From Bvio
The '''Communist Party of Canada''' is a
communist political party in
Canada.
==Party History==
The CPC was organized with great secrecy in a barn near the city of
Guelph, Ontario, in May
1921. Many of its founding members had belonged to groups such as the
Socialist Party of Canada,
One Big Union, the
Socialist Labor Party, the
Industrial Workers of the World and other
socialist,
Marxist or
Labour parties or clubs. The party was founded as the
Canadian section of the
Comintern, and was thus similar to
Communist parties around the world.
The CPC alternated between legality and illegality during the 1920s and 1930s. It was initially illegal, and created the ''Workers' Party of Canada'' in
1922 as its public face. The CPC was legalized in
1924, and the Workers' Party ceased to exist.
In
1922-
24, the provincial wings of the WPC/CPC affiliated with the
Canadian Labour Party, as part of a "united front" strategy against the capitalist classes. The CPC came to dominate the CLP organization in several regions of the country; the CLP itself, however, never became an effective national organization. The Communists withdrew from the CLP in
1928-
29, following a shift in
Comintern policy.
In
1931, eight of the CPC's leaders were arrested and imprisoned in under Section 98 of Canada's Criminal Code. The party continued to exist, but was under the constant threat of legal harrassment, and was for all intents and purposes an underground organization until
1936.
Although the party was banned, affiliated groups such as the Workers' Unity League, the Relief Camp Workers Union, and the National Unemployed Workers Association played a significant role in organizing the unskilled and the unemployed in protest marches and demonstrations and campaigns such as the
On to Ottawa Trek. Party members were also active in the
Congress of Industrial Organizations attempt to unionise the auto sector.
The party also mobilised the 1,500-man
Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion to fight in the
Spanish Civil War as part of the
International Brigade. Among the leading Canadian Communists involved in that effort was Dr.
Norman Bethune, who is known for his work with the
Chinese Communist Party.
From
1928 to the mid-1930s, supporters of
Leon Trotsky, such as
Maurice Spector, the editor of the party's paper ''The Worker'' and party chairman, were expelled.
Jack MacDonald, who had supported Spector's expulsion, was removed as the party's general secretary for not supporting the Stalinist position, and was ultitmately expelled. MacDonald later became a
Trotskyist and joined Spector in founding the
International Left Opposition (Trotskyist) Canada, which was part of the Trotsky's International
Left Opposition. Also expelled were supporters of
Nikolai Bukharin and
Jay Lovestone's
Right Opposition, such as
William Moriarty.
J.B. Salsberg was initially sympathetic to the Right Opposition but quickly recanted, allowing him to remain in the party.
Tim Buck replaced MacDonald as party
general secretary in 1929, and remained in the position until 1962, steering a course of unswerving loyalty to the leaders of the
Soviet Union.
The Communist Party opposed Canada's entry into
World War Two until the
1941 invasion of the USSR and the collapse of the
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. During the
Conscription Crisis of 1944, the CPC set up "Tim Buck Committees" across the country to campaign for a "yes" vote in the national
referendum on
conscription.
The party's first elected
MP was
Dorise Nielson. Nielson was elected in North Battleford, Saskatchewan in
1940 under the
popular front Progressive Unity label.
The party was banned in 1941, and henceforth ran candidates as the
Labour-Progressive Party until 1959. Several party members were elected at various levels:
*
Fred Rose was elected to represent a Montreal riding in the
Canadian House of Commons.
*
Mary Kardash and
William Ross were school trustees in
Winnipeg
*
Jacob Penner and
Joseph Zuken were popular
aldermen in
Winnipeg.
*
W. A. Kardash and
James Litterick were
Manitoba MLAs.
*
A.A. MacLeod and
J.B. Salsberg were members of the Ontario
legislature.
*
Stanley Brehaut Ryerson and
Stewart Smith were
Toronto aldermen.
*
Harry Rankin sat on
Vancouver's city council on behalf of the
Committee of Progressive Electors which he helped found. Though not officially a Communist Party member he was a supporter of the party and a member in all but name.
Nikita Khrushchev's 1956
Secret Speech exposing the crimes of
Josef Stalin and
the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary shook the faith of many Communists around the world. Many, perhaps most, members of the Canadian party left, including a number of prominent party members. Many ex-Communists joined the
Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and its successor the
NDP. Some joined the
Liberals. The
USSR's
1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia caused more people to leave the Canadian Communist Party.
In common with most communist parties, it went through a crisis after the
collapse of the Soviet Union, and subsequently split. The pro-reform majority formally dissolved the Communist Party in 1991 and created the
Cecil-Ross Society as a political foundation to continue its efforts. (The name comes from the intersection of Cecil Street and Ross Street in
Toronto where the headquarters of the party was located.) The orthodox minority faction refused to accept the dissolution of the party and relaunched itself as the Communist Party of Canada in 1992. However the pro-reform majority took possession of the ''Canadian Tribune'', which had been the party's weekly newspaper for decades, as well as most of the party's property, such as its headquarters at 24 Cecil Street in Toronto. The Cecil-Ross Society ended publication of the ''Canadian Tribune'' and attempted to launch a new broad-left magazine, ''New Times'' which failed after several issues and then ''Ginger'' which only published twice.
The reconstituted Communist Party operated by the old CP minority was deregistered and its assets seized by
Elections Canada when it failed to run more than fifty candidates in the 1993 general election. The party launched a legal challenge that went to the
Supreme Court of Canada (''Figueroa vs. Canada''; named for the current party leader
Miguel Figueroa). With lawyer Peter Rosenthal representing the CPC, The Supreme Court of Canada ruled the law (originally put in place by the
Mulroney government) as unconstitutional. This vicory was celebrated by many of the other small parties - regardless of political differences - on the principle that it was a victory for the people's right to democratic choice.
The CPC publishes a fortnightly newspaper called ''The People's Voice''.
The Communist Party is one of two Communist parties in Canada, the other is the
Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist). The CPC-ML was founded in 1963 as ''the Internationalists'', an anti-
revisionist Maoist party rejecting the reforms of
Nikita Khrushchev. Today, the CPC-ML is known during elections as the ''Marxist-Leninist Party'', and functions as a
Stalinist party.
==
General Secretaries of the CPC==
*
Jack MacDonald 1921-1929
*
Tim Buck 1929-1962
*
Leslie Morris 1962-1964
*
William Kashtan 1965-1988
*
George Hewison 1988-1991
*
Miguel Figueroa since 1992
== Election results ==
{| border="1" cellpadding="2"
! Election
! # of candidates nominated
! # of seats won
! # of total votes
! % of popular vote
|-
!
1930
|
6
| <center> 0
| <center> 4,557
| <center> 0.12%
|-
!1935
| <center> 13
|<center> 0
| <center> 27,456
| <center> 0.46%
|-
!1940*
| <center>9
|<center> 0
| <center> 14,005
| <center> 0.36%
|-
!1945**
| <center> 68
| <center> 1
| <center> 111,892
| <center> 2.13%
|-
!1949**
| <center> 17
| <center> 0
| <center> 32,623
| <center> 0.56%
|-
!1953**
| <center> 100
| <center> 0
| <center> 59,622
| <center> 1.06%
|-
!1957**
| <center> 10
| <center> 0
| <center> 7,760
| <center> 0.12%
|-
!1958**
| <center> 18
| <center> 0
| <center> 9,769
| <center> 0.13%
|-
!1962
| <center> 12
| <center> 0
| <center> 6,360
| <center> 0.08%
|-
!1963
| <center> 12
| <center> 0
| <center> 4,234
| <center> 0.05%
|-
!1965
| <center> 12
| <center> 0
| <center> 4,285
| <center> 0.06%
|-
!1968
| <center> 14
| <center> 0
| <center> 4,465
| <center> 0.05%
|-
!1972***
| <center> n.a
| <center> n.a.
| <center> n.a.
| <center> n.a.
|-
!1974
| <center> 69
| <center> 0
| <center> 12,100
| <center> 0.13%
|-
!1979
| <center> 71
| <center> 0
| <center> 9,141
| <center> 0.08%
|-
!1980
| <center> 52
| <center> 0
| <center> 6,022
| <center> 0.06%
|-
!1984
| <center> 52
| <center> 0
| <center> 7,551
| <center> 0.06%
|-
!1988
| <center> 51
| <center> 0
| <center> 7,066
| <center> 0.05%
|-
!1993****
| <center> n.a
| <center> n.a.
| <center> n.a.
| <center> n.a.
|-
!1997****
| <center> n.a
| <center> n.a.
| <center> n.a.
| <center> n.a.
|-
!2000
| <center> 52
| <center> 0
| <center> 8,779
| <center> 0.07%
|-
!2004
| <center> 35
| <center> 0
| <center> 4,564
| <center> 0.03%
|}
===By-elections===
The party has also nominated candidates in numerous by-elections:
1943**: 1
1947**: 1
1949**: 2
1950**: 2
1954**: 5
1955**: 1
1958**: 1
1977: 5
1978: 5
(*) A ninth candidate, Dorise Nielson was a member of the Communist Party but ran and was elected as a Progressive Unity candidate.
(**) The Communist Party was banned in 1941. From 1943 until 1959 they ran candidates under the name Labour Progressive Party.
(***) In 1972 the party ran its candidates as independents. It is unknown how many party members ran in that election.
(****) The party failed to register at least 50 candidates in time for the 1993 election. As a result the party was deregistered and its candidates ran as independents. Party status was not regained until prior to the 2000 general election. It is unknown how many party members ran in the 1993 and 1997 elections as independents.
==See also==
*Communist Party of Ontario
*Communist Party of Canada - Manitoba
*Labour Progressive Party of Canada
*Liberal-Labour
*List of political parties in Canada
*Jack Kavanagh
==External links==
*Communist Party of Canada
*Communist Party of Canada history
*Maurice Spector on the founding of the Workers Party of Canada, 1922
<center>
{| id="toc" style="margin: auto;" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="5"
! style="background:"#333333" align="center" width="100%" colspan="4" | Federal Political Parties of Canada
|-
| align="center" width="25%" bgcolor="lightcoral" | '''Liberal'''
Image:Lpcsmall.jpg
| align="center" width="25%" bgcolor="cornflowerblue" | '''Conservative'''
Image:Cpcsmall.jpg
| align="center" width="25%" bgcolor="lightskyblue" | '''B.Q.'''
Image:Bqsmall.jpg
| align="center" width="20%" bgcolor="sandybrown" | '''N.D.P.'''
Image:Ndpsmall.jpg
|-
| colspan="4" | '''''Not represented in the House of Commons'''''
|-
| align="center" width="25%" bgcolor="powderblue" | Action
Image:Capsmall.PNG
| align="center" width="25%" bgcolor="palevioletred" | C.H.P.
Image:Chpsmall.PNG
| align="center" width="25%" bgcolor="indianred" | Communist
Image:Cmpcsmall.PNG
| align="center" width="25%" bgcolor="yellowgreen" | Green
Image:Gpcsmall.jpg
|-
| align="center" width="25%" bgcolor="darkkhaki" | Libertarian
Image:Ltpcsmall.PNG
| align="center" width="20%" bgcolor="tan" | Marijuana
Image:Mpsmall.PNG
| align="center" width="20%" bgcolor="gold" | Marxist-Leninist
Image:Mlpcsmall2.PNG
| align="center" width="20%" bgcolor="#9999FF" | PC Party
Image:Pcpsmall.PNG
|-
| colspan="4" | Election - List of election results - List of political parties in the Americas - Political parties
Canadian federal elections | Canadian election results | Summaries
1867 -
1872 -
1874 -
1878 - 1882 -
1887 -
1891 -
1896 -
1900 -
1904 -
1908 -
1911 -
1917 -
1921
1925 -
1926 -
1930 -
1935 -
1940 -
1945 -
1949 -
1953 -
1957 -
1958 -
1962 -
1963 -
1965 -
1968
1972 -
1974 -
1979 -
1980 -
1984 -
1988 -
1993 -
1997 -
2000 -
2004 -
|}
