A Trudeau apology 50 years overdue

What will the NDP do in the new session of Parliament? Will the Liberal government's expected shift to the left squeeze them out? That's about the present and future; herewith some (unsolicited) advice for the NDP about the past.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the “October Crisis,” the invocation of martial law by the government of Pierre Trudeau in 1970.

The throne speech will take place on Wednesday and is always followed by a vote of confidence. The minority government will need the

support of either the NDP or the Bloc Québécois to survive. In his negotiations with the government for such

support, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh should demand a free vote in the House on a motion apologizing for the invocation of the War Measures Act in 1970, and finding that the Trudeau government of the day was unjustified in declaring martial law.

It may not be a tough negotiation; Prime Minister

Justin Trudeau is fond of apologizing for other people, and may well find it congenial that contrition can begin at home, as it were.

In any case, in a minority Parliament the NDP could find another way to bring its motion to the floor. But to allow Liberal MPs to vote freely on it would require the prime minister's consent.

The total suspension of civil liberties in October 1970 applied across the country in principle. Instantly, by proclamation of the federal cabinet in the middle of the night, all fundamental freedoms were, in theory, gone: freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of peaceable assembly, freedom of association, habeas corpus. In practice, arbitrary measures were taken in Ottawa and the province of Quebec. The federal response to the FLQ's kidnapping of two senior officials was intentionally formidable, dramatic and far-reaching. It was meant to intimidate, to restore order by fear. The excessive force was not, as we would say today, a bug but a feature.

It was not justified. That is certainly clear today, but even at the time it was known. Nearly 500 were swept up in the mass arrests; many were held for days without charge. Pierre-Marc Johnson, son of former Quebec premier Daniel Johnson, and a future Quebec premier himself, would be arrested and released five times. There was a comical incompetence to much of what the police and security forces did in those days, but there was little humour in it for those who were dragged away by the midnight knock on the door, a feature theretofore thought reserved to totalitarian societies.

Pierre Trudeau mocked at the time the “bleeding hearts” who blanched at the presence of troops in the streets. “Go on and bleed,” he taunted, knowing that his law-and-order crackdown was politically popular. In English Canada, Trudeau's hard line against the French terrorists had massive support.

Robert Stanfield, Leader of the Opposition, was caught in a political bind. A principled stand in defence of fundamental freedoms would have divided his own Progressive Conservative caucus. So he equivocated, accepting martial law in principle and then quibbling about certain abuses.

Courage on the opposition benches was found instead with the NDP, led by Tommy Douglas. He and his party voted against martial law — and saw their popular support plummet by a third in the polls. Yet he was right, then and now.

Tommy Douglas and the NDP were lonely, but not entirely alone. David MacDonald, the red Tory MP from Prince Edward Island, organized the printing of a political pamphlet criticizing the invocation of martial law, “Strong and Free: Nos Foyers et Droits; A Response to the War Measures Act.” Many Canadian leaders of future prominence participated in the production and distribution of the pamphlet, including Alan Eagleson, Norman Atkins, Dalton Camp, June Callwood, Ramsay Cook, George Grant, Flora MacDonald, Roy McMurtry and Lloyd Axworthy. A petition against imposition of martial law was signed by Barbara Frum, Northrop Frye and Robert Fulford.

In Parliament though it was the NDP that stood up to the authoritarian actions of the Liberal government.

“We've supported the government in bringing in troops where they thought the police forces needed additional assistance but now we have come to a serious difference of' opinion,” Douglas said. “It is a dangerous course to abrogate basic freedoms in this manner. … Surely it is the responsibility of all those who love freedom in this country to question the need for the absolute and sweeping powers of the War Measures Act which endanger many of the safeguards against arbitrary arrest that our forefathers won for us.”

Singh should honour Douglas on the 50th anniversary of his stand, now vindicated. A motion to apologize should be brought before the House, with MPs free to vote as citizens who love liberty, including the Liberals in government.

THERE WAS LITTLE HUMOUR IN IT FOR THOSE DRAGGED AWAY.