Herbert Greenfield
Encyclopedia
Herbert W. Greenfield was a Canadian
politician who served as the fourth Premier of Alberta
from 1921 until 1925. Born in Winchester
, Hampshire
, in England, he immigrated to Canada in his late twenties, settling first in Ontario
and then in Alberta
, where he farmed. He soon became involved in the United Farmers of Alberta
(UFA), a farmers' lobby organization that was in the process of becoming a political party
, eventually becoming the organization's vice president. Though he did not run in the 1921 provincial election
, the first in which the UFA fielded candidates, Greenfield was the party's eventual choice to serve as Premier when the UFA won a majority of the seats that year.
Like most of the UFA caucus
, Greenfield had no experience in government and he struggled in the position. He relied extensively on his Attorney General, John E. Brownlee, for counsel on policy and strategy. He was unable to control his caucus, which did not generally believe in party discipline
, and his government lost several votes in the legislature despite its nominal majority. He was unable to effectively address the problems facing farmers (including drought
and low grain prices), bitter labour disputes in the coal
industry, or the pronounced divisions in public opinion that had sprung up around prohibition
(which his government ended). Despite this, his time as Premier saw the eventual elimination of the provincial deficit, substantial progress in negotiating the transfer of natural resource rights from the federal government, and the creation of the Alberta Wheat Pool
. He also named Irene Parlby
as the province's first female cabinet minister.
By 1924, many UFA Members of the Legislative Assembly
(MLAs) wanted to see Greenfield leave office, both because they were frustrated with his failings and because they thought it likely that a Greenfield-led government would be defeated in the next election. Their first attempt to replace him failed when Brownlee, their intended replacement, refused to have anything to do with the plan, but a second attempt, in 1925, was successful when Brownlee agreed to take office if Greenfield personally requested that he do so. Greenfield had not wanted the job in the first place, and agreed to resign in Brownlee's favour.
After his retirement from politics, Greenfield represented Alberta in London
, England for several years before returning to Canada to work in the oil and gas industry. He died in 1949 at the age of 79.
, Hampshire
, England, the son of John Greenfield (c. 1830–1909) and Mary Leake (c. 1835–1904). He attended Wesleyan School in Dalston
, but dropped out as a result of his father's bankruptcy. He worked aboard a cattle boat in 1892 before emigrating to Canada
in 1896.
In Canada, he worked in the oil fields near Sarnia
, Ontario
, and as a farmer in Weston. He married Elizabeth Harris on February 28, 1900. The couple had two sons, Franklin Harris Greenfield and Arnold Leake Greenfield. In 1904, the family went west for economic reasons and homesteaded near Edmonton
. He found work in a lumber mill and later turned to farming. During his first year in Alberta, a fire destroyed his home, and he and his wife spent the winter in an abandoned sod hut. In 1906, they resettled to a large home four kilometers south of Westlock
.
In 1922, while Greenfield was Premier, Elizabeth died suddenly as a result of routine surgery. He remarried in 1926, to Marjorie Greenwood Cormack, who brought two children of her own into the marriage.
Provincially, Greenfield was originally a Liberal
, but along with many other farmers, began to grow dissatisfied with the Liberal government's treatment of farmers. He became involved with the United Farmers of Alberta
, which prior to 1919 was a non-partisan lobby group that eschewed direct involvement in the political process. He was elected to the organization's executive in 1919 and chaired its mass conventions
in 1920 and 1921. He followed this by heading an extremely successful membership drive, and was named interim Vice President of the organization upon the sudden death of Percival Baker
. Despite this involvement, he did not seek election to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta
in the 1921 election
, the first in which the UFA ran candidates. When the UFA, which as part of its resistance to old-style politics had contested the election without designating a leader, won 38 of 61 seats, it found itself needing to form a government without knowing who would head it. The logical choice was UFA President Henry Wise Wood
. However, Wood had little taste for the minutiae of government, preferring to remain at the head of what he saw as a broader political movement (noting that he would "sooner be President of the UFA than the USA"), and saw party lawyer Brownlee as the best choice. Brownlee, who, like Wood, had not contested the election, felt that the Premier must be a farmer for the aspirations of the UFA's base to be fulfilled. George Hoadley, the only UFA member with previous legislative experience, was considered, but since his previous experience had been as a Conservative
—one of the old line parties so disdained by the UFA—he was deemed unacceptable. There was even some speculation that incumbent Liberal Premier Charles Stewart
, who had become a member of the UFA before it entered politics directly, would stay on as Premier, but he immediately announced that he would serve only until the UFA selected a leader. A meeting of the UFA caucus in Calgary
selected Greenfield, and he took office as Premier on August 13, 1921.
Greenfield took office as Premier amid great expectations: the Lethbridge Herald
called him "the only new Moses
that can bridge the Red Sea
", while the Calgary Herald
noted that "No government ever went into office in this country carrying better wishes for its success". He also took office without a seat in the legislature. This latter circumstance was addressed through the voluntary resignation of Donald MacBeth Kennedy
, who had won the riding
of Peace River
for the UFA. Greenfield won the seat by acclamation
December 9, 1921.
. When Greenfield selected his cabinet and was about to announce it to his caucus for their vetting, he was interrupted by Lorne Proudfoot
who asked whether, in addition to the rumoured inclusion of Labour
members, the cabinet would include any of the fourteen Liberal
MLAs. Proudfoot argued that to exclude them would be to "start out much after the matter of the old parties". Greenfield had not intended this, and suggested that no Liberals would likely be amenable to it. Irene Parlby
, the caucus's only woman (who Greenfield would shortly name as Alberta's first female cabinet minister) agreed, and suggested that the UFA's ideal of securing representation for all economic groups in society did not apply to the Liberals, who were not an economic group and were not democratically organized in any event. Proudfoot's proposal was defeated sixteen votes to fourteen. Greenfield went on to name the seven member cabinet he had intended, including Labour MLA Alex Ross
as Minister of Public Works, Parlby as Minister Without Portfolio, and Greenfield himself as Provincial Treasurer.
Once the legislature convened in 1922, the inexperience of the Premier and his caucus was further laid bare. Greenfield, devastated by the sudden death of his wife, turned in a poor performance. Faced with an aggressive attack by new Liberal leader John R. Boyle
, Greenfield relied heavily on Attorney General John Brownlee, who sat next to him in the legislature, to provide the defense. The session got off to an inauspicious start: Greenfield nominated the government's preferred candidate for speaker
, Oran McPherson
, only to have one of his backbenchers, Alex Moore, nominate Independent Conservative John Smith Stewart
; Stewart spared the government embarrassment by declining the nomination.
