Canadian prime minister who fought free trade deal with U. S.
John Turner, the former Canadian prime minister who, during his short time in the top job, opposed efforts to bring his country into a free- trade agreement with the U. S., has died. He was 91.
Mr. Turner died Saturday in Toronto, according to a government statement.
Canada’s 17th prime minister, Mr. Turner saw his tenure last less than three months, the second- shortest in the country’s history, after he replaced Pierre Trudeau as Liberal Party leader in in 1984. He called an election and lost in a landslide to Brian Mulroney’s Progressive Conservatives.
Mr. Turner had been a minister in successive Liberal governments in the 1960s and ‘ 70s, but he was perhaps best known for leading opposition to the CanadaU. S. Free Trade Agreement negotiated under Mr. Mulroney and U. S. President Ronald Reagan — the precursor to the current North American trade pact.
John Napier Turner was born in the London suburb of Richmond on June 7, 1929.
When John Turner was just 3 years old, his father, Leonard, died; shortly afterward, his mother, Phyllis, brought him to her native Canada — first to Rossland, British Columbia, and a year later to Ottawa, where she took a job with the tariff board.
While studying political science, economics and English at the University of British Columbia, Mr. Turner was also a star sprinter. In 1947, he set a national record when he ran the 100- yard dash in 9.8 seconds. The following year, he qualified for the London Olympics, but a bad knee prevented him from competing.
Mr. Turner was a gifted politician, lawyer and athlete who was “deeply committed to the law and democratic process,” current Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement.
Mr. Turner graduated from the University of British Columbia with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1949; became a Rhodes Scholar; and went on to study law at Magdalen College at Oxford University. At Oxford, one of his track and field teammates was Roger Bannister, who broke the 4- minute mile, and one of his classmates was Malcolm Fraser, the future Australian prime minister.
Mr. Turner won his first seat in Parliament in 1962 in a Montreal district and become a Cabinet minister in 1965 under Prime Minister Lester Pearson.
After Mr. Pearson resigned in 1968, Mr. Turner sought the leadership but lost out to Pierre Trudeau, the father of the current prime minister.
As justice minister, Mr. Turner oversaw the only peacetime use of the War Measures Act during 1970’ s October Crisis. Pierre Trudeau’s government used the law to suspend some civil rights and send soldiers to Montreal after two kidnappings by the terrorist group Quebec Liberation Front, which called for the separation of that Canadian province from the rest of the nation.
As finance minister, Mr. Turner had his 1974 budget rejected by the opposition parties that controlled Parliament, triggering an election that Pierre Trudeau won again.
Mr. Turner quit politics in 1976 to practice corporate law at McMillan Binch in Toronto.
When Pierre Trudeau retired in 1984, Mr. Turner returned to politics and defeated future Prime Minister Jean Chretien in the 1984 Liberal leadership race. That victory made him prime minister without a seat in Parliament, which was part of the reason he called a quick election.
But that turned out to be a significant miscalculation. Mr. Turner’s Liberals plunged to 40 seats out of 282, compared with 147 under Pierre Trudeau’s last mandate. Mr. Mulroney won 211 seats in the House of Commons, the country’s biggest majority government, after Mr. Turner struggled during televised debates to explain 19 patronage appointments made as he took power.
Mr. Turner revived his image and his party in a passionate but unsuccessful 1988 electoral rematch against Mr. Mulroney, when he led efforts to defeat Mr. Mulroney’s plan for a freetrade agreement with the United States. Mr. Turner attacked the plan in the campaign, saying it would erode Canadian sovereignty.
“I don’t believe our future depends on our yielding those economic levers of sovereignty to become a junior partner in Fortress North America to the United States,” Mr. Turner said during the campaign.
Liberal seats more than doubled to 83, and Mr. Mulroney’s tally fell to 169 seats, but that’s still a majority.
Mr. Turner quit as opposition leader in 1990, ending his political career for good, and joined Miller Thomson LLP law firm in Toronto before retiring in 2013.
He is survived by his wife, Geills; a daughter, Elizabeth; and three sons: Michael, David and Andrew.