Things in History You Should Know: Sir Matthew Baillie Begbie

A 'Thor is My Drinking Buddy' original! Are you feeling privileged yet?

Back in the early days of British Columbia – ‘early’ in this case being defined as after it became a colony and before it became a province – justice was a tricky thing to administer. Tensions, both racial and national, flared. The amount of land to cover wasn’t exactly compact, nor was it easy to traverse, what with all the mountains in the way. And people, being people, refused to stop committing crimes to make things easier for a poor, beleaguered law man.

Enter Matthew Baillie Begbie, the so-called Hanging Judge. Born at sea in 1819 to Scottish parents, he frittered away his first four decades in Great Britain – attending Cambridge, being a lawyer, and that sort of thing. He must have made a decent account of himself in that field, for when the Colony of British Columbia was formed in 1858, it was decided that he should definitely go be a judge there. (Fun fact: the man who introduced the bill in the British Parliament to make BC happen was none other than Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, of ‘it was a dark and stormy night’ fame. A robust literary career was no bar to politics in those days.)

It wasn’t a cozy desk job like he had back in London and it’s not certain why he accepted it. Most likely, he was the type of person to whom travelling hundreds of miles on horseback to hear a case sounded romantic. He rode about in his circuits, always holding court in full costume and often in his tent. And yes, there was some hanging involved, but not as much as you might think.

At the time, hanging was the only possible sentence for murder. Fifty-two murder trials were conducted during the colonial part of his stint, with thirty-eight convictions and twenty-seven actual hangings. (Begbie had asked for and got clemency for the remaining eleven convicts.) Nevertheless, the soubriquet stuck. Not that he didn’t take advantage of its intimidation factor, which was probably aided by his giant stature.

It also seems like he made it a personal policy not to be an asshole towards the locals, which was always a fine plan when they outnumbered the British in the area ten to one. He still insisted on having his trials be as British as possible, of course, but he made allowances such as switching out the oath on the Bible with something that would actually mean something to them and conducting the proceedings in their language. Did he use an interpreter? No. They were for the weak. He learned those languages, man.

Furthermore, those eleven convicts that he got clemency for were all natives and he could and did convict white men for crimes against natives using evidence from natives. This made him more progressive than approximately 95% of the English-speaking world of the time, give or take.

Now, how did Begbie get along with James Douglas, the governor of BC? It’s complicated. It seems as though most of the time, he dealt with the cranky old bastard quite well. He spoke up for a friend who wished to marry one of Douglas’ daughters and did not immediately get thrown out of the house. He served as a pallbearer at his funeral.

But Begbie made his true feelings be known at Douglas retirement party in 1864. Not only did he have the unmitigated audacity to plonk down beside the soon-to-be ex-governor whilst smoking a pipe – this was considered to be as rude as all hell even back then – he proceeded to give a speech about how he had hated every one of Douglas’ policies and he wasn’t the only one to think so. This didn’t go over well and he was booed into silence.

After BC joined up with the rest of Canada in 1871, Begbie was named its first chief justice of its supreme court. But four years later, during his first vacation in a very long time, Queen Victoria knighted him by surprise and he became Sir Matthew Baillie Begbie. Once he came back, he still rode his circuits and participated in what passed for progressive politics at the time (“I’ve got an idea, everyone! Let’s not be complete jerks towards the minorities and the poor!”). While he charmed the socks off of all the ladies, he never married. Perhaps he never met anyone who was so into horseback riding.

He died in Victoria in 1894 of cancer and buried at Ross Bay Cemetery. It is said that if you visit his grave on the night of the full moon, nothing much will happen. Maybe you’ll get rained on.

Things in History You Should Know: Pierre Trudeau

Today is the tenth anniversary of Trudeau's death. At the time, I'm not sure if I cared overmuch. Class was in session when the news broke and the option was given for those students overwhelmed by it all to go home and think about this great democracy. There may have been some genuine feeling among those who took advantage of it, but it was largely understood as an officially-sanctioned excuse to play hooky. I think I stayed at school.

I grew up and learned. I learned that history didn't have to occur more than a century ago to be interesting and that I damned well better know and understand the more recent stuff if ever I were to have a perspective beyond the previous week. I learned just how recently the national character of Canada consisted of reactionaries who seemingly longed for the heyday of the British Empire even as they struggled for a visible place on the world stage. Unless they were Francophones. Then they were just reactionaries. Don't ask about the First Nations.

That's not to say that all of Canada consisted of bigots and reactionaries. It's just that if you weren't, you were obviously a communist. Yes, I'm exaggerating, but not as much as I'd like.