Moore, along with fellow UFA backbencher John Russell Love
, caused the government further trouble with a resolution aiming to limit the circumstances under which the government would have to resign. By convention of the Westminster system
, a government was required to resign on the defeat of any piece of its legislation that was critical to its program. Moore and Love objected to the manner in which this provision could be expected to pressure UFA MLAs to back government legislation that they might otherwise be inclined to oppose, and introduced a resolution in the legislature that called for a policy by which the government would resign only upon passage of an explicit motion of no confidence
. The resolution caught the attention of politicians across Canada, including future Prime Minister R. B. Bennett
, who warned that it was unconstitutional. Brownlee moved an amendment that reduced the resolution to a vague statement of principle, which passed and was not heard of again.
UFA members also objected to the concept of a caucus
, in which MLAs from one party debate policy behind closed doors. They believed that the role of an MLA was to represent the views of his or her constituents directly on the floor of the legislature. This belief too proved problematic to the government. The Dairyman's Act had been adopted by the Liberal government to provide low-interest loans to dairy farmers. It was unpopular among farmers, and Greenfield's government aimed to amend it. Many UFA backbenchers, however, wanted to see it repealed all together, but because of their objection to caucus discussions Greenfield was not aware of this by the time his amendments came to the floor of the legislature. They passed through the house with little debate, until just after third reading, when one of the backbenchers rose to ask if the time had come to speak against the bill. Brownlee suggested that, in view of the legislators' inexperience with parliamentary procedure, the legislature consider the motion to adopt the bill on third reading as not yet having passed, that debate might ensue. This suggestion adopted, several UFA members attacked the Act. They were joined in this by the Liberals, despite the fact that it was a Liberal act that had been co-authored by Boyle. In the end, the bill passed only by virtue of the support of the four Labour members.
More trouble with the legislature struck Greenfield in August 1922, during a special session called for the purpose of passing enabling legislation for a provincial wheat board. The session lasted only a week, and on August 31 the only item of business that remained was the members' pay for the session. The government was proposing $100 per member, but some MLAs complained that this was insufficient in light of the long travel times between Edmonton and their constituencies. Greenfield, lacking the counsel of the vacationing Brownlee and wanting to avoid trouble, proposed upping the amount to $200. Independent MLA Robert Pearson
proposed increasing it once again, to $250, to match what their counterparts in Saskatchewan
had received. This suggestion was carried. While Greenfield had hardly been the driving force behind the increases, he had facilitated them and had been blind to the appearance of paying MLAs more for six afternoons of work than some farmers were able to earn in a year. The grassroots
of his own party condemned the move, all the more so when the wheat board that had been the purpose of the special session failed to come to fruition.
The government did not give up on addressing the problem when it ended subsidies. It had previously commissioned a number of studies on the agricultural situation and related factors, and converted some of the results of these studies into legislation. The Debt Adjustment Act of 1923 was designed to adjust farmers' debts to a level that they could actually pay, thus allowing them to carry on while still ensuring that creditors received as much as was feasible. In the words of University of Calgary
professor David C. Jones, the bill offered "solace, but no real satisfaction". According to Jones, Greenfield's attempts to rescue southern Alberta from agricultural calamity were probably doomed to failure. Even so, Greenfield had called the situation his top priority, and his failure to bring it to a successful resolution cost him politically.
Another preoccupation of the UFA and the Greenfield government was the marketing of wheat. From 1919 to 1920 there had been a federally established wheat pool
to stabilize wheat prices. When it was disbanded, wheat prices tumbled by two-thirds, prompting many farmers to call for its re-introduction. At the call of the UFA and farmers' organizations in other provinces, the federal government (whose razor-thin majority in the House of Commons
was often widened by the support of farmer-friendly Progressive
members) created a new, mandatory agency, pending the appointment by the provincial governments of Alberta and Saskatchewan
of a board of directors for the agency. This they proved unable to do. Greenfield's government ultimately admitted defeat and gave up on re-establishing the pool, opting instead to guarantee loans to farmer-run cooperative pools. With government assistance, the Alberta Wheat Pool
came into existence in time for the 1923 harvest.
, and the industry was not prospering. Production was more than 50% greater than demand, and fewer than half of the province's mines were profitable. The industry as a whole was earning a profit of less than one cent per ton of coal. While miners' wages had more than doubled (in nominal terms) between 1909 and 1920, in the 1920s mine owners began to roll them back. Besides wages, miners were unsatisfied with working conditions in an industry that saw more than 3,300 workplace accidents per year. The results were labour militancy and violence. A general strike in 1920 saw strikers assault strikebreakers, throw them off their bicycles, and launch rocks through the windows of buses. When police escorts were called in to aid the strikebreakers, they were sometimes attacked as well; one constable was partially paralyzed from the beating he received. Provincial police commissioner W.C. Bryan was warned against inspecting one strike site in a note reading "You spoilt the strike, and if you go...you will be killed." He went anyway, and was greeted by an ambush in which three bullets were fired into his car, missing him.
Greenfield was at a loss as to how to respond to this crisis, complaining that both employees and employers were the most difficult people in the province to deal with and that they showed "very little spirit of compromise". He was not aided by his own Minister of Public Works, Labour MLA Alex Ross, who took the side of the miners and objected to the government's provision of police escorts for strikebreakers. Though the problems originated before Greenfield took office, many Albertans felt that a stronger leader might have been more successful than Greenfield in appealing for peace.
had been introduced in Alberta following a 1916 referendum, during which the UFA had advocated for the prohibitionist side. The Liberal version of prohibition was weak, and Greenfield came into office intending to strengthen the legislation. Even by 1920, however, it was becoming apparent that the policy was not working (or, as the Medicine Hat News
noted, "Prohibition is now working smoothly. The only thing left is to stop the sale of liquor!"). Greenfield's own MLAs began to grumble about the policy—Archibald Matheson expressed in 1923 the view that "This government has acted as philosopher, guide, and God to the people long enough." Public opinion, too, began to shift against the policy, more rapidly after 1922 when three police officers were killed in the line of duty by bootleggers. The last and most dramatic of these was the murder of Steve Lawson in front of the barracks where he and his family lived, by Emil "Pic" Picariello and Florence Lassandra. Public opinion ran high both for and against the pair, and their 1923 hanging
s only served to unite both factions against prohibition.
An autumn 1923 referendum saw Albertans vote decisively for the repeal of prohibition, despite the UFA's continuing support for the policy. In response, the government resolved to repeal the Prohibition Act and replaced it with government-controlled liquor sales. Greenfield attempted to make the move more palatable to prohibitionists by proposing that liquor profits be shared with impoverished municipalities. However, the scheme proved unworkable, and the re-legalization went ahead without any such profit-sharing. In 1924, the government introduced legislation to replace prohibition with the regulation of liquor sales by the government, and subjected it to a free vote. While the legislation passed, the new measures were divisive, pitting community leaders who wanted their towns to remain "dry" against those who wanted to apply for liquor licenses, and different would-be saloon-keepers against one another in competing for the government-issued licenses.
