“He had no high cards, but he knew how to play almost any game.”

1868 onwards were tough times for John A Macdonald, the first prime minister of Canada. He would lose a national election for the first (and only) time; he would face accusations of corruption about railway construction; he would endure national division over the rebellion of Louis Riel. He would overcome all this, and be re-elected while establishing the RCMP, building a railway across Canada, expanding Canada from coast to coast, and as usual, going around being his witty and charismatic self.

Louis Riel is perhaps the best known figure from that period, now recognized as a symbol of Manitoba, but at the time he was seen in Ontario as a Metis rebel, while in Quebec he was seen as the victim of the abuse of English power. His demands for land for the Metis, and his armed rebellion against Canada, polarized the country and aroused strong feelings. In the end, he would be executed for treason and for many years forgotten about, but he remains a source of controversy today, though for different reasons. The treatment of the First Nations in the same area, and the execution of 8 of them in public without lawyers or translators, remains all but forgotten, however.

This is the second part of Gwyn’s John A Macdonald biography: I reviewed the first part here. In brief, the first part covers a younger John A and Canada’s Conferation, while the second is focused on the second half of John A’s life, the Canadian Pacific Railway, and Louis Riel. Though still good, I liked this one less than the last; Gwyn’s sympathy for and love of John A, though it serves him well in many respects, can feel apologist when it comes to the scandals surrounding the construction of the railway.

The thesis of the biography, if biographies are allowed to have theses, is that with no John A, there would have been no Canada. Without John A’s constant worry over the Americans, Canada would simply be America North. That may well be true, but in the same time period lies the roots of much more of modern Canada; French/English divisions, political corruption (definitely political corruption), and perhaps even why the Liberal party has done so well over Canada’s history. That, of course, is why reading history is interesting.