaining the affection and devotion of his followers and adherents. It was this which caused him to be likened in the minds of many to Sir John A. Macdonald, who had the same notable faculty in supreme degree.
A further and great source of his power lay in his extraordinary gifts as an orator. As a speaker either in the House or on the public platform he took the highest rank. His oratorical achievements were greatly promoted and enforced by his individual characteristics and qualities, for it is an undoubted fact that much of the success of speech depends upon personality.
His style was simple, direct, lucid. It had been modelled upon the best examples of English prose, and had been fashioned and moulded by his study of the classics, which is the best school for literary form. Some of his speeches in this House were notable illustrations of the supreme art of the orator. Those upon the death of Sir John A. Macdonald, the Right Honourable Mr. Gladstone and Her Majesty Queen Victoria are among the finest in the history of panegyrical literature.
In the House, where he was a most assiduous attendant and an eager listener, he was always courteous and considerate of the views of opponents and was by them all personally liked and respected.
Such, in most imperfect outline, was Sir Wilfrid Laurier and the principles and ideals for which he stood. He was idolized among the French Canadian portion of our population as their great exemplar and representative on the floor of Parliament and as Prime Minister of Canada for so long a period. They were naturally and justly proud of his high intellectual qualities and the force and strength of his character, his political sagacity and his success as a statesman. But apart from those of his own race he had devoted followers and admirers without number throughout the other provinces of Canada. His private life was simple and blameless, and he leaves behind him a career unsullied by self-seeking or love of gain. To state that he had defects, that he made mistakes at times, is only to say that he was human and what he himself would be the first to admit and acknowledge.
We mourn his loss. We feel that a great gap has been created in this House, that a powerful link with the past has been snapped and broken beyond repair. The spirit of the age has altered since the days when Sir Wilfrid Laurier was in his political prime. Times change and men change with them – in appearance, manner, methods, characteristics.
We desire to express our most heartfelt sympathy to that most worthy helpmate, the light of whose life has gone out in the loss of him who was for more than fifty years of happy wedded life her constant comrade as well as husband, counsellor and protector. We pray that she may be granted strength to bear the heavy bereavement which has come upon her.
As for our dead friend and fellow member, he has joined the great majority, the unnumbered shadowy hosts of the dead. We shall see his face and hear his voice in these halls no more. He has left these scenes and these voices, and it will be indeed long before we shall look upon his like again.
His life was gentle, and the elements so mixed in him that nature might stand up and say to all the world: This was a man.
Mr. D.D. McKenzie (North Cape Breton):198 Mr. Speaker, the task that falls to my lot on this occasion is a very serious one and one that I fully realize my personal inability to fulfill as it ought to be fulfilled and discharged. Speaking for the moment on behalf of the gentlemen who sit on this side of the House, and speaking, as I believe, for the late Right Honourable Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s personal friends and admirers throughout this Canada of ours, I wish in the first place, if I may be permitted, most sincerely to thank the Acting Prime Minister of Canada [Sir Thomas White] for the magnificent tribute which he has paid to the great worth of the illustrious dead. The tribute is so full, so comprehensive, so complete, so just, that indeed very little is left to be added to it. It would rather spoil the effect of what has been said so well and moulded so completely to try to add very much to it.
Nevertheless, Mr. Speaker, it comes home to me, as the desk-mate of our late revered leader, and for so many years his friend, that we should from this side of the House join with the Honourable Leader of the Government in saying something about our departed friend. I stand, Mr. Speaker, by the vacant chair, a chair that will never so worthily be filled in this House or in any other Canadian House within my lifetime and perhaps not within the lifetime of the youngest man here. The leadership of the Opposition and of the Liberal Party will someday be filled, but it is no disparagement to whoever may fill that position to say that we have not the mould, nor the man to fill the place of the departed Chieftain of the Liberal Party.
As to the love and affection which the people of this country had for him, may I remind you, Mr. Speaker, and my Honourable Friends, of that great pattern of human love that has been held out to us and which we used to read in our school books and in the Sacred Book itself about David and Jonathan of old; held out to us as the greatest human evidence of love between two men. When David and Jonathan were parting, Jonathan, his brother-in-law, took him fervently by the hand and said: David, I will never see your face again; we are parting now and forever; but to-morrow you will be missed, for your seat will be empty.”199
The great dead is missed in this House today, because his seat is empty and it can never be filled. His place in this House is empty, his place in his home is empty, but his memory shall never fade. We as his friends, have reason to be thankful, and we are thankful, that his great worth has been appreciated by the people of Canada and presented to this House today in such a magnificent manner by the hon. gentleman who is leading the Government.