(CPR), a course of action that was endorsed by Brownlee, but many farmers despised the CPR and most UFA MLAs preferred to keep the lines government-operated. Moreover, Greenfield's own Minister of Railways, Vernor Smith
, was among this faction. This problem plagued Greenfield for his entire term as Premier, and it was not until Brownlee succeeded him that a resolution came in the form of a $25 million sale to the major lines.
Absent a solution to the railway problem, the government continued its deficits. Brownlee advocated deep cuts in spending to bring them under control, and, when Greenfield demurred, began to cut staff in his own department. He found an ally in Richard Gavin Reid
in 1923 when Greenfield, exhausted by his responsibilities, appointed the latter to replace him as Provincial Treasurer. Reid impressed on the cabinet the need for drastic economy in all departments and, by 1925 (the last year of Greenfield's Premiership), the government at last showed a surplus, a state that would persist until the beginning of the Great Depression
, with the exception of a small deficit in 1927.
sent a letter to his fellow Liberal, Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon MacKenzie King
, pleading with him to delay any agreement until after the expected 1925 election so that the UFA could not claim success. Greenfield and Brownlee attended a series of meetings with federal representatives beginning May 19 in Ottawa
; these continued until June 7, whereupon Brownlee returned home. Greenfield offered to stay, but on June 11 King told him that the cabinet would need the summer to consider the question and that no agreement would be immediately forthcoming. This decision did not help the Alberta Liberals, who went on to lose the next election
soundly, and did not prevent the transfer of resource rights, which took place in 1929, but was enough to rob Greenfield of his glory; he left office the next year.
), against the stiff opposition of Attorney-General Brownlee. Brownlee's opposition stemmed in part from investigations that Greenfield's government had already undertaken into the subject: information was gathered from similar experiments in New Zealand
and New South Wales
, leading to the conclusion that, while there would be some benefit to a provincially owned bank, Alberta "had neither the economic nor constitutional base to consider such a scheme". This conclusion was affirmed by University of Alberta
professor D. A. MacGibbon in a government-commissioned study.
The issue would not go away so easily. At the 1924 UFA convention, Bevington and his followers moved a resolution calling for immediate action on the previous year's banking resolution. Against them stood Greenfield's government, UFA president Henry Wise Wood
(whom Bevington was challenging for re-election), and radical Labour
Member of Parliament
William Irvine
. Thanks to Irvine's surprising intervention on the side of the conservatives, the resolution was soundly defeated.
, Progressive Party of Canada
leader Thomas Crerar
was considering a merger of his party with the Liberal Party of Canada
and asked Greenfield to join him as Alberta's representative in the federal cabinet upon completion of this merger. This initially lofty stature was reduced by incident after incident: his reliance on Brownlee in the legislature and elsewhere, his failure to deliver on the promised economic relief, and his alienation of the radical wing of his own party. By 1924, many of Greenfield's own backbenchers had had enough and hatched a plan to force Greenfield's resignation and replace him with Brownlee, who was perceived as more likely to lead the UFA to victory in the impending election. This group—which included George Johnston, George MacLachlan
, William Shield
, Donald Cameron, Oran McPherson
, and Austin Claypool
—contacted Brownlee to alert him to their intentions and were taken aback when the Attorney-General told them that if Greenfield resigned, so would he.
The following year, the group approached Greenfield directly to ask for his resignation. He initially agreed, but then vacillated long enough for Brownlee to once again pledge his loyalty to the Premier. This time, Henry Wise Wood
intervened to ask Brownlee to reconsider, which he agreed to do only if Greenfield himself made the request. The Premier immediately did so, saying that he had never wanted the job in the first place. On November 23, Greenfield resigned as Premier of Alberta, tearfully telling the media that he was "through with politics".
The media judged the rebellion harshly. The Calgary Herald
mocked the rebels as a "group of farmer politicians who have always claimed to be purer than those of other parties" and yet "[threw] their leader to the wolves in the hope that they may save their own skins". It concluded: "Greenfield was not a good political captain, but he had a poor set of officers and a mutinous crew."
, England. The appointment was controversial and was perceived as a patronage reward even by some UFA backbenchers. Liberals also accused the government of benefiting the Hudson's Bay Company
, which owned the London office that the government leased, more than Alberta. Even so, Greenfield's performance in the position was well regarded: his personality was better-suited for his duties there, which included the promotion of Alberta's burgeoning oil and gas industry, attracting English immigration to Alberta, and acting as a guide for Albertans visiting London. It was in this last capacity that he welcomed Brownlee to London, where the two met together with British immigration and financial officials.
In 1931, the Agent General's office closed, and Greenfield returned to Alberta, settling in Calgary
. There he entered the oil and gas business, serving as a director (and later vice president) of Calmont Oils, president of the Oil and Gas Association, president of the Alberta Petroleum Association, and director of Home Oil. He also served as managing director of the British Dominion Land Settlement Corporation and as president of the Calgary Board of Trade. He spent the rest of his life in the city, maintaining an office in the General Trusts Building.
Greenfield died at 8:25 in the morning of August 23, 1949. His funeral took place at Grace Presbyterian Church and he is buried in Union Cemetery, both of which are in Calgary. In 1968, Greenfield School, an elementary school in Edmonton
, was named in his honour.
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
politician who served as the fourth Premier of Alberta
Premier of Alberta
The Premier of Alberta is the first minister for the Canadian province of Alberta. He or she is the province's head of government and de facto chief executive. The current Premier of Alberta is Alison Redford. She became Premier by winning the Progressive Conservative leadership elections on...
from 1921 until 1925. Born in Winchester
Winchester
Winchester is a historic cathedral city and former capital city of England. It is the county town of Hampshire, in South East England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government district, and is located at the western end of the South Downs, along the course of...
, Hampshire
Hampshire
Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...
, in England, he immigrated to Canada in his late twenties, settling first in Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
and then in Alberta
Alberta
Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...
, where he farmed. He soon became involved in the United Farmers of Alberta
United Farmers of Alberta
The United Farmers of Alberta is an association of Alberta farmers that has served many different roles throughout its history as a lobby group, a political party, and as a farm-supply retail chain. Since 1934 it has primarily been an agricultural supply cooperative headquartered in Calgary...
(UFA), a farmers' lobby organization that was in the process of becoming a political party
Political party
A political party is a political organization that typically seeks to influence government policy, usually by nominating their own candidates and trying to seat them in political office. Parties participate in electoral campaigns, educational outreach or protest actions...
, eventually becoming the organization's vice president. Though he did not run in the 1921 provincial election
Alberta general election, 1921
The Alberta general election of 1921 was the fifth general election for the Province of Alberta, Canada. It was held on July 18, 1921 to elect members to the 5th Alberta Legislative Assembly....
, the first in which the UFA fielded candidates, Greenfield was the party's eventual choice to serve as Premier when the UFA won a majority of the seats that year.