Come the fifties, a sea change became apparent. First, you have Diefenbaker who was otherwise insane with his humble Bill of Rights. Second, you have Pearson with his bow tie and his student loans and social security and all sorts of other goodness. (Not to mention the bow tie. Bow ties are cool.) Third, you have... Trudeau, who among other things, made being Canadian something genuinely cool.

To think on this again makes me long for a Prime Minister with a sense of vision - someone who understands that we can go to so many wonderful places from here. Right now, we have a fellow who combines the worst worlds of fiscal irresponsibility and reactionary politics that seem like a throwback to the bad old days. We can do better and we will do better.

This article was originally published on December 9, 2009 in the University of Lethbridge student newspaper, the Meliorist. I was a week shy of graduating and being done with Alberta forever - hence my bitter tone towards the province. To be fair, anyone would feel like that after hearing Stelmach speak.

So read on. Toast to Trudeau afterwards if you're so inclined and hope that one day, I'll write a more fitting tribute to him.


~

Screw it. For what’s very probably my last article for this esteemed chronicle of news – hurrah for imminent graduation! – I’m going to piss off as many Albertans as possible. Because I will move away, and you will not find me.

That’s right. It’s Pierre Trudeau time. And I will start off by saying this: he was a better than average prime minister. If you wish to argue with me on this point, attempt to name a Tory PM that was better than him. Mulroney? Harper? Thor forbid, Diefenbaker? Sorry, Macdonald and Borden were the only awesome ones. So what did this chap do, in his multitude of years in office (1968-1979, 1980-1984, apologies to Joe Clark) to merit my relatively high opinion of him? Dude, I will tell you.

He made the world give two shits who the Canadian prime minister was. This was likely aided by Richard Nixon being the US president during a respectable chunk of his tenure, an ugly sort of man in every possible way. But even if Nixon had been a worthwhile human being, Trudeau had him bang to rights on the charm and wit front. Which is why John Lennon chose to hang out with him. (Nixon did get to talk football with Hunter S. Thompson, though.)

He rocked as Minister of Justice, which was what Lester Pearson, our nicest PM, made him in 1967. What on earth did he do in that position? Well, I’ll tell you! He legalized contraception and homosexuality, and shoved a foot in the door for the eventual legalization of abortion by making it legal to perform the act if the mother’s life was in danger. Oh, and he made it illegal for you to drive if you had one too many. All of this came from the massive Bill C-150, which also placed restrictions on harassing phone calls, gun ownership, and animal cruelty. Separate from all this, he further enabled one to leave one’s loveless sham of a marriage, should one please.

He was kind of bad ass. This was a man who just sat there calmly while separatists chucked bottles and rocks at him on the very eve of his first election as Prime Minister and leader of the Liberal Party, while everyone went and hid like the sensible people children that they were. His successors in the party tended to exercise this trait as well, with Turner saving Diefenbaker from drowning and Chretien’s development of the Shawinigan Shake. Ignatieff must learn from these exalted examples if he is ever to become PM.

He introduced official bilingualism. Yes, this is a virtue. Whether we like to admit it or not, historically speaking, French language rights in this country – not just in Quebec, mind you – have been kicked repeatedly in the teeth. Frankly, having that bit of extra text on your cereal box or having that additional bit of a requirement if you intend to enter certain sectors of the federal bureaucracy is not an overwhelming sacrifice to redress this.

He engineered the patriation of the Constitution. It is a rather ridiculous thing that for 165 years after Confederation, we did not have the ability to tinker with our own constitution. Nay, we had to go all the way to the British Parliament and ask nicely, perhaps bringing along a tasteful gift basket with a nice selection of tea and biscuits. Regardless of the political circus that surrounded the process (Night of the Long Knives, anyone?), it was something that needed to be done if we were ever going to become independent from Britain on paper as well as in fact.

His newfangled constitution included the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Diefenbaker’s Bill of Rights of 1960, while well-intentioned, was toothless. True, it caused the dawn of judicial activism in Canada, bringing forth such terrible thing as full abortion rights and same-sex marriage and Native land claims. (Note: the word ‘terrible’ in the last sentence is sarcastic. I can hear your hands wringing, campus Right to Lifers.) Plus, it has been argued that such activism limits democracy in this fair country. However, I would argue that human rights should not be subject to the whims of the electorate because if history has shown us anything, it’s that the electorate haven’t been too great on that count. Pity about that notwithstanding clause, though.

Oh yes, National Energy Program – the implementation of this is a legitimate gripe, no matter how well-meaning it was, although it may have sheltered Canada as a whole from the worst effects of the global recession that was all the rage at the time. And there was the whole ‘invoking the War Measure Act’ thing with the FLQ Crisis. Still, my filthy lefty self can’t help but appreciate Trudeau, ginormous faults and all.

