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The Ontario “Gestapo” Affair, 1943–1945
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 November 2014
Extract
The Ontario election of June 4, 1945, will likely be remembered by historians as the “Gestapo election.” For it was in that election that Edward B. Jolliffe, leader of the official CCF opposition in the legislature, made the remarkable accusation that Premier George Drew was “maintaining in Ontario … a secret political police, a paid government spy organization, a Gestapo to try and keep himself in power.” A provincial Royal Commission was named to investigate Jolliffe's charges. Unfortunately, however, it has been impossible to locate a complete transcript of the Commission's proceedings. It is the purpose of this paper to assess, using the material that is available, the validity of the CCF leader's spectacular accusations.
Most observers agreed that Drew's minority Conservative administration would be re-elected in 1945. Yet the CCF was still considered a serious contender. The CCF's opponents certainly did not discount its challenge. Anti-socialist politicians and professional propagandists alike played heavily on the theme that a CCF government would impose a dictatorship on the citizens of Ontario. The CCF's campaign, in contrast, was relatively undramatic initially. Its propaganda centred primarily upon its uncomplicated “Five Star Programme For Ontario,” the five stars representing security on the job, for the farm, the home, health, and nation.
- Type
- Articles
- Information
- Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science/Revue canadienne de economiques et science politique , Volume 30 , Issue 3 , August 1964 , pp. 343 - 359
- Copyright
- Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1964
References
1 It is curious indeed that the Ontario provincial government seems to have no copy of the proceedings of a provincial Royal Commission. I have attempted to piece the story together using the Report of the Ontario Royal Commission appointed May 28, 1945 to Investigate Charges Made by Mr. E. B. Jolliffe, K.C. (Toronto, 1945)Google Scholar, hereafter referred to as LeBel Report; Grube, G. M. A., “The Le Bel Report and Civil Liberties,” Canadian Forum, XXV, 11, 1945 Google Scholar; and, above all, Guillet, E. C., “Famous Canadian Trials,” vol. 50 Google Scholar, “Political Gestapo” (unpublished typewritten manuscript, 1949). Guillet had, for his monograph, a complete transcript of the hearings, which he in effect summarized. All facts and quotations which follow are, unless otherwise noted, from Guillet's précis.
2 For a more detailed elaboration of the war-time political background of the crucial Ontario and national elections of 1945, see my “The Failure of Canadian Socialism: The Ontario Experience, 1932–45,” Canadian Historical Review, XLIV, no. 2, 06 1963, 98–113.Google Scholar
3 For George Drew's attacks upon the CCF, see Toronto Telegram, May 19, 1945, and Toronto Daily Star, May 21, 1945. The most devastating contribution from the professional anti-socialist propagandist was a tabloid by B. A. Trestrail called Social Suicide (no publisher, no city or date of publication ).
4 Murray and M. A. Sanderson, together with Trestrail, were the three major anti-socialist propagandists in Ontario between 1943 and 1945. Sanderson, as all his anti-CCF newspaper advertisements proudly proclaimed, was an insect exterminator by profession, thus Jolliffe's contemptuous label.
5 The complete speech is given in LeBel Report, App. A, 49–55.
6 See, e.g., the article on Drew, George by Hyman, Ralph, Toronto Globe and mail, 09 21, 1963.Google Scholar “The so-called Gestapo,” Hyman writes, “was nothing more than the anti-sabotage branch of the Ontario Provincial Police, established before Mr. Drew came to office [in 1943].”
7 Guillet, “Political Gestapo,” preface.
8 Ibid.
9 Cited in ibid., chap. 1 (Guillet's manuscript is unpaginated).
10 Ibid., chap. 4, sec. 1.
11 Ibid., chap. 7, introduction.
12 LeBel Report, 9–10.
13 Ibid., 11.
14 “Political Gestapo,” chap. 10.
15 Ibid., App. E, Dempster's Reports no. 2, “C.C.F. Caucus,” Nov. 29, 1943.
16 “The LeBel Report.”
17 LeBel Report, 11–19.
18 “The LeBel Report”.
19 LeBel Report, 24–5.
20 Ibid., 34.
21 In none of the party's private or public documents—Provincial Convention Reports, Provincial Council Minutes, Provincial Executive Minutes, or the New Commonwealth, the official CCF newspaper—can reference be found to this by-election.
22 LeBel Report, 22–3.
23 Ibid., 26–8.
24 Ibid., 28–9.
25 Ibid., 32–4.
26 Ibid., 35.
27 Guillet, “Political Gestapo,” App. G, Murray's circulars of Aug. 4 and Sept. 29, 1943.
28 LeBel Report, 36–8.
29 Ibid., 39–40.
30 Ibid., 38.
31 “The LeBel Report.”
32 LeBel Report, 41. Italics added.
33 Ibid., 42.
34 Canadian Forum, Nov., 1945.
35 “Political Gestapo,” chap. 11.
36 “The LeBel Report.”
37 “Political Gestapo,” chap. 11.
38 Ibid.
39 Interview with E. B. Jolliffe.
40 The only exchange between the two men on the OPP in the House was an innocuous one. Jolliffe intimated that Blackwell was not revealing all he knew about the activities of the police, but did not press the issue when Blackwell denied it. Province of Ontario, Debates and Proceedings of the 1st Session of the 21st Legislature, 1944, vol. 3, April 4, 1944, pp. 2180, 2185, 2192.
41 Province of Ontario, Sessional Papers, 1945, vol. LXXVII, Part IV, Sessional Paper no. 34, Report of the Commissioner of Police for Ontario for 1944.
42 Interviews with Andrew Brewin, George Grube, David Lewis.
43 Interview with Jolliffe.
44 LeBel Report, 55.