Like most of the UFA caucus
Caucus
A caucus is a meeting of supporters or members of a political party or movement, especially in the United States and Canada. As the use of the term has been expanded the exact definition has come to vary among political cultures.-Origin of the term:...
, Greenfield had no experience in government and he struggled in the position. He relied extensively on his Attorney General, John E. Brownlee, for counsel on policy and strategy. He was unable to control his caucus, which did not generally believe in party discipline
Party discipline
Party discipline is the ability of a parliamentary group of a political party to get its members to support the policies of their party leadership. In liberal democracies, it usually refers to the control that party leaders have over its legislature...
, and his government lost several votes in the legislature despite its nominal majority. He was unable to effectively address the problems facing farmers (including drought
Drought
A drought is an extended period of months or years when a region notes a deficiency in its water supply. Generally, this occurs when a region receives consistently below average precipitation. It can have a substantial impact on the ecosystem and agriculture of the affected region...
and low grain prices), bitter labour disputes in the coal
Coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...
industry, or the pronounced divisions in public opinion that had sprung up around prohibition
Prohibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...
(which his government ended). Despite this, his time as Premier saw the eventual elimination of the provincial deficit, substantial progress in negotiating the transfer of natural resource rights from the federal government, and the creation of the Alberta Wheat Pool
Alberta Wheat Pool
The Alberta Wheat Pool was the first of Canada's wheat farmer co-operatives.-Early years:In 1923, the United Farmers of Alberta met with then Attorney General John Edward Brownlee to consider setting up a Wheat Pool just in Alberta...
. He also named Irene Parlby
Irene Parlby
Irene Parlby was a Canadian women's farm leader, activist and politician.Born in London, England, Parlby came to Canada in 1896. In 1913, Parlby helped to found the first women's local of the United Farmers of Alberta. In 1921, she was elected to the Alberta Legislature for the riding of Lacombe,...
as the province's first female cabinet minister.
By 1924, many UFA Members of the Legislative Assembly
Legislative Assembly of Alberta
The Legislative Assembly of Alberta is one of two components of the Legislature of Alberta, the other being the Queen, represented by the Lieutenant-Governor of Alberta. The Alberta legislature meets in the Alberta Legislature Building in the provincial capital, Edmonton...
(MLAs) wanted to see Greenfield leave office, both because they were frustrated with his failings and because they thought it likely that a Greenfield-led government would be defeated in the next election. Their first attempt to replace him failed when Brownlee, their intended replacement, refused to have anything to do with the plan, but a second attempt, in 1925, was successful when Brownlee agreed to take office if Greenfield personally requested that he do so. Greenfield had not wanted the job in the first place, and agreed to resign in Brownlee's favour.
After his retirement from politics, Greenfield represented Alberta in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, England for several years before returning to Canada to work in the oil and gas industry. He died in 1949 at the age of 79.
Early life
Herbert W. Greenfield was born November 25, 1869, in WinchesterWinchester
Winchester is a historic cathedral city and former capital city of England. It is the county town of Hampshire, in South East England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government district, and is located at the western end of the South Downs, along the course of...
, Hampshire
Hampshire
Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...
, England, the son of John Greenfield (c. 1830–1909) and Mary Leake (c. 1835–1904). He attended Wesleyan School in Dalston
Dalston
Dalston is a district of north-east London, England, located in the London Borough of Hackney. It is situated northeast of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London...
, but dropped out as a result of his father's bankruptcy. He worked aboard a cattle boat in 1892 before emigrating to Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
in 1896.
In Canada, he worked in the oil fields near Sarnia
Sarnia, Ontario
Sarnia is a city in Southern Ontario, Canada . It is the largest city on Lake Huron and is located where the upper Great Lakes empty into the St. Clair River....
, Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
, and as a farmer in Weston. He married Elizabeth Harris on February 28, 1900. The couple had two sons, Franklin Harris Greenfield and Arnold Leake Greenfield. In 1904, the family went west for economic reasons and homesteaded near Edmonton
Edmonton
Edmonton is the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta and is the province's second-largest city. Edmonton is located on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Capital Region, which is surrounded by the central region of the province.The city and its census...
. He found work in a lumber mill and later turned to farming. During his first year in Alberta, a fire destroyed his home, and he and his wife spent the winter in an abandoned sod hut. In 1906, they resettled to a large home four kilometers south of Westlock
Westlock, Alberta
Westlock is a town in central Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1913, the town is primarily an agricultural, business, and government administration centre serving communities and rural areas within surrounding Westlock County.- Geography :...
.
In 1922, while Greenfield was Premier, Elizabeth died suddenly as a result of routine surgery. He remarried in 1926, to Marjorie Greenwood Cormack, who brought two children of her own into the marriage.
Early political career
Greenfield entered public life on a local level soon after moving to his new farm. He was elected to the local school board, where he spent twelve years, including stints as chair, secretary, and treasurer. He also served as Vice President of the Alberta Educational Association, as President of the Westlock Agricultural Society, and as co-founder and President of the Alberta Association of Municipal Districts. Greenfield also was an officer of the province-wide Association of Local Improvement Districts, which advocated for reforms such as a change from a ten-hour to an eight-hour work-day, on the grounds that many Local Improvement Districts (LIDs) were having trouble competing with railways for labour. John E. Brownlee later said of Greenfield's involvement in the ALID that it was there "that he was first initiated into the discussion of public subjects, and it became the training ground for his subsequent success."Alberta Liberal Party
The Alberta Liberal Party is a provincial political party in Alberta, Canada. Originally founded in 1905, when the province was created, it was the dominant political party until 1921 when it was defeated. It has never been in government since that time...
, but along with many other farmers, began to grow dissatisfied with the Liberal government's treatment of farmers. He became involved with the United Farmers of Alberta
United Farmers of Alberta
The United Farmers of Alberta is an association of Alberta farmers that has served many different roles throughout its history as a lobby group, a political party, and as a farm-supply retail chain. Since 1934 it has primarily been an agricultural supply cooperative headquartered in Calgary...
, which prior to 1919 was a non-partisan lobby group that eschewed direct involvement in the political process. He was elected to the organization's executive in 1919 and chaired its mass conventions
Political convention
In politics, a political convention is a meeting of a political party, typically to select party candidates.In the United States, a political convention usually refers to a presidential nominating convention, but it can also refer to state, county, or congressional district nominating conventions...
in 1920 and 1921. He followed this by heading an extremely successful membership drive, and was named interim Vice President of the organization upon the sudden death of Percival Baker
Percival Baker
Percival Baker was a farmer, church minister and provincial politician from Alberta, Canada. He served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta for two days in 1921 before his death.-Early life:...
