Canadian Election Series

The election of 1944 did not give Robert Manion his conscription mandate.
Unionist: 35% (-4%), 95 seats (-16)
CCF: 35% (nc), 82 seats (nc)
Bloc Populaire: 9% (+9%), 37 seats (+37)
Social Credit: 6% (+2%), 21 seats (+8)
Liberal: 13% (-8%), 10 seats (-29)
Communist: 1% (+1%), 0 seats (nc)

Gouin’s decision to back the unity cabinet destroyed his leadership, as Quebecois voters defected to the Bloc Populaire. He was unable to win compensating votes in Anglo Canada,went down in defeat in his own riding, and resigned soon after the election. Social Credit’s anti-communist campaign found fertile soil among traditionalist Catholics, and the previously all-Alberta party returned a small Quebec caucus. The Unionist votes collapsed in Quebec and the party only returned a few Anglo-Montrealers. The CCF-Tory race was status quo elsewhere in Canada and the Communists failed to win a seat, coming close in a couple of industrial seats.

The unity cabinet continued as before sans the Liberals, who were in disarray. With the Liberals knocked out of cabinet and Gouin out of the leadership, the Bloc Populaire MP’s soon began to take out their Liberal membership cards and rejoin the Liberal caucus. Manion and Gillis continued in their tacit understanding that an election would be called after the war. In the spring of 1945, with the war drawing to a close, Robert Manion had a heart attack and died. Congenial backbencher Joseph Harris was appointed as interim leader and Prime Minister until a new leader could be selected.

The Tories faced a leadership election in the fall of 1945. With the war in Europe over and the government popular, they hoped to ride a wave of good tidings and win a majority government on the back of their new leader. After Manion’s win last time, the party’s right wing establishment quickly coalesced behind Ontario Premier George Drew. With most of cabinet behind him, Drew was a strong favourite. However several more progressive voices put their names forward as well. Drew won the leadership for the Tory right in a surprisingly close race.

Meanwhile the Liberals are in disarray. After facing their worst ever result, it was expected that Arthur Cardin of the Bloc Populaire would simply absorb the Liberal caucus and assume the Liberal leadership unchallenged. However, Cardin bowed out of the race early on due to very poor health. He would die in 1946. Cardin’s departure left the door open for a more competitive race. While the Bloc Populaire formed a separate caucus in Parliament, many of the MP’s had strong Liberal ties and plenty of Liberal members had sympathies for the Bloc. Frederic Dorion, the former deputy leader of Bloc Populaire defeated the most prominent Anglo Liberal, Paul Martin on a platform of traditional Catholicism and Anglophone rights

George Drew: 41.4%, 56.5%
William Rowe: 34.5%, 43.5%
Camillien Houde: 17.2%
Howard Green 6.9%

Frederic Dorion: 33.3%, 44.8%, 60.7%
~~Paul Martin: 27.3%, 31.0%, 39.3%~~
~~Charles Power: 24.4%, 24.2%~~
~~Louis St. Laurent: 18.2%~~

Dorion's victory allowed the Liberals to reunify somewhat. He absorbed most of the Bloc Populaire caucus with Arthur Cardin's blessing. However a few hardline MP's decided to stay outside of the caucus. With the war over, and countries around the worls lookining for change, the opposition parties saw their chance. In early 1946, all non-Unionist parties supported a non-confidence motion and the government fell.

Unionist Led by their new, blandly rightist leader George Drew (former Premier of Ontario), the Unionists are hoping to win a new majority government off of goodwill earned by seeing Canada through World War Two. Drew is running on a blandly centre right platform, supporting low taxes, free enterpise and a strong national defense to counter growing tensions with the Soviet Union. The Unionists have adopted the slogan "They Won Us the War"

CCF Gillis is hoping to repeat Attlee's success in the UK by replacing a popular wartime government with a social democratic one. To this end, Gillis is playing up his role in the wartime unity cabinet, and spending most of his time talking about creating a just post-war society for returning veterans. To this end he is promising generous veteran pensions and education aid, as well as the standard CCF promises to nationalize industry. The CCF have also quietly jettisoned some of their more pacifist voices to present themselves as a serious contender for government. The pacifists have mostly departed for the Communists.

Liberal Under Dorion, the party has tacked to the right, attacking the "English" parties and promoting francophone rights in Quebec and the rest of Canada. Dorion has attracted the endorsement of Premier Duplessis thanks to his traditional Catholicism, and support for public works. The Anglo wing of the party is essentially running a seperate campaign promoting the old Liberal campaign promise; free trade.

Social Credit Social Credit is still running with J.H. Blackmore as their leader. The party is attempting to continue it's transformation into an alternative party of the right. To that end, they are promising a return to traditional values, a national minimum income in place of any welfare programs. As tensions between the Soviet Union and USA continue to rise, Social Credit is planning to "ban the red menace", that is, the Communist party, should they come to power.

Communist Still led by Tim Buck, the communists are your standard Marxist-Leninists. The only difference this election is that they now have garnered the support of some of the CCF's old pacifist wing as Gillis has tacked the party to the right on policy issues.

Seven days.

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