And as a final, I’d like to say this: the brands of small ‘c’ and big ‘c’ conservatism to be found in this province are rubbish, the tar sands are rubbish too, ‘feminism’ is not a cuss word, and your wind is far too apt to cause shenanigans (such as making me feel like frickin’ Shackleton whilst out walking last weekend). But what the hell, Alberta beef is still delicious.

Farewell, all! I head now for hillier climes.

John A. Macdonald and the Pacific Scandal

A nonfiction piece, done in the vein of Things in History You Should Know.

In 1873, John A. Macdonald was not in a happy place. He’d been serving as Canada’s first prime minister for six years by that point and he quite liked the gig – that, and the drinking. He’d accomplished much in that time. He’d put down rebellions. He’d weathered through the murder of Thomas D’Arcy McGee, a dear friend and drinking partner. To the original four provinces of Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, he’d added British Columbia, Prince Edward Island and the entire Northwest Territories, which was so huge, they eventually carved out three extra provinces and two territories from its magnificent bulk. And now that he already fulfilled his main goal of creating a country that spanned the continent, he was already enacting schemes of keeping it together.

Exhibit number one, the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR), which would connect all of the provinces together without venturing into American territory.

So Macdonald had a great, nation-building, media-friendly project on the strength of which he could and did win the 1872 election. What could he possibly do to screw it up? Send a telegram to a railway promoter by the name of Hugh Allan begging for more campaign money. Have a paper trail indicating that said Allan contributed about a third of a million dollars to the campaign, which to put it in today’s terms, was holy crap, a lot of money. Reward Allan the contract for the CPR post-election. Have a Liberal Opposition that’s hell-bent on getting in power one of these days and ready to spend a respectable chunk of change for a copy of the telegram.

Which are promptly published in all the right Liberal newspapers.

Thus we come back to Macdonald, in the August of 1873. He was facing an inquiry in less than two weeks. His finances were in shambles. His young daughter, Mary, was suffering from a mysterious condition that swelled her head and debilitated her body – it would later be known to be hydrocephaly. He walked out of his summer home in Trois-Rivières and disappeared for an entire weekend.

What is known is that he spent this time going on the mother of all benders, heading off to Montreal and elsewhere while his wife, Agnes, wondered where the hell he had got to. What isn’t known is whether he merely fell into the river in a drunken stupor or if it was an attempt at suicide. The papers started speculating… then stopped.

Then Macdonald sobered up. Relatively speaking.

He survived the royal inquiry, but when Parliament met again in October, it was done. Previously loyal MPs had revolted, Macdonald could no longer pretend to have their support, so he resigned as Prime Minister. He just barely held on as leader of the Conservative Party.

Alexander Mackenzie of the Liberal Party took over from that point, calling an election in 1874. He won this despite making it as un-fun as possible – secret ballots never did have the thrill of danger and pressure of peers as the old method did. He engaged on a program of electoral reform and having the CPR finance its own damned self. But there were two things working against him. One, solidness and dependability are admirable traits for a stonemason, which he formerly was, but the public demands a touch more zing in their prime ministers. Two, economic depression, which was, of course, entirely the fault of him and his inclination for freer trade with the States.

Macdonald took advantage of both with bells on in the election of 1878. The matter of ‘zing’? Easy for him to take care of. Ugly though he was, drunk though he may be at times, Macdonald was a walking ball of charm. The matter of the economy? Oh, he had a plan for that. First, you get that railway built. Second, you used that railway to ship people westward to the Prairies to homestead. Third, you shipped – grains and foodstuffs eastward, manufactured goods and niceties westward. A simple, pat plan in which the States hardly needed to be dealt with at all. It was called the National Policy and the voting population deemed it good.
He never left office after that.

The railway was eventually built, several years overdue and millions of dollars over-budget, but the National Policy did seem to work. He’d held onto power despite the matter of Louis Riel’s second rebellion over in the west, which ended with Riel’s execution and the whole of Quebec being righteously ticked about that. He even made a solid go at giving unmarried women the vote, but was, alas, defeated in that.

John A. lived to see his son, Hugh, become an MP in the 1891 election, but died in office later that year. Considering his recurring poor health, the drinking, and the century, seventy-six was not a bad age to make it to.

Of course, because of his failure to groom a successor, the Conservative Party wouldn’t recover from his death for another generation. Canada would just have to deal with the Liberal PM Wilfrid Laurier, who was almost as stylish as John A. and less prone to silly little scandals. It seemed to work for him.