. Despite this involvement, he did not seek election to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta
Legislative Assembly of Alberta
The Legislative Assembly of Alberta is one of two components of the Legislature of Alberta, the other being the Queen, represented by the Lieutenant-Governor of Alberta. The Alberta legislature meets in the Alberta Legislature Building in the provincial capital, Edmonton...
in the 1921 election
Alberta general election, 1921
The Alberta general election of 1921 was the fifth general election for the Province of Alberta, Canada. It was held on July 18, 1921 to elect members to the 5th Alberta Legislative Assembly....
, the first in which the UFA ran candidates. When the UFA, which as part of its resistance to old-style politics had contested the election without designating a leader, won 38 of 61 seats, it found itself needing to form a government without knowing who would head it. The logical choice was UFA President Henry Wise Wood
Henry Wise Wood
Henry Wise Wood was an American-born Canadian agrarian thinker and activist. He became director in 1914 and was elected president of the United Farmers of Alberta in 1916. Under his leadership the UFA became the most powerful political lobby group in the province...
. However, Wood had little taste for the minutiae of government, preferring to remain at the head of what he saw as a broader political movement (noting that he would "sooner be President of the UFA than the USA"), and saw party lawyer Brownlee as the best choice. Brownlee, who, like Wood, had not contested the election, felt that the Premier must be a farmer for the aspirations of the UFA's base to be fulfilled. George Hoadley, the only UFA member with previous legislative experience, was considered, but since his previous experience had been as a Conservative
Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta
The Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta is a provincial centre-right party in the Canadian province of Alberta...
—one of the old line parties so disdained by the UFA—he was deemed unacceptable. There was even some speculation that incumbent Liberal Premier Charles Stewart
Charles Stewart (Canadian politician)
Charles Stewart, PC was a Canadian politician who served as the third Premier of Alberta from 1917 until 1921. Born in Strabane, Ontario, in Wentworth County, Stewart was a farmer who moved west to Alberta after his farm was destroyed by a storm...
, who had become a member of the UFA before it entered politics directly, would stay on as Premier, but he immediately announced that he would serve only until the UFA selected a leader. A meeting of the UFA caucus in Calgary
Calgary
Calgary is a city in the Province of Alberta, Canada. It is located in the south of the province, in an area of foothills and prairie, approximately east of the front ranges of the Canadian Rockies...
selected Greenfield, and he took office as Premier on August 13, 1921.
Premier
Lethbridge Herald
Lethbridge Herald is the leading paper in the Lethbridge, Alberta area, with an average weekday circulation of 18,185 in the six-month period ending March 31, 2007. This local paper has been serving southern Alberta since 1905....
called him "the only new Moses
Moses
Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...
that can bridge the Red Sea
Red Sea
The Red Sea is a seawater inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. The connection to the ocean is in the south through the Bab el Mandeb strait and the Gulf of Aden. In the north, there is the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and the Gulf of Suez...
", while the Calgary Herald
Calgary Herald
The Calgary Herald is a daily newspaper published in the Canadian city of Calgary, Alberta.- History :The paper was first published on August 31, 1883 by Andrew Armour and Thomas Braden as The Calgary Herald, Mining and Ranche Advocate and General Advertiser. It started as a weekly paper with only...
noted that "No government ever went into office in this country carrying better wishes for its success". He also took office without a seat in the legislature. This latter circumstance was addressed through the voluntary resignation of Donald MacBeth Kennedy
Donald MacBeth Kennedy
Donald MacBeth Kennedy was a farmer as well as a provincial and federal level Canadian politician....
, who had won the riding
Electoral district (Canada)
An electoral district in Canada, also known as a constituency or a riding, is a geographical constituency upon which Canada's representative democracy is based...
of Peace River
Peace River (provincial electoral district)
Peace River is a provincial electoral district in Alberta, Canada. The district is mandated to return a single member to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta using the first past the post method of voting...
for the UFA. Greenfield won the seat by acclamation
Acclamation
An acclamation, in its most common sense, is a form of election that does not use a ballot. "Acclamation" or "acclamatio" can also signify a kind of ritual greeting and expression of approval in certain social contexts in ancient Rome.-Voting:...
December 9, 1921.
Legislature and cabinet
Once in the legislature, however, Greenfield faltered in his leadership of his caucus. The UFA MLAs came from a determinedly independent and non-partisan background and proved nearly impossible to whipWhip (politics)
A whip is an official in a political party whose primary purpose is to ensure party discipline in a legislature. Whips are a party's "enforcers", who typically offer inducements and threaten punishments for party members to ensure that they vote according to the official party policy...
. When Greenfield selected his cabinet and was about to announce it to his caucus for their vetting, he was interrupted by Lorne Proudfoot
Lorne Proudfoot
Lorne Proudfoot was a farmer, teacher and a provincial politician from Alberta, Canada. He served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1921 to 1935 sitting with the United Farmers caucus in government.-Early life:...
who asked whether, in addition to the rumoured inclusion of Labour
Labour candidates and parties in Canada
There have been various groups in Canada that have nominated candidates under the label Labour Party or Independent Labour Party or other variations from the 1870s until the 1960s...
members, the cabinet would include any of the fourteen Liberal
Alberta Liberal Party
The Alberta Liberal Party is a provincial political party in Alberta, Canada. Originally founded in 1905, when the province was created, it was the dominant political party until 1921 when it was defeated. It has never been in government since that time...
MLAs. Proudfoot argued that to exclude them would be to "start out much after the matter of the old parties". Greenfield had not intended this, and suggested that no Liberals would likely be amenable to it. Irene Parlby
Irene Parlby
Irene Parlby was a Canadian women's farm leader, activist and politician.Born in London, England, Parlby came to Canada in 1896. In 1913, Parlby helped to found the first women's local of the United Farmers of Alberta. In 1921, she was elected to the Alberta Legislature for the riding of Lacombe,...
, the caucus's only woman (who Greenfield would shortly name as Alberta's first female cabinet minister) agreed, and suggested that the UFA's ideal of securing representation for all economic groups in society did not apply to the Liberals, who were not an economic group and were not democratically organized in any event. Proudfoot's proposal was defeated sixteen votes to fourteen. Greenfield went on to name the seven member cabinet he had intended, including Labour MLA Alex Ross
Alex Ross (politician)
-Political career:Alex was first elected in the 1917 Alberta election defeating Conservative Thomas Tweedie. He was elected as the first and only member of the Labor Representation League to sit in the assembly...
as Minister of Public Works, Parlby as Minister Without Portfolio, and Greenfield himself as Provincial Treasurer.
Once the legislature convened in 1922, the inexperience of the Premier and his caucus was further laid bare. Greenfield, devastated by the sudden death of his wife, turned in a poor performance. Faced with an aggressive attack by new Liberal leader John R. Boyle
John R. Boyle
John Robert Boyle was a Canadian politician and jurist who served as a Member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, a cabinet minister in the Government of Alberta, and a judge on the Supreme Court of Alberta. Born in Ontario, he came west and eventually settled in Edmonton, where he practiced...