I am sorry that the duty of paying this tribute to the departed statesman has not fallen upon someone more capable than I. One cannot help thinking on an occasion of this kind of the masterly eulogies which our late leader has pronounced, and one is apt to say, with the poet: “O, for the touch of a vanished hand, and the sound of a voice that is still!”200
The acting leader of the Government has pointed to the many things Sir Wilfrid Laurier had done for the development of this nation, and it is no disparagement to others to say that in bringing this country of ours up to the full measure of nationhood, in bringing it vividly to the attention of the Mother Country and of the home Government, in securing for it as a nation and as a dominion the high position we hold in the commercial and political world, none has done so much as Sir Wilfrid Laurier. Canada has risen to her rightful place as a nation within the great Empire to which we belong. The position which Sir Wilfrid Laurier took at the time of the diamond jubilee of Her late Majesty Queen Victoria, and again at the coronation of King Edward VII and of King George V and at the various imperial conferences of the great statesmen of the Empire, did more to bring Canada before the world and to secure for us the position which we now occupy than anything hitherto done by any other Canadian. We have therefore much to be thankful for, both for his life, and for the memories he has left behind not only in Canada but throughout the Empire.
Sir Wilfrid Laurier rose to the very highest position in the gift of the people of this country. As he had often himself said, he was a democrat to the hilt. He was capable of realizing and anticipating every feeling of the people and almost of every individual in the community, for he had gone through the various stages of life within Canada, and he could see what was necessary for the true welfare of his native land, of which he was so proud. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, I repeat, occupied the very highest position in the gift of this country and I submit that had he lived in any other country of the civilized world he would have occupied a similarly high position. Had he lived in the great republic to the south, with its hundred millions of people, he would have shared in the hearts of the people of that country a place with Washington, Lincoln and Grant. Had he lived in France, the home of his ancestors, I submit that he would have been President of France. Had he lived in our own beloved Mother Country of Great Britain and Ireland, I have no doubt, and I have often heard it said, that he would have occupied a similar position to that held by Lord Chatham, John Bright, Gladstone and Disraeli. It has often been stated by men in this Chamber, and not by those in sympathy with him politically, that if Sir Wilfrid Laurier had lived in Great Britain, nothing could have prevented him from becoming its Prime Minister. So we have reason to believe that his talents, although afforded plenty of scope in Canada, did not reach the full limit of their possibilities here, and that he was fully capable of performing higher and more exacting duties if fate had placed those duties as his task.
I think it is sometimes justifiable to use the language of others when it exactly expresses one’s own sentiments, and what I am about to quote I would adopt as the language of this side of the House as well as adopting the sentiments so ably expressed by the Minister of Finance. This newspaper was not a supporter of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, and therefore I quote from it with the greater freedom. It says:
“Another Link with the Glorious Days of Canada’s Making is Broken by Laurier’s Death.
In the passing of Sir Wilfrid Laurier yet another link with the spacious days of Canada’s making has gone. There are great names in Canadian history – Baldwin and LaFontaine, Brown, Galt and Tupper, Blake, Macdonald and Laurier,” and rightly indeed does the London Daily Chronicle, in its tribute to the dead statesman, say:
“Laurier’s name will be permanently associated with some of the most important phases in the development of the British Commonwealth. Not only will Canada always rank him among the great builders of her nationhood, but he will hold his niche in the temple of world history.”
Apart altogether from the political views which he held, and advocated, the testimony is universal that Sir Wilfrid Laurier in the truest sense was a great man. He belonged to the Empire, and for many years he was the most considerable figure in Greater Britain. A French Canadian with unquestioned devotion to that race and its traditions, he yet accepted as his task the establishment of a better understanding and closer union of the two races of the Dominion, and though it was a task which has not yet been completed, Sir Wilfrid had the satisfaction of achieving a marked advance. No need of Canada has been greater and none has lain nearer to the statesman’s heart than the removal of discord between the different races and tongues and creeds which comprise the Canadian Confederacy. To have attempted a task of such magnitude and hedged with tremendous and critical difficulties, is in itself an eloquent testimony to his essential greatness.
