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The Progressive Conservative Party of Canada (PC) (French: Parti progressiste-conservateur du Canada) (1867–2003) was a Canadian centre-right conservative political party. While the national party officially dissolved in 2003, several members of the Senate of Canada continued to sit as members of the Progressive Conservative caucus, and the conservative parties in most Canadian provinces still use the Progressive Conservative name. While the name may be used by some Senators and provincial parties, the federal-level party ceased to exist following its merger with the Canadian Alliance. (Many Canadians simply referred to the party as "the Conservatives".) Canada's first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, was original a member of the Conservative or "Blue" Party. But in advance of confederation in 1867, the Conservative Party took in a large number of right-wing leaning members who defected from the Liberal or "Red" Party. Thereafter, the Conservative Party was the "Liberal-Conservative" (in French, "Liberal-Conservatiste") Party until the turn of the twentieth century The federal Tories governed Canada for over forty of the country's first seventy years of existence. However, the party spent the majority of its history in opposition as the nation's number two federal party, behind the Liberals. The party suffered a decade-long decline following the 1993 federal election, and was formally dissolved on December 7, 2003, when it merged with the Canadian Alliance to form the new Conservative Party. The Progressive Conservative caucus last officially met in early 2004. Between the party's founding in 1867, and its adoption of the "Progressive Conservative" name in 1942, the party changed its name several times. It was most commonly known as the Conservative Party. Several loosely-associated provincial Progressive Conservative parties continue to exist in Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador. As well, a small rump of Senators opposed to the merger continue to sit in Parliament as Progressive Conservatives. The Yukon association of the party was renamed the Yukon Party in 1990. The British Columbia Progressive Conservative Party changed its name back to the British Columbia Conservative Party in 1991. Saskatchewan's Progressive Conservative Party ceased to exist in 1997, at which point the Saskatchewan Party was formed, primarily from former PC Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) with a few Liberal Party MLAs joining them. The party adopted the "Progressive Conservative" party name in 1942 when Manitoba Premier John Bracken, a long-time leader of that province's Progressive Party, agreed to become leader of the Conservatives on condition that the party add Progressive to its name. Despite the name change, most former Progressive supporters continued to support the Liberal Party or the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, and Bracken's leadership of the Conservative Party came to an end in 1948. A major weakness of the party since 1885 was its inability to win support in Quebec, estranged significantly by that year's execution of Louis Riel. This problem was exacerbated in the Conscription Crisis of 1917. Even though the Quebec Conservative Party dominated politics in that province for the first thirty years of Confederation at both the federal and provincial levels, in the 20th Century the party was never able to be a force in provincial politics, being out of power starting in 1897, and ultimately dissolved into the Union Nationale in 1935 which took power in 1936 under Maurice Duplessis. In 20th century federal politics, the Conservatives were often seen as insensitive to French-Canadian ambitions and interests and were never able to win more than a handful of seats in Quebec with a few notable exceptions: It never fully recovered from the fragmentation of Mulroney's broad coalition in the late 1980s resulting from English Canada's failure to ratify the Meech Lake Accord. Immediately prior to its merger with the Canadian Alliance, it held only 15 of 301 seats in the Canadian House of Commons and never held more than 20 seats in Parliament between 1994 and 2003.
Ideology The Progressive Conservative Party was generally centre-right in its political ideology. From 1867 on, the party was identified with Protestant social values, British Imperialism, Canadian Nationalism, and constitutional centralism. This was highly successful up until 1920, and to that point in history, the party was the most successful federal party in the Dominion. As such, Canadian conservatism has historically more closely resembled that which was practised in the United Kingdom and, to an extent, Europe, than in the United States. The "Tory" approach worked well for the party up until 1917, when, as was common amongst 19th Century conservative movements, Canadian Tories opposed the rollback of government intervention in social and economic matters advocated by the liberals of the era. In contrast to so-called "American conservative" counterparts, however, they did not undertake as dramatic an ideological turnaround in the first half of the 20th century by continuing to follow mercantilism and nascent notions of the welfare state. Like their Liberal rivals, the party defines itself as a "big tent", welcoming a broad variety of members who supported relatively loosely-defined goals. Unlike the Liberal Party, there was a long history of ongoing factionalism within this tent. This factionalism arose from the party's lack of electoral success, and because the party often reached out to particular political groups in order to garner enough support to topple the Liberals. These groups usually remained semi-autonomous blocs within the party, such as Quebec nationalists and western Canadian Reformers in the 1980s. In later years, observers generally grouped the PC Party's core membership into two camps, "Red Tories" and "Blue Tories". Red Tories tend to be traditionally conservative, that is, "tory" in the Disraelian sense in social policy, placing a high value on the principles