, Greenfield relied heavily on Attorney General John Brownlee, who sat next to him in the legislature, to provide the defense. The session got off to an inauspicious start: Greenfield nominated the government's preferred candidate for speaker
Speaker (politics)
The term speaker is a title often given to the presiding officer of a deliberative assembly, especially a legislative body. The speaker's official role is to moderate debate, make rulings on procedure, announce the results of votes, and the like. The speaker decides who may speak and has the...
, Oran McPherson
Oran McPherson
Oran Leo "Tony" McPherson was a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta for Little Bow from 1921 to 1935 as a member of the United Farmers of Alberta.-Early life:...
, only to have one of his backbenchers, Alex Moore, nominate Independent Conservative John Smith Stewart
John Smith Stewart
John Smith Stewart, C.M.G., D.S.O., Croix de guerre, D.D.S. served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1911 to 1925 and as a Member of Parliament for the Canadian House of Commons in the Lethbridge riding from 1930 to 1935. He was a Brigadier-General for the 3rd Canadian...
; Stewart spared the government embarrassment by declining the nomination.
Moore, along with fellow UFA backbencher John Russell Love
John Russell Love
John Russell Love was a provincial politician from Alberta, Canada. He served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1921 to 1935 sitting with the United Farmers caucus in government...
, caused the government further trouble with a resolution aiming to limit the circumstances under which the government would have to resign. By convention of the Westminster system
Westminster System
The Westminster system is a democratic parliamentary system of government modelled after the politics of the United Kingdom. This term comes from the Palace of Westminster, the seat of the Parliament of the United Kingdom....
, a government was required to resign on the defeat of any piece of its legislation that was critical to its program. Moore and Love objected to the manner in which this provision could be expected to pressure UFA MLAs to back government legislation that they might otherwise be inclined to oppose, and introduced a resolution in the legislature that called for a policy by which the government would resign only upon passage of an explicit motion of no confidence
Motion of no confidence
A motion of no confidence is a parliamentary motion whose passing would demonstrate to the head of state that the elected parliament no longer has confidence in the appointed government.-Overview:Typically, when a parliament passes a vote of no...
. The resolution caught the attention of politicians across Canada, including future Prime Minister R. B. Bennett
R. B. Bennett
Richard Bedford Bennett, 1st Viscount Bennett, PC, KC was a Canadian lawyer, businessman, politician, and philanthropist. He served as the 11th Prime Minister of Canada from August 7, 1930, to October 23, 1935, during the worst of the Great Depression years...
, who warned that it was unconstitutional. Brownlee moved an amendment that reduced the resolution to a vague statement of principle, which passed and was not heard of again.
UFA members also objected to the concept of a caucus
Caucus
A caucus is a meeting of supporters or members of a political party or movement, especially in the United States and Canada. As the use of the term has been expanded the exact definition has come to vary among political cultures.-Origin of the term:...
, in which MLAs from one party debate policy behind closed doors. They believed that the role of an MLA was to represent the views of his or her constituents directly on the floor of the legislature. This belief too proved problematic to the government. The Dairyman's Act had been adopted by the Liberal government to provide low-interest loans to dairy farmers. It was unpopular among farmers, and Greenfield's government aimed to amend it. Many UFA backbenchers, however, wanted to see it repealed all together, but because of their objection to caucus discussions Greenfield was not aware of this by the time his amendments came to the floor of the legislature. They passed through the house with little debate, until just after third reading, when one of the backbenchers rose to ask if the time had come to speak against the bill. Brownlee suggested that, in view of the legislators' inexperience with parliamentary procedure, the legislature consider the motion to adopt the bill on third reading as not yet having passed, that debate might ensue. This suggestion adopted, several UFA members attacked the Act. They were joined in this by the Liberals, despite the fact that it was a Liberal act that had been co-authored by Boyle. In the end, the bill passed only by virtue of the support of the four Labour members.
More trouble with the legislature struck Greenfield in August 1922, during a special session called for the purpose of passing enabling legislation for a provincial wheat board. The session lasted only a week, and on August 31 the only item of business that remained was the members' pay for the session. The government was proposing $100 per member, but some MLAs complained that this was insufficient in light of the long travel times between Edmonton and their constituencies. Greenfield, lacking the counsel of the vacationing Brownlee and wanting to avoid trouble, proposed upping the amount to $200. Independent MLA Robert Pearson
Robert Pearson
Captain Robert Pearson was a soldier and politician from Alberta, Canada.Pearson was first elected as a non-partisan to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta in the 1917 Alberta general election as the top pick in the, At large soldiers' and nurses vote from voters fighting overseas in World War I...
proposed increasing it once again, to $250, to match what their counterparts in Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan is a prairie province in Canada, which has an area of . Saskatchewan is bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, and on the south by the U.S. states of Montana and North Dakota....
had received. This suggestion was carried. While Greenfield had hardly been the driving force behind the increases, he had facilitated them and had been blind to the appearance of paying MLAs more for six afternoons of work than some farmers were able to earn in a year. The grassroots
Grassroots
A grassroots movement is one driven by the politics of a community. The term implies that the creation of the movement and the group supporting it are natural and spontaneous, highlighting the differences between this and a movement that is orchestrated by traditional power structures...
of his own party condemned the move, all the more so when the wheat board that had been the purpose of the special session failed to come to fruition.
Agriculture
Greenfield became Premier at a time of agricultural depression, especially in the province's south. The region, which was responsible for approximately 75% of Alberta's wheat production, was in the midst of its fifth consecutive year of drought, and the farmers who had been responsible for putting the UFA into office were now demanding action. Initially, the government offered direct financial assistance, with $5 million provided in seed and grain relief by the end of 1922. However, this effort was driving the province close to bankruptcy, and in 1923 Greenfield announced an end to the handouts (the bill authorizing the last of these was a source of chagrin for MLAs from all parties, both because it marked the end of direct assistance for farmers and because the last of the assistance was itself so expensive). Farmers and political representatives from the affected areas criticized the government bitterly, referencing Greenfield's earlier pledge that "if the south country should fall, then we are prepared to fall with it".University of Calgary
The University of Calgary is a public research university located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1966 the U of C is composed of 14 faculties and more than 85 research institutes and centres.More than 25,000 undergraduate and 5,500 graduate students are currently...
professor David C. Jones, the bill offered "solace, but no real satisfaction". According to Jones, Greenfield's attempts to rescue southern Alberta from agricultural calamity were probably doomed to failure. Even so, Greenfield had called the situation his top priority, and his failure to bring it to a successful resolution cost him politically.