Former political opponents are one today in voicing their ungrudging admiration and unqualified recognition of his undoubtedly great gifts. Though not blind to his political failings and to views which they believed to be detrimental to Canada’s truest welfare, yet as one man they express the highest regard of Sir Wilfrid’s strict personal probity, his untarnished character and the years of strenuous and devoted service to the Dominion.
As an orator Sir Wilfrid Laurier occupied a unique position. As one writer in the English press has said – “He was gifted with unusual personal advantages. His appearance alone was worth a handsome fortune. His figure, lithe and straight as a larch; his face unwrinkled; his glance clear and searching, made up a personality that wielded a strange fascination for his hearers. He spoke as well in English as he did in French – his mother-tongue.” Among the many gems of Sir Wilfrid’s oratory, the following, delivered in Paris in 1897, is considered one of his finest utterances – “a speech touched with a prophetic fire”:
The citation from the speech referred to by this writer, I quote:
“It may be that here in France the memories of the ancient struggles between France and England have lost nothing of their bitterness, but as for us, Canadians of whatever origin, the days we hold glorious are the days when the colours of France and of England, the tri-colour and the Cross of St. George, waved together in triumph on the banks of Alma, the heights of Inkerman, the ramparts of Sebastopol.201 Times change; other alliances are made, but may it be permitted to a son of France, who is at the same time a British subject, to salute those glorious days with a regret which will perhaps find an echo in every generous mind on either side of the Channel.”
This quotation which I have taken the liberty to read, conveys to you, Sir, and to the House, my own views, and perhaps puts them better and more concisely than I myself could. Let me conclude by saying that we appreciate what has been done in the country, and what is now being done, to honour the memory of the great departed chieftain. We acknowledge, with thankfulness, what has been done by the Government in honouring his mortal remains, and we are thankful for the tribute that has been paid to his memory by the leader of the Government today. We on this side of the House, and his friends generally, particularly those of his own party, might say, as has been said by a wise man of old, “Our Father, our Father, the chariots of liberalism and the horsemen thereof,”202 and may I say, with one of old, to my friends and the public at large, “Know ye not that this day there has fallen in Canada a prince and a great man.”203
Honourable Rodolphe Lemieux (Maisonneuve and Gaspé):204 Mr. Speaker, the Shadow of Death has stalked through this Chamber; a chair stands vacant. As we gaze upon the flowers strewn about us, which, by the morrow, will have withered away, more deeply than ever do we understand the baffling brevity of this life’s span, the specious vanity of each and every thing. Sir Wilfrid Laurier is no more.
The mellow voice which for so long enthralled this assembly and stirred the enthusiasm of all who heard it, is silent.
“The trumpet’s silver voice is still
The warder silent on the hill.”205
The last survivor of a great generation, he whose imposing stature, whose eagle eye and whose white plume recalled those noblemen of the eighteenth century, such as we meet them still in medallions of olden times, is sleeping his last sleep.
An illustrious ancestor has passed away. Let us incline our heads with respect in the presence of this grave: its closing writes “finish” to a whole epoch of our history.
Death is a law and not a punishment. No one better understood this profound truth than the eminent statesman whose loss we mourn. He had long since made his preparations for the voyage from Time into Eternity. Without bitterness the old gladiator saw himself disarmed as he was about to descend once more into the arena. His spirit passed gently, serenely, as though “midst the darkening shadows of life’s falling night the Faith of his forefathers had already revealed the gleam of dawn, passage of Eternal Day.”206
Speaking here in the name of my colleagues of the old French province who counted him her most distinguished son, and whose idol he became, it does the heart good to recall that throughout his entire career he was ever faithful to his origin and to the finest traditions of his race.
“I love,” he was wont to say, “I love France who gave us birth, I love England who gave us liberty, but the first place in my heart belongs to Canada, my country, my native land.”
This striking formula was, if I may speak thus, the Ideal, the Polar Star which guided his public life. Affectionate gratitude towards the nation, resplendent among all nations – whose sons we have the honour to be – the splendour of whose glory lights up the highest summits; unswerving loyalty towards that great and generous nation who inherited the administrative genius of the Romans and of whom Tennyson could say that hers was the classic land of liberty.