of noblesse oblige, communitarianism, and One Nation Conservatism — and were thus seen as moderate (in the context of classical economic thought) in their economic policy. For most of their history they were trade protectionists, engaging in free-trade economics in only a limited fashion, as in Empire Free-Trade. Historically they comprised the largest bloc of the original Canadian Conservative party. Notable Red Tories include Sir John A. Macdonald, Sir Robert Borden, John Farthing, George Grant, John Diefenbaker, E. Davie Fulton, Robert Stanfield, Dalton Camp, W.L. Morton, William Davis, Joe Clark, and Flora MacDonald. Blue Tories were originally members of the Tory elite drawn from the Commercial classes in Montreal and Toronto. Prior to World War II, they were generally tory in social policy, and classically liberal in economic policy. From 1964 on, this cadre came to identify more with neo-liberal influences in US Republican party, as espoused by Barry Goldwater, and Ronald Reagan, and the Thatcherite leadership in the British Conservative Party, as represented by Sir Keith Joseph and Margaret Thatcher. They have come to be termed, in the Canadian lexicon — neoconservatives. From 1891 until the party's dissolution, Red Tories generally dominated the highest rungs of the party and its leadership. The emerging neoconservatives of the 1970s were significantly reduced in numbers in the party by the late-1980s, and many of the disaffected drifted towards neo-liberalism and single-issue parties with a neoconservative bent, such as the Reform Party of Canada. When the PC party held power at the federal level, it never truly embraced Reaganomics and its crusade against "big government" as vociferously as was done in the USA and the UK. Canadian neoconservatives lean towards radical individualism and economic liberalism. Support for the Canadian Alliance and its predecessor the Reform Party of Canada derived principally from this group, and that support carried forward into the new Conservative Party of Canada. The success of the neoconservative movement in appropriating the label "Conservative" has brought into debate the very definition of conservatism in Canada today. Although adhering to economic philosophies similar to those originally advanced by 19th century liberals (known confusingly as both neoliberalism and neoconservatism), the Canadian Alliance agreed to the name "Conservative Party of Canada" for the new party in order to market themselves better to the electorate. They have also retained the appellation "tory," despite the fact that there is little evidence that they embrace any of the principles that are seen as core to the tory tradition in Canada since 1796. History
Rump PC caucus Following the merger, a rump Progressive Conservative caucus remained in Parliament, consisting of individuals who declined to join the new Conservative Party. In the House of Commons, Joe Clark, André Bachand and John Herron sat as PC members. In the 2004 election, Bachand and Clark did not run for re-election, and Herron ran as a Liberal, losing to Rob Moore in his riding of Fundy—Royal. Scott Brison, who had joined the Liberal caucus immediately upon departing the Conservative Party, was reelected as a Liberal in the 2004 election. In the Senate, William Doody, Lowell Murray and Norman Atkins also declined to join the new party, and continued to sit as Progressive Conservative senators. On March 24, 2005, Prime Minister Paul Martin appointed nine new senators, two of whom, Nancy Ruth and Elaine McCoy, were designated as Progressive Conservatives. Thus there may be Progressive Conservative senators until 2021 when McCoy, the youngest of the five, attains the mandatory retirement age of 75, or later if subsequent senators designate themselves Progressive Conservatives. Nancy Ruth has since left to sit with the Conservative Party. Adding the death of Senator Doody on December 27 2005, this reduced the number of PC Senators to three. Progressive Canadian Party On January 9, 2004, a group claiming to be loyal to the Progressive Conservative Party and opposed to the merger, which they characterized as an Alliance takeover, filed application with the Chief Electoral Officer to register a party called the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada. The application was refused on the grounds that the name could no longer be utilized. The group resubmitted with the name Progressive Canadian Party, and a new "PC Party" was recognized by Elections Canada on March 26. It secured sufficient backing to be registered as an official party on May 29. It is lead by Tracy Parsons of Truro, Nova Scotia. The Progressive Canadian party aims to be perceived as the successor party to the Progressive Conservatives. However, it is not clear how broad its support is among former Progressive Conservatives. In particular, no prominent anti-merger Progressive Conservatives such as Joe Clark or David Orchard are associated with the Progressive Canadian party, nor are any sitting MPs or senators. The most prominent member to join is former MP and junior cabinet minister, Heward Grafftey, who polled near or below Craig Chandler in the final PC Party leadership race. (Liberal-) Conservative Progressive Conservative 1 Created Viscount Bennett following his retirement from office. (Liberal-) Conservative Progressive Conservative Footnotes 1 On this occasion, Meighen failed in his attempts to win re-election to the House of Commons, so Hanson remained Leader of the Opposition throughout Meighen's term 2 Bracken did not win election to the House of Commons until 1945, so Hanson remained Leader of the Opposition until January 1943, when he was replaced by Gordon Graydon 3 On two occasions when Drew was too ill to perform his duties, William Earl Rowe served as Leader of the Opposition 4 Michael Starr served as Leader of the Opposition until November 5, 1967, when Stanfield, who had previously been premier of Nova Scotia, won election to Parliament Election results 1945-2000 See also | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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