Another preoccupation of the UFA and the Greenfield government was the marketing of wheat. From 1919 to 1920 there had been a federally established wheat pool
Wheat pool
A wheat pool is a co-operative that buys grain from farmers.In Canada in 1923 and 24, three wheat pools were created. They were farmer-owned co-operatives, created to break the power of the large for-profit corporations, that had dominated the grain trade in Western Canada since the late 19th...
to stabilize wheat prices. When it was disbanded, wheat prices tumbled by two-thirds, prompting many farmers to call for its re-introduction. At the call of the UFA and farmers' organizations in other provinces, the federal government (whose razor-thin majority in the House of Commons
Canadian House of Commons
The House of Commons of Canada is a component of the Parliament of Canada, along with the Sovereign and the Senate. The House of Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 308 members known as Members of Parliament...
was often widened by the support of farmer-friendly Progressive
Progressive Party of Canada
The Progressive Party of Canada was a political party in Canada in the 1920s and 1930s. It was linked with the provincial United Farmers parties in several provinces and, in Manitoba, ran candidates and formed governments as the Progressive Party of Manitoba...
members) created a new, mandatory agency, pending the appointment by the provincial governments of Alberta and Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan is a prairie province in Canada, which has an area of . Saskatchewan is bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, and on the south by the U.S. states of Montana and North Dakota....
of a board of directors for the agency. This they proved unable to do. Greenfield's government ultimately admitted defeat and gave up on re-establishing the pool, opting instead to guarantee loans to farmer-run cooperative pools. With government assistance, the Alberta Wheat Pool
Alberta Wheat Pool
The Alberta Wheat Pool was the first of Canada's wheat farmer co-operatives.-Early years:In 1923, the United Farmers of Alberta met with then Attorney General John Edward Brownlee to consider setting up a Wheat Pool just in Alberta...
came into existence in time for the 1923 harvest.
Labour unrest
During Greenfield's premiership, Alberta's major non-agricultural industry was coal miningCoal mining
The goal of coal mining is to obtain coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content, and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United States,...
, and the industry was not prospering. Production was more than 50% greater than demand, and fewer than half of the province's mines were profitable. The industry as a whole was earning a profit of less than one cent per ton of coal. While miners' wages had more than doubled (in nominal terms) between 1909 and 1920, in the 1920s mine owners began to roll them back. Besides wages, miners were unsatisfied with working conditions in an industry that saw more than 3,300 workplace accidents per year. The results were labour militancy and violence. A general strike in 1920 saw strikers assault strikebreakers, throw them off their bicycles, and launch rocks through the windows of buses. When police escorts were called in to aid the strikebreakers, they were sometimes attacked as well; one constable was partially paralyzed from the beating he received. Provincial police commissioner W.C. Bryan was warned against inspecting one strike site in a note reading "You spoilt the strike, and if you go...you will be killed." He went anyway, and was greeted by an ambush in which three bullets were fired into his car, missing him.
Greenfield was at a loss as to how to respond to this crisis, complaining that both employees and employers were the most difficult people in the province to deal with and that they showed "very little spirit of compromise". He was not aided by his own Minister of Public Works, Labour MLA Alex Ross, who took the side of the miners and objected to the government's provision of police escorts for strikebreakers. Though the problems originated before Greenfield took office, many Albertans felt that a stronger leader might have been more successful than Greenfield in appealing for peace.
Prohibition
ProhibitionProhibition in Canada
The temperance movement reached its height in Canada in the 1920s, when outside imports were cut off by provincial referendums. As legislation prohibiting consumption of alcohol was repealed, it was typically replaced with regulation restricting the sale of alcohol to minors and imposing excise...
had been introduced in Alberta following a 1916 referendum, during which the UFA had advocated for the prohibitionist side. The Liberal version of prohibition was weak, and Greenfield came into office intending to strengthen the legislation. Even by 1920, however, it was becoming apparent that the policy was not working (or, as the Medicine Hat News
Medicine Hat News
The Medicine Hat News is a daily newspaper published in Medicine Hat, Alberta. It features a city news section, a national news section, a world news section, a sports section, a comics section, and a classifieds section. The paper is owned by Southern Alberta Newspapers and has been published...
noted, "Prohibition is now working smoothly. The only thing left is to stop the sale of liquor!"). Greenfield's own MLAs began to grumble about the policy—Archibald Matheson expressed in 1923 the view that "This government has acted as philosopher, guide, and God to the people long enough." Public opinion, too, began to shift against the policy, more rapidly after 1922 when three police officers were killed in the line of duty by bootleggers. The last and most dramatic of these was the murder of Steve Lawson in front of the barracks where he and his family lived, by Emil "Pic" Picariello and Florence Lassandra. Public opinion ran high both for and against the pair, and their 1923 hanging
Hanging
Hanging is the lethal suspension of a person by a ligature. The Oxford English Dictionary states that hanging in this sense is "specifically to put to death by suspension by the neck", though it formerly also referred to crucifixion and death by impalement in which the body would remain...
s only served to unite both factions against prohibition.
An autumn 1923 referendum saw Albertans vote decisively for the repeal of prohibition, despite the UFA's continuing support for the policy. In response, the government resolved to repeal the Prohibition Act and replaced it with government-controlled liquor sales. Greenfield attempted to make the move more palatable to prohibitionists by proposing that liquor profits be shared with impoverished municipalities. However, the scheme proved unworkable, and the re-legalization went ahead without any such profit-sharing. In 1924, the government introduced legislation to replace prohibition with the regulation of liquor sales by the government, and subjected it to a free vote. While the legislation passed, the new measures were divisive, pitting community leaders who wanted their towns to remain "dry" against those who wanted to apply for liquor licenses, and different would-be saloon-keepers against one another in competing for the government-issued licenses.
Provincial finances
At the outset of his premiership, Greenfield served as Provincial Treasurer as well as Premier. In both of these capacities, he was faced with a provincial deficit, which reached an accumulated total of $4 million between his taking office and the end of the 1922 fiscal year. One reason for this was the government's involvement in railways: it had found itself the owner of four uncompleted money-losing railway lines after the private syndicates set up to run them collapsed due to construction cost overruns. By 1922, the government had lost a total of $6.7 million on the endeavor, with an additional $5 million expected to follow that year—37% of the estimated 1922 provincial budget. Greenfield wanted to sell the lines to the Canadian Pacific RailwayCanadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway , formerly also known as CP Rail between 1968 and 1996, is a historic Canadian Class I railway founded in 1881 and now operated by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, which began operations as legal owner in a corporate restructuring in 2001...
(CPR), a course of action that was endorsed by Brownlee, but many farmers despised the CPR and most UFA MLAs preferred to keep the lines government-operated. Moreover, Greenfield's own Minister of Railways, Vernor Smith
Vernor Smith
Vernor Winfield Smith was a politician in Alberta, Canada who served as the province's Minister of Railways and Telephones from 1921 until 1932. Born in 1864 in Prince Edward Island, he moved to British Columbia in 1883 where he worked for several railway companies as an accountant. In 1915 he...
, was among this faction. This problem plagued Greenfield for his entire term as Premier, and it was not until Brownlee succeeded him that a resolution came in the form of a $25 million sale to the major lines.
