Dictionary of National Biography, 1927 supplement/Laurier, Wilfrid
LAURIER, Sir WILFRID (1841–1919), Canadian statesman, the only son of Carolus Laurier, by his wife, Marcelle Martineau, was born at St. Lin, a village near Montreal, 20 November 1841. He was of French and Roman Catholic ancestry, resident in Canada during seven or eight generations. After spending seven years at L'Assomption College he took a course in law at McGill University, and began practice in Montreal; but ill-health, linked with narrow means, led to his removal to the small town of Arthabaska. In 1868 he married Zoë, daughter of G. N. R. Lafontaine, of Montreal, who survived him. The marriage was childless.
Laurier's mind was essentially liberal, and even as a schoolboy he had expressed opinions startling to severe clericalism. In 1871 he was elected to the legislature of Quebec, and in 1874 to the parliament of Canada for Drummond-Arthabaska. In 1877 he entered the liberal cabinet of Alexander Mackenzie [q.v.] as minister of inland revenue. When the conservatives opposed the new minister's re-election he was beaten; but he soon found a seat for Quebec East, which he continued to hold during more than forty years. Laurier always avowed himself a moderate protectionist, but in 1878 the liberals went to the country on the policy of a tariff for revenue, as opposed to the conservative ‘national policy’ of protection. From 1878 to 1896 they remained in opposition.
In 1880 Edward Blake [q.v.] became leader of the liberal party. Two years later the liberals were defeated in a federal election, and when, in 1887, this again happened, Blake retired from the leadership. His recommendation of Laurier, a French Canadian, as his successor, was looked upon as of doubtful wisdom, coming so soon after the strong feeling aroused among French Canadians by the execution (1885) of the agitator, Louis Riel [q.v.]; but, once leader, Laurier quickly made his position secure. In the federal election of 1891 the liberal policy was unrestricted reciprocity in trade with the United States, and it was successfully opposed by Sir John A. Macdonald [q.v.], the conservative leader, as involving union with the United States. But after Macdonald's death in 1891, the disintegration of the conservative party was rapid. In that year the liberal government in Manitoba had abolished Roman Catholic separate schools. By a special provision of the constitution, the federal government had the right to redress grievances of a minority in respect to education. The Quebec bishops in particular were insistent for a remedial bill restoring separate schools, and this Sir Charles Tupper [q.v.], the conservative prime minister, promised. Education was, however, under provincial control, and federal interference would, Laurier said, create more difficulties than it would solve. The remedy was in conciliation not defiance. The cry ‘hands off Manitoba’ was effective. The electors in Quebec stood by one of their own race, even against the bishops, and Laurier carried the country.
Laurier was prime minister from 1896 to 1911. He had to meet the double difficulty of redeeming his promise of freer trade, and of saving industries which had grown up under a protective tariff. He found the solution in a compromise. In 1897, while he gave to Great Britain a preferential tariff, amounting to one-third of the duty, he made few reductions in the general tariff. The preference increased imports from Great Britain, and Laurier was received with great enthusiasm and was knighted when he attended the diamond jubilee of Queen Victoria in that year. Canada's great need was population. The North-West was still almost unpeopled, but in 1900 a vigorous immigration policy, framed by the capable minister of the interior, Sir Clifford Sifton, brought in many settlers, especially from the United States. This in time caused a demand for more railways. In earlier days the liberal party had opposed the rapid building of the Canadian Pacific Railway across the continent, in advance, as they claimed, of economic needs; but, in an era of boundless optimism, Laurier gave extensive aid to the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, a trans-continental line, and also to a second line, the Canadian Northern. When the European War broke out in 1914 these lines were already in difficulties and, in the end, they were taken over by the state with enormous financial loss.
