Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1958-04-01


Those were the questions
this morning as they awake
hangover.
How well may the peoples
interests be served by a gov
eminent which practically
monopolizes the House Of
Commons?
For that is what the Con-
sentative administration Of
Prime Minister John G. Diefen-
baker now does. With zoe seats
in the chamber of 265 members
it has no effective opposition
If it chooses, 1t can make its
will supreme with scarcely any,
one in Parliament to gainsay it.
Only Scattered Resistance
The mighty Liberals. who
ruled this country for % years
up to last June, were reduced
from LOG to Al by the Tory
shock wave that Travelled from
the Atlantic to the Pacific
without encountering more than
scattered islands of resistance
The right wing Social Credit
Party, 10 members in the last
House. was wiped out to a man.
The left wing Cooperative
Commonwealth Federation $50
cialist) was reduced from IS
seats to eight. Its leader and
deupty leader. two Of Canada'S
most highly respected parlia-
mentarians. were among the
defeated.
One seat, formerly held by
q Liberal, was still in doubt
early today.
Called Snap Election
Primarily, the why and how
of it seemed to be one man,
62-year-old John Diefenbaker
He had waged q campaign last
spring reminiscent of Harry
Truman's in 1913, and had won
q narrow victory largely by his
own personal magnetism.
He had proceeded to carry
out his main election promises
Then. wearying Of the vicissi-
tudes of government by mi
nority. relying on the ephem-
eral willingness of at least one
Of the three opposition parties
to vote for his measures, he
had called a snap election to
demand a firm majority of the
voters.
Give us a chance to finish
the job" he appealed as he
crisscrossed the provinces in
the six weeks campaign.
The voters most obviously,
thought his record in his nine
months in Office merited q ma
Jority. This appeal for a proper
majority to carry out the Tory
program is belived by many
observers to have been the
greatest single factor in per-
suading some SO per cent of
the voters to vote Conservative.
Only SO per cent voted Liberal.
Blanked in Four Provinces
In spite of the fact that the
last time the Tories were In Of
flee, 1880 to 1885, the country
hit the bottom of the depres-
sion. the voters refused to
blame them for the recession
which has developed since they
took office last June. The Con-
servatives simply stated that
unemployment was the result of
the Bank Of Canada's tight
money policy. instituted with
Liberal acquiescence two years
ago. and Of the previous Lib
eral administrations failure to
take action to minimize a re-
cession which had been FORE
told by economists.
Liberal Leader Lester B.
Parsons promise to cut taxes
by $400 million a year as an
antitdote for unemployment-a
rs per cent tax cut for most
taxpayers-went over like the
proverbial lead balloon.
The Liberals failed to gain
q single seat formerly held by
one Of the other parties. They
were wiped out in 4 of the 10
Provinces. The only place they
held their own was in New
foundland. which is under the
political thumb Of Liberal Pre-
mier joey Smallwood.
The other three Atlantic
Provinces went strongly Tory
inevitable as a result of boun-
tiful economic aid the Diefen-
baker government has given
them In the last few months.
after generations in which the
maritimers have felt they were
the unwanted offspring of the
1867 confederation of Quebec
and Ontario.
Quebec was the great Bas-
ton Of liberalism for two gen.
erations. In 1880 the Tories
had managed to get "a Quebec
seats-but by 1949 they had
been reduced to none. Last
June the Liberals, then led by
native son Prime Minister Louis
st. Laurent. captured "a Que
bee seats while the Tories won
only nine.
Yesterday the Conservatives
won so Quebec seats; the Lib
erals rs.
Two Other Factors
French Canadian political ex-
perts say Quebec's Premier
Maurice Duplessis did it Mr..
Duplessis. a former Tory who
formed his own party, the I'm
ion Rationale. % years ago and
has dominated Quebec political
life for most Of the years since