But, first and foremost, Laurier was a Canadian. To his French inheritance he owed his golden tongue, his keen intellectual vision, the boldness and the grandeur of his conceptions. To his contact with the great English school, the school of Burke, Fox, Pitt, O’Connell, Gladstone, he owed his deep practical knowledge of British institutions, and it may be said without exaggeration that it was by assimilating the teachings of these parliamentary leaders that Sir Wilfrid Laurier made for himself a lasting niche in the Hall of Fame.
At the time when he stepped through the threshold of Parliament, the memory of the great Papineau still hovered over the country. And the image of Lafontaine, whose profound wisdom had saved many rights from the wreckage of a storm-tossed sea, was becoming greater as time went by.
In those days Cartier and Dorion represented the two different channels of opinion in our province. The one, dashing, impetuous, disdained all obstacles; the other calm, of proverbial integrity, possessing a mind of very high attainments, trusted to time to dispel hoary prejudice. If it be true that, in a certain way, Laurier was the disciple of Dorion, events made him the fortunate successor, rather the direct heir, of Lafontaine’s policy – the policy which strives to soothe all hurts, the better to build on a solid foundation; the policy of conciliation for the sake of unity; the policy of the golden mean; the best, the true, the sole policy which can obtain in our country.
Sprung from a vanquished people, but a people who, in their turn had themselves made the conquest of Liberty, his dream was to unite the two races on the only rational basis: equality of rights, mutual respect and tolerance. His political vision moved him to seal anew the pact entered into by Lafontaine and Baldwin in days gone by and so bring fresh strength to the work of the Fathers of Confederation.
Was this majestic vision too ambitious? History, that impartial judge of men and events, will say whether or not he brought it to realization, but what we of his time may uphold from this moment is his untiring perseverance, his steadfast courage, his invincible faith in the ideal he set out to attain from the very start of his career. However, he was too well versed in psychology not to realize the difficulties which beset his path.
In 1887, hardly a year after that historical debate when, at one flight, he had risen to the greatest heights of parliamentary eloquence, when the English-speaking press had acclaimed him as the “silver-tongued orator,” the Liberal Party, helpless after the retirement of Edward Blake, was casting about for a leader. The French Liberals formed a minority in this party, as they formed a minority in the country. Let it be said to the honour of the English Liberals, it was Edward Blake, it was Sir Richard Cartwright, it was David Mills, who selected the leader, and the unanimous choice fell upon Wilfrid Laurier. What was the answer of the young member for Quebec East? Ah, Mr. Speaker, our great countryman, despite his marvellous endowments, did not covet the honour offered him. He well knew the burden he was assuming; already he could catch a glimpse of the obstacles which lay in wait for him, and the answer of this man who, beneath a stolid exterior, hid very deep emotions, his answer was a sob.
Thus, unable to escape the earnest entreaties of his English-speaking friends, he undertook to lead the Liberal Party, determined to steer the ship of state towards progress and liberty, to bind together, by conciliation in both word and deed, the heterogeneous elements which go to make up Canada. He had often said that the national sentiment of a country is worth no more than the pride which it inspires in its sons. He knew this country was overflowing with strength and vigour, full of activity, of ambition.
He loved its distant childhood; its history, every page of which he knew; its legends; its fertile, majestic natural beauty; he loved this country especially for its ethnic duality which showed him the children of two greatest races of Europe, henceforth fellow-wayfarers towards a common destiny in the boundless spaces of the New World.
By healing the wounds of days-gone-by and rallying all for the development of our immense resources, he opened a new era, he anticipated the day when he could declare in the presence of his Sovereign: “Sir, Canada is a nation. The nineteenth century belonged to the United States; but the twentieth century will witness the expansion of Canada.”
The twenty-third of June, 1896, was a memorable date in our political annals. The member for Quebec East had just been borne into power by a majority of the electorate. He became Prime Minister of a Dominion which had been guided by the genius of Macdonald. The old Tory chieftain had passed from the stage some five years before and the memory of his bewitching magnetism bordered on the legendary. People anxiously wondered if the orator from Quebec would reveal himself a statesman of sterling worth.
Would he have the necessary firmness? Could he grapple with our intricate problems? Would he prove himself an experienced helmsman and steer the ship safely through shallow shoals, flinging into the teeth of the gale, to ride at anchor in the port beyond? My answer to all these apprehensions, already distant and, mayhap, forgotten, is that which John Morley made, one day, regarding Gladstone. The occasion was the unveiling of the statue erected in honour of the Grand Old Man, but a step or two from Lincoln’s Inn. “The stalwarts of finance, of the City, looked with misgiving upon the idealism of Gladstone and smiled at his supposed incompetence in matters of money and business. I wonder,” added Morley – and I still see him, his finger pointing to the monument – “I wonder, whether after Gladstone’s long and brilliant career, the Bank of England itself would not feel honoured by the presence and strengthened by the counsel of the orator?”
As I have just said, it is only in the cold, calm light of impartial history that the part played by men in the great events of their time, can be duly appreciated. But I think I am within the mark of stating now that in Laurier’s optimism, in his power of assimilation, in his incessant and untiring toil, in his boundless faith in the future of our country, may be seen and reflected in the powerful impulsion given to Canada from 1896 to 1911, her wonderful ascent towards economic progress, her marvellous development. How often have I not heard him whenever grappling with some difficult problem repeating the lines penned by André Chénier, the great French poet:
“L’illusion féconde habite dans mon sein,
J’ai les ailes de l’espérance!
“In my bosom dwells fruitful Illusion
On the wings of hope I soar!”
He had to the fullest extent mastered the sense of the Constitution; he had an insight into its jurisprudence and genius, and he loved it.
He ever advocated adherence to the federal pact, in its integrity. To his mind, any change, any departure or new orientation involved a danger. He was an apostle of autonomy, like Blake and Mowat.
His political creed borrowed its inspiration from British liberalism. He believed in progress grounded on order; he believed in the advent of democracy through evolution, not through revolution, but never did he allow himself to be carried away by his love of liberty beyond those two limits laid down by conscience and human reason, that is to say, rights and duties.
From the national standpoint, none of the two great ethnical elements of the country was to predominate or to be domineered. Equal justice, equal rights for all such, was his motto. He deprecated isolation, because as he said, for an ethnical group to isolate itself is tantamount to stagnating in inferiority. Let me add that he always advocated harmonious relations between religions and liberty, by means of a loyal alliance. In a country like ours so hard to govern, and owing to the fact that the opinions and creeds of the various ethnical groups have to be taken into consideration – policy of exclusiveness is not properly speaking a policy but a blunder which must prove fatal to minorities. Love of justice and of freedom, tolerance, loyalty grounded upon autonomy, patriotism, such were his ideals. And with what mastery did he expound them!
Those who will read his speeches in which the scholar always controls the tribune, checks his outburst, chastens his language, will no doubt find in them the luster of fancy coupled with the magic of style, but they will first of all discover loftiness of thought combined with an unerring judgment, and the intuition of the right course to steer through the winds of Canadian politics. And this constitutes a lofty ideal, and it was this ideal which fashioned Laurier into the Great Canadian that he was. But in appreciating his career, it is on his firm and dignified attitude in the relations of Canada and the Mother Country that our attention must be focused.
None more than Laurier admired the majestic institutions of the British Empire, where liberty wrought this miracle of a Gavan Duffy, a Wilfrid Laurier, a Louis Botha, respectively governing Australia, Canada, Africa, with intense loyalty and devotedness to the interests of the Crown.207
In this connection may I be allowed to add that after the Transvaal war, Sir Wilfrid Laurier was consulted in turn by [Henry] Campbell-Bannerman208 and by General Botha as to the contemplated South African Union and that both these statesmen benefited by vast experience. I shall never forget the words uttered in my presence at Cape Town, in November, 1910, by the Boer General: “In South Africa, two names are particularly dear to us, that of Campbell-Bannerman and that of Wilfrid Laurier. To those two men we owe an eternal debt of gratitude.”
At the several Imperial conferences which he attended – and we all know what a brilliant role he played in them – Sir Wilfrid Laurier, whose fiscal policy had tickled the pride of the Mother Country, had nevertheless to withstand the new wave which was just then beginning to roll from London into the Dominions. This brilliant dream of a vast Empire, whose centre of action would be Westminster, could, forsooth, seduce the leaders of British politics, but Laurier was a Canadian first and last. Our country having disentangled itself from the bonds of Colonialism had gradually conquered its political freedom, through the extension of the principle of autonomy. Knowing the exact extent of our rights and duties, he boldly and sincerely proclaimed the principle of Imperial unity based upon local liberties.
