Allan J. MacEachen: A canny reformer
Allan J. MacEachen, the most influential and effective Nova Scotia federal politician of his time, won many high honours, and a few cogent nicknames, too, in his 96 years on the good earth of his native Cape Breton, and during some four decades toiling in the political mills of Ottawa, where he was a master of keeping Liberal governments alive and of getting things done.
The epithets included the Laird of Lake Ainslie and the Celtic Sphinx. Or, around home on the Island, just Allan J.
That first-name recognition captured both his status as a kind of elected monarch of Cape Breton and as the miner’s son from Beaton Street, Inverness, who knew, respected and empathized with all manner of regular folks.
Indeed, Allan J. drew on his understanding of their needs, and of life’s fragility, to guide some of Canada’s defining social programs — medicare, the pension supplement for the elderly, and transfers for social assistance and higher education — through Parliament in the 1960s. For those great achievements, Canadians are remembering him with affection and respect with his passing this week.
MacEachen’s portfolios included Health and Welfare, Finance and External Affairs in the governments of Lester Pearson and Pierre Trudeau, as well as deputy prime minister to Mr. Trudeau and Liberal leader in the Senate. He was honoured with the Order of Canada, a prestigious series of public policy lectures in his name and the foundation of the MacEachen Institute at Dalhousie University to conduct research into citizen engagement, effective health and social policy and Atlantic Canada development.
And home in Inverness, there’s a fitting tribute to this rock of the Liberal party who also ably applied the philosophy of Father Moses Coady, enlisting the resources of society to create a humane social safety net and to address urgent economic and social needs.
In 2008, the community of Inverness unveiled 10 tonnes of Grit-red marble in his honour, inscribed with the motto: “The state still has a role in keeping bread on the table.”
It’s a reminder that for all Allan J.’s deserved reputation as an unmatched political strategist and parliamentary tactician (who masterminded two comebacks by Mr. Trudeau, first from minority government and later from an election defeat), his canniness served a real belief that government must be there for the basic human needs.
That’s a hardscrabble insight into the reality of human frailty and the need for social responsibility that we should never forget. We can be thankful Allan J. had both the will and the wiles to weave that insight into a better support system for health, education, old age and food on the table.