Richard Gavin Reid
Richard Gavin "Dick" Reid was a Canadian politician who served as the sixth Premier of Alberta from 1934 to 1935...
in 1923 when Greenfield, exhausted by his responsibilities, appointed the latter to replace him as Provincial Treasurer. Reid impressed on the cabinet the need for drastic economy in all departments and, by 1925 (the last year of Greenfield's Premiership), the government at last showed a surplus, a state that would persist until the beginning of the Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
, with the exception of a small deficit in 1927.
Natural resources
At the time that Alberta was made a province in 1905, the federal government retained control of its natural resources (though it provided financial compensation to the new provincial government for this), a fact that set it apart from the older provinces. By 1925, negotiations to alter this state of affairs had been ongoing for more than a decade, and the two levels of government had an agreement in principle. Despite this, Alberta Liberal leader John R. BoyleJohn R. Boyle
John Robert Boyle was a Canadian politician and jurist who served as a Member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, a cabinet minister in the Government of Alberta, and a judge on the Supreme Court of Alberta. Born in Ontario, he came west and eventually settled in Edmonton, where he practiced...
sent a letter to his fellow Liberal, Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon MacKenzie King
William Lyon Mackenzie King
William Lyon Mackenzie King, PC, OM, CMG was the dominant Canadian political leader from the 1920s through the 1940s. He served as the tenth Prime Minister of Canada from December 29, 1921 to June 28, 1926; from September 25, 1926 to August 7, 1930; and from October 23, 1935 to November 15, 1948...
, pleading with him to delay any agreement until after the expected 1925 election so that the UFA could not claim success. Greenfield and Brownlee attended a series of meetings with federal representatives beginning May 19 in Ottawa
Ottawa
Ottawa is the capital of Canada, the second largest city in the Province of Ontario, and the fourth largest city in the country. The city is located on the south bank of the Ottawa River in the eastern portion of Southern Ontario...
; these continued until June 7, whereupon Brownlee returned home. Greenfield offered to stay, but on June 11 King told him that the cabinet would need the summer to consider the question and that no agreement would be immediately forthcoming. This decision did not help the Alberta Liberals, who went on to lose the next election
Alberta general election, 1926
The Alberta general election of 1926 was the sixth general election for the Province of Alberta, Canada. It was held on June 28, 1926 to elect members of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta. The writs of election were issued on May 10, 1926 allowing for an election period of 40 days.After Herbert...
soundly, and did not prevent the transfer of resource rights, which took place in 1929, but was enough to rob Greenfield of his glory; he left office the next year.
Provincial banking
It was the longstanding view of a segment of the UFA that the Alberta government should enter the banking business directly by obtaining a bank charter from the federal government (which has responsibility for banking under the Canadian constitution). At the UFA convention in 1923, a leader of this group, George Bevington, made a passionate speech in favour of this idea, bringing most of the membership around to his side. The convention passed a resolution in favour of the idea (along with one calling on the provincial treasury to establish a loan department, an idea that came to fruition fifteen years later with the creation of Alberta Treasury BranchesATB Financial
Alberta Treasury Branches, doing business as ATB Financial, is a financial institution and crown corporation owned by the Province of Alberta. ATB operates in Alberta only, providing financial services to 680,000 Albertans and Alberta-based businesses. ATB has 167 branches and 130 agencies, serving...
), against the stiff opposition of Attorney-General Brownlee. Brownlee's opposition stemmed in part from investigations that Greenfield's government had already undertaken into the subject: information was gathered from similar experiments in New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
and New South Wales
New South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
, leading to the conclusion that, while there would be some benefit to a provincially owned bank, Alberta "had neither the economic nor constitutional base to consider such a scheme". This conclusion was affirmed by University of Alberta
University of Alberta
The University of Alberta is a public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford, the first premier of Alberta and Henry Marshall Tory, its first president, it is widely recognized as one of the best universities in Canada...
professor D. A. MacGibbon in a government-commissioned study.
The issue would not go away so easily. At the 1924 UFA convention, Bevington and his followers moved a resolution calling for immediate action on the previous year's banking resolution. Against them stood Greenfield's government, UFA president Henry Wise Wood
Henry Wise Wood
Henry Wise Wood was an American-born Canadian agrarian thinker and activist. He became director in 1914 and was elected president of the United Farmers of Alberta in 1916. Under his leadership the UFA became the most powerful political lobby group in the province...
(whom Bevington was challenging for re-election), and radical Labour
Labour candidates and parties in Canada
There have been various groups in Canada that have nominated candidates under the label Labour Party or Independent Labour Party or other variations from the 1870s until the 1960s...
Member of Parliament
Canadian House of Commons
The House of Commons of Canada is a component of the Parliament of Canada, along with the Sovereign and the Senate. The House of Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 308 members known as Members of Parliament...
William Irvine
William Irvine (Canadian politician)
William Irvine was a Canadian politician, journalist and clergyman. He served in the Canadian House of Commons on three different occasions, as a representative of Labour, the United Farmers of Alberta and the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation...
. Thanks to Irvine's surprising intervention on the side of the conservatives, the resolution was soundly defeated.
Departure from politics
Greenfield's political stock fell during the course of his time as Premier. His arrival was heralded with great expectations of economic and political reform. After the 1921 federal electionCanadian federal election, 1921
The Canadian federal election of 1921 was held on December 6, 1921 to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 14th Parliament of Canada. The Union government that had governed Canada through the First World War was defeated, and replaced by a Liberal government under the young leader...
, Progressive Party of Canada
Progressive Party of Canada
The Progressive Party of Canada was a political party in Canada in the 1920s and 1930s. It was linked with the provincial United Farmers parties in several provinces and, in Manitoba, ran candidates and formed governments as the Progressive Party of Manitoba...
leader Thomas Crerar
Thomas Crerar
Thomas Alexander Crerar, was a western Canadian politician and a leader of the short-lived Progressive Party of Canada. He was born in Molesworth, Ontario, and moved to Manitoba at a young age....
was considering a merger of his party with the Liberal Party of Canada
Liberal Party of Canada
The Liberal Party of Canada , colloquially known as the Grits, is the oldest federally registered party in Canada. In the conventional political spectrum, the party sits between the centre and the centre-left. Historically the Liberal Party has positioned itself to the left of the Conservative...
and asked Greenfield to join him as Alberta's representative in the federal cabinet upon completion of this merger. This initially lofty stature was reduced by incident after incident: his reliance on Brownlee in the legislature and elsewhere, his failure to deliver on the promised economic relief, and his alienation of the radical wing of his own party. By 1924, many of Greenfield's own backbenchers had had enough and hatched a plan to force Greenfield's resignation and replace him with Brownlee, who was perceived as more likely to lead the UFA to victory in the impending election. This group—which included George Johnston, George MacLachlan
George MacLachlