George A. Drew
George Alexander Drew PC CC QC (May 7, 1894 – January 4, 1973) was a Canadian politician. He served as the 14th premier of Ontario from 1943 to 1948 and founded a Progressive Conservative dynasty that would last 42 years. He later served as leader of the federal Progressive Conservative Party and Leader of the Official Opposition from 1948 to 1956.
For his grandfather, see George Alexander Drew (Liberal-Conservative MP).
George A. Drew
William Earl Rowe (interim)
William Earl Rowe (interim)
William Earl Rowe (interim)
John Bracken
William Earl Rowe (interim)
January 4, 1973 (aged 78)
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Woodlawn Memorial Park, Ontario, Canada
Progressive Conservative (federal)
Ontario PC Party (provincial)
2
- Barrister
- Ambassador
- Author
1914–1919
Lieutenant-colonel
Early life[edit]
Drew was born in Guelph, Ontario, the son of Annie Isabelle Stevenson (Gibbs) and John Jacob Drew.[1] He was educated at Upper Canada College and graduated from the University of Toronto, where he was a member of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity (Alpha Phi chapter). He then studied law at Osgoode Hall Law School. He served with distinction in World War I as an officer in the Canadian Field Artillery. After the war, he became lieutenant-colonel of the 11th Field Brigade and later honorary colonel of the 11th Field Regiment, Royal Canadian Artillery. He was the author of a book about Canadian aviators in World War I, "Canada's Fighting Airmen."[2]
He was called to the bar in 1920. He married Fiorenza Johnson (1910–1965), daughter of Edward Johnson, who was a noted opera singer (tenor) and later general manager (1935–1950) of the Metropolitan Opera House, in New York City.[3] Drew remarried in 1966 to Phyllis McCullagh, the widow of George McCullagh, the former publisher of Toronto's The Globe and Mail and The Toronto Telegram newspapers.[4]
Entry to politics[edit]
Drew was elected mayor of the City of Guelph in 1925 after he had served as an alderman. In 1929, he left to become assistant master and then master of the Supreme Court of Ontario. As a practising lawyer, he was in 1931 appointed as the first chairman of the Ontario Securities Commission by the provincial Conservative government and was fired by the Liberal government of the colourful Mitch Hepburn, who had come power as a result of the 1934 provincial election. Drew ran for the leadership of the nearly-moribund Conservative Party of Ontario at the 1936 Conservative leadership convention. He lost to William Earl Rowe, who appointed Drew to the position of provincial organizer for the party.
Drew broke with the Conservatives, however, when they opposed Hepburn's attempt to crush the Congress of Industrial Organizations attempt to unionize General Motors in Oshawa. Drew ran as an Independent Conservative in Wellington South during the 1937 provincial election but was defeated, along with the Conservatives. Rowe failed to win a seat in the legislature and consequently resigned as party leader. Drew ran again for the Conservative leadership in 1938, this time successfully, and entered the Legislative Assembly of Ontario at a 1939 by-election as the Member of Provincial Parliament for Simcoe East. In the 1943 provincial election, he was elected in the Toronto riding of High Park.
The Liberal government went through a series of crises during World War II because of Hepburn's feud with Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King and his Liberal Party of Canada. The crises led to Hepburn's resignation.
Federal politics[edit]
While it would have been easy enough for Drew to re-enter the legislature by running in a by-election, Drew decided to enter federal politics. "Colonel Drew" (as he liked to be called) won the 1948 federal Progressive Conservative leadership convention, defeating John Diefenbaker on the first ballot.
Progressive Conservative Party Member of Parliament (MP) George Russell Boucher resigned his Carleton seat so that Drew could then contest it in a by-election in order to enter the House of Commons.[25] The federal Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) was determined to defeat him, so they ran Eugene Forsey as their candidate.[26] Bill Temple was brought up from Toronto to appear at a political meeting in Richmond, Ontario's Town Hall, where Forsey and Drew were speaking.[27] He accused the Tory leader of being "a tool of the liquor interests" and also made suggestions about Drew's sobriety.[27] Throughout the evening Drew grew more red-faced and explosive every time Temple spoke.[26] Finally, after Drew misheard Temple calling him dishonest, the two men were restrained before they could come to physical blows with each other.[26] A riot was barely averted, and the meeting had to be terminated.[27] On December 20, 1948, Drew soundly defeated Forsey by over 8,000 votes — forcing the CCF candidate to lose his deposit — and went on to sit in Parliament.[28] As leader of the federal Progressive Conservative Party and now an MP, he became Leader of the Opposition.[29]
In the 1949 and 1953 federal elections, Drew's Tories were defeated handily by the Liberals, led by Louis St. Laurent. As a federal politician, Drew alienated potential supporters in Quebec when it was remembered that he had called French-Canadians a "defeated race". This rhetoric may not have been as damaging among some English-Canadian voters when he had been a provincial politician, but it was now used against him by his federal opponents. His support for conscription during World War II also hurt his prospects among French-Canadian voters. He ran against Forsey again in the Carleton district and defeated him by an even wider margin on June 27, 1949.[30]
Drew led the PCs into one more general election in 1953, with slightly better results than the previous election. In poor health following a nearly fatal attack of meningitis, Drew resigned as Progressive Conservative leader on September 21 1956, and was succeeded by John Diefenbaker.[31] On 12 December 1956 he received the Key to the City of Ottawa.[32]
Later life[edit]
From 1957 to 1964 he served as Canadian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and meanwhile worked with the newspaper baron and fellow Canadian Lord Beaverbrook in an attempt to influence British public opinion against joining the European Common Market, which Drew saw as a threat to the British Commonwealth.
Drew served as the first Chancellor of the University of Guelph from 1965 to 1971. In 1967, "for his services in government," he entered the newly created Order of Canada as a Companion.[33] In November 1972, he had a heart attack and was admitted to Wellesley Hospital on November 19.[34] His condition worsened due to congestive heart failure, and he slipped into and out of consciousness in late December and early January.[34] In 1973, Drew died of heart failure in his Wellesley Hospital room at 78.[3] He requested not to receive a state funeral and had a public family funeral in Toronto.[35] He was buried in his family's plot, next to his first wife, Fiorenza Johnson, in the Woodlawn Cemetery in Guelph.[35]
Archives[edit]
George Drew Archives are held at Library and Archives Canada[38] and the Archives of Ontario.[39]
