At the Door

For 15 years the socialist Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) had been lurking like a poor relation around the Dominion's political house in Ottawa. Old-line Liberals and Conservatives thought that if they paid no attention, the loiterer might go away. But last week he walked up and started banging on the door.

The CCF knocks were loud. After winning the Yale, (B.C.) by-election (TIME, June 14), the party put on a three-ring show.

In Ontario it: 1) gained 14 seats in the provincial legislature, became the official opposition; 2) defeated Premier George Drew in his home riding; 3) routed the Conservative Party in Tory Toronto for the first time since Confederation in 1867 (the socialists won eleven Toronto seats, the Tories four). The day after the Ontario disaster there was more bad news for the old parties: two more by-election victories for the CCF, both won from the Liberals, in the ridings of Ontario (Ont.) and Vancouver Centre (B.C.). That cut the Liberal margin in the Dominion House of Commons to four seats.

Looking Back. Prime Minister King led the politicians who tried to explain how it happened. An extraordinary press release from his office put it down as the "inevitable consequence of war . . . high living costs and privations and restrictions of any kind." Said King: "It is, however, the long run rather than the short run which counts for most." Wily Politician King was unlikely to accept his own advice. He and his party had to think of the short run and think fast. Some immediate consequences of the political upset: P: The prospect that the Liberal Party may adopt such vote-getting CCF promises as price control, housing, expanded social security, better labor laws. (King had done it before. The baby-bonus idea, a CCF dream child, was adopted by the Liberals.)

P: A more determined drive by the Liberals to win Quebec from Premier Maurice Duplessis in the provincial elections July 28. More than ever, the Liberals needed anti-socialist Quebec. P:Further postponement of a federal election. Voters obviously were not in a Liberal mood.

P: A new lease on the national Tory leadership for John Bracken. After last week's voting in Ontario, George Drew was in no position to push his claims.

Looking Ahead. Long-run consequences of the CCF growth looked even more significant: National CCF Leader M. J. Coldwell predicted that his party would win 70 seats in the next Parliament. If that happened, the Liberals would be unable to form a government alone, would have to unite with the Tories to stave off socialism. In a deal like that, one of the old-line parties would disappear. Canada, like much of the rest of the world, would be split left & right.

By week's end there were already appeals for an immediate Liberal-Conservative coalition. Said the Conservative Vancouver Daily Province: "The Liberals and Conservatives have their differences, no doubt, but these are not fundamental ... They could easily be healed by compromise." The independent Quebec Chronicle-Telegraph warned the old parties: ". . . Quit playing partisan politics and come to the aid of the country--or else."

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