That virile attitude was to him, no doubt, the source of disappointment. But the old Premier was too much of a philosopher not to realize that impulses cannot play the part of reason, and that popularity is a poor substitute for arguments.
Were I called upon to define the outstanding qualities of Sir Wilfrid Laurier as a statesman, I would say that his moderation was a driving power in itself, his gift of expression a shining light, and that, with this master of oratory, sound judgment and common sense outweighed his very eloquence.
His worthy manner of living, his thorough honesty, his perfect equanimity through the worst ordeals, his devouring intellectual activity, his unimpeachable righteousness, his home life imbued with such charm and beauty, his loyalty to friends, his discreet charity, but, above all, his eloquence exerted in behalf of the downtrodden, all these recall in many respects some distinctive characteristics of Gladstone and Lincoln.
We shall no longer have before our eyes those refined and aristocratic features of Laurier, whose most amiable smile went to the plebeian, the needy, the humble, the lowly and the feeble; but his memory made immortal in works of bronze and marble will pass on to coming generations as one of the greatest embodiments of virtue in public and private life, as one of the finest products of human-kind in the last century.
We, as his followers, his admirers, find solace in the thought that he died in the way he had wished to die. As the Norman knights of old, it was clothed in his armour that he appeared before the Supreme Judge. Death, the soother of all suffering, was to him like the declining hours of a beautiful day.
Before closing his eyes to things terrestrial, he had the supreme joy of seeing the Allies victorious. Enamoured of freedom and justice, he witnessed the downfall in Europe of autocracy and its instrument, militarism, and the founding on their ruins of the League of Nations.
As of yore at Inkerman and at Sebastopol, he saw our two great mother countries clasping hands and joining their forces on the battlefield, and our sons rushing with a light heart to meet together a glorious death and take their full share of sacrifice and victory.
Yes, he was granted that supreme consolation of seeing France, France which was branded as frivolous, because she was cheerful, standing before the whole world as an example of endurance and fortitude, and showing herself to the oppressed what she had ever been, the shield of civilization, the champion of right. He beheld England, that country deemed cold and self-seeking, set out all her sails, spend lavishly of her wealth; call to arms all her children to rescue the world from oppression.
The alliance of these two great powers, sealed by the purest of blood, was especially dear to his heart. To him it appeared like the rainbow which breaks through the clouds, and which is described in the Holy Writ as a messenger of peace, a presage of better days to all men of good will.
O Laurier! Should there remain something to be done towards the fulfillment of that triumph of harmony and goodwill which you have so persistently striven to bring about, then those younger Canadians, whose teacher you were, will in turn take up the work and carry it to its full completion. They will pride themselves in following in your footsteps along the rugged and endless path of duty which you have opened and pointed out to them.
And now, with this last farewell, allow us to mingle the expression of our deep sense of gratitude. We are thankful to you, Laurier, for having ever remained worthy of the part entrusted to you by Providence, since from the palaces of our sovereigns and from the most humble farmhouse, from the towering cathedral as well as from the smallest country church, there ascends towards heaven the same hymn of gratitude.
We say farewell and we thank you. We thank you for having thus gathered around you your own people, the descendants of those Canadians of old, the last to give up the fight in that last battle, who, with souls anguished by defeat, escorted the Marquis of Montcalm from the gates of Old Quebec to the Château Saint-Louis, on the night following the battle on the Plains of Abraham. We thank you for having lifted them up to you and invited them to share your glory.
We say farewell and we thank you. We thank you for the shining memento which you bequeathed to the historian at large. Its brilliancy will not fade. It will be a guiding light which the tempest-beaten mariner will look to. It will be as a pillar of fire which will guide, on their march towards the promised land of a better Dominion, all sections of the Canadian people, reconciled at last to one another and linked together by the bonds of an “Union sacrée.”
Farewell. Close to your resting place, amid maples and poplars, adorned by the coming spring with luxuriant foliage, we shall, many of us, congregate to pray in the tongue of your ancestors. The field wherein you lie, whose tender embrace you received, will be light to you. For it is part of that native land whose history is three centuries old and whose motherly womb will some day cover our meanness with its vastness and shroud our nothingness with its perennity. Adieu!
Few words are as likely to evoke anxiety in a speechwriter as, “I’ll need you to draft the eulogy.” Blame Pericles. Ever since his funeral oration for the fallen of the Peloponnesian War in the fifth century B.C., there has been an expectation that the death of worthies should be marked with an appropriate eulogy.
Few succeed. Lincoln came closest with his Gettysburg Address – a speech that leaned heavily, in structure and theme, on Pericles’s masterpiece.
With the passing of Wilfrid Laurier in 1919, the challenge of providing a fitting tribute was compounded by the fact that he had himself set the gold standard with his eulogies of Sir John A. Macdonald and Queen Victoria. Any eulogy of him, in other words, would be measured against the eulogies by him. No pressure.
And yet…
All three speakers rose to the occasion with thoughtful, eloquent speeches. The language in every case is grand and glorious. Their sentences proceed at their own dignified pace. Their themes move inexorably from the particular to the universal, setting Laurier’s life against the larger ideas of principles, values, and history.
Could such speeches be delivered today? Probably not. Certainly the style of speaking would be different. Today’s speeches are informal, even conversational. You’d never get away with, “No need of Canada has been greater and none has lain nearer to the statesman’s heart than the removal of discord between the different races and tongues and creeds which comprise the Canadian Confederacy.”
It’s a beautifully crafted sentence, but it reflects the style of its time. In 1919, oratory was still prized and attention spans were longer. Politicians didn’t speak in sound bites, and audiences were used to following long, complex arguments through meandering sentences and extended speeches.
Speakers of the early twentieth century were also able to refer freely to history, poetry, literature, and the Bible, confident that their audience would know exactly what they were talking about. Today? If a speaker wants to be sure that their listeners will get a cultural reference, it probably has to be about “The Simpsons.” (D’oh!)
To be sure, today’s political leaders can rise to the occasion in times of deep emotion and high patriotism. We saw them do so after the shootings on Parliament Hill and in the tributes to the Honourable Jim Flaherty.209
Even in these cases, however, there were important differences. Reading the tributes to Flaherty, for example, one is struck by the apparent relief felt by members of Parliament, from all sides, in being able to speak without partisanship. In 1919, at such moments of national import, neutrality was a given.
Today’s tributes are also much more self-referential. If the eulogies to Laurier were exhortations to idealism, today’s speeches are exercises in association. Members recount their own interactions with Flaherty. This insertion of one’s self into a eulogy would have been deemed unseemly in 1919. Indeed, the only such reference in these earlier speeches is to declare the speaker’s own inadequacy to pay the required tribute.
In our age, obsessed with self-image, self-regard, and self-actualization, it seems that even tributes to others are, ultimately, still about us.
It is also affecting to see how the long shadow of Sir John A. Macdonald extends over Laurier even in death. All three speakers refer to the Old Chieftain. While the comparisons are always favourable, and Laurier would no doubt have appreciated the association, it would also have been nice for Laurier to be remembered for his own merits, rather than for his relationship with Macdonald.
The three eulogies also connect Laurier to his place in history, with an almost elegiac acknowledgment that his passing marks the closing of an age – an age when Canada was born, fought its first wars, welcomed new provinces and took its place on the world stage.
Today, the setting of events in their historical context is rare, perhaps because that history is less well known or perhaps because our perspective, like our attention span, is more limited.
But if the speeches reflect the tone and tenor of their time, they also express ideals that should inspire us still. In light of current debates over “reasonable accommodation” and the integration of immigrants, we might benefit by remembering D.D. McKenzie’s articulation of Laurier’s aim: “…to bind together, by conciliation in both word and deed, the heterogeneous elements which go to make up Canada.”
In her latest book, History’s People: Personalities and the Past, historian Margaret MacMillan writes of the relationship between history and biography, of the role of individuals in shaping events. Tributes like those offered on Laurier’s death remind us of the difference one person can make and of the example he or she can set for those who follow.
To modern ears, these speeches can sound stilted, archaic, grandiose. But to those who love words, to read them is to luxuriate, if only for a few moments, in the kinder temper of earlier times. And to recall that language used to matter in politics.
It still should.
Veteran Ottawa speech writer David Lockhart, who has worked with the Right Honourable John Turner, the Right Honourable Paul Martin, and numerous other public figures, leads Lockhart Communications.