On the outbreak of the Boer War in 1899, Laurier, in obedience to dominant public opinion, sent contingents to South Africa. But Quebec viewed sullenly this sharing in imperial wars with which Canada had no direct concern. In the election of 1900 Henri Bourassa, the nationalist leader, a former liberal, attacked Laurier so violently as to awaken his fears for his hold upon Quebec. At the Imperial Conference in 1902 he resisted firmly Mr. Joseph Chamberlain's proposals to unite the whole Empire in a common system of defence. Quebec, the source of his political strength, would oppose any form of imperialism. In 1905, when Saskatchewan and Alberta were made self-governing provinces, Laurier tried to conciliate clerical opinion by permitting to the Roman Catholic minority state-supported separate schools. When this threatened the break-up of his Cabinet, he modified his proposals. This gave Bourassa further ground of attack, but Laurier carried the general election in 1908.
After his victory in the federal election of 1908 Laurier's position seemed secure. But in 1910, when the menace of the German fleet led Canada to take the first steps in creating a Canadian navy as auxiliary to the British, Bourassa again assailed Laurier for supporting British jingoism. In a hotly contested election in Drummond-Arthabaska, liberal since 1887, Laurier's candidate was beaten. At the same time he was attacked in Ontario as yielding to clerical pressure in the French province—a religious cry which he himself believed to have led finally to his political undoing. The avowed issue, however, was that of free trade with the United States in natural products. Canada had built up her transport, her industries, and her finance in the face of a high American tariff. When, early in 1911, a trade agreement with the United States was reached, the first impression was one of approval. But Canada's railways, running east and west to the sea, were likely to be injured. Her industrial leaders feared that free trade would soon be extended from natural products to manufactures, and that these would be ruined in competition with the more highly developed American industries. Above all, the British sentiment of Canada was alarmed lest the proposal should involve union with the United States. In great confidence Laurier dissolved parliament, but he was defeated, and his long term of office ended in September 1911.
After the defeat of Laurier the naval question was still urgent. In 1913 the new prime minister, Sir Robert Borden, abandoned the plan of a Canadian navy, and, on the ground of an emergency, proposed to add three ‘Dreadnought’ battleships to the British fleet. Laurier held that his own policy of a Canadian navy, which the conservatives had accepted, was the true one for Canada. He put this forward as against a gift of ships. The government measure was carried in the Canadian House of Commons, after the adoption for the first time in Canada of the closure, but was defeated by the liberal majority in the Senate. When war came in 1914, Canada, unlike Australia, had no share in naval defence. While Laurier supported the government's war policy, Bourassa vigorously attacked British imperialism as only less dangerous to the world than that of Germany. In 1917, when both Britain and the United States adopted conscription, and the many military failures of the year pointed to a prolonged war, a strong movement set in for coalition government. Sir Robert Borden announced that conscription would be applied to Canada, and, at the same time, he invited Laurier to join a coalition. While this was favoured by the great mass of English-speaking liberals, bitter opposition to conscription came from Quebec. Laurier was unwilling to risk losing support in his own province. He refused to join the new government, and in the election of 1917 Quebec alone stood with him. The liberal party was shattered in English-speaking Canada. By this time Laurier's health was failing, and he died at Ottawa on 17 February 1919, before peace was finally concluded.
Laurier was tall and graceful. His dignity and his courtesy were alike impressive. This charm of manner concealed a will which was like iron when once his mind was made up. He used, with some truth, to accuse himself of indolence. He disliked detail, with the result that he sometimes allowed abuses to go far before checking them. His tastes were simple, and during most of his life he was very poor. Though he could be opportunist, his personal character always commanded high respect. By long ancestry Canadian, he had no personal ties with either England or France. While, in all great crises, his opinions ran with those of the French element in Canada, he always opposed with outspoken vigour any appeal to racial or religious passions.
[J. S. Willison, Sir Wilfrid Laurier and the Liberal Party, Toronto, 1903; O. D. Skelton, Life and Letters of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, New York, 1922; J. W. Dafoe, Laurier, a Study in Canadian Politics, Toronto, 1922; L. O. David, Laurier: Sa vie, Ses Œuvres, 1919; Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Discours à l'Étranger et au Canada, Montreal, 1909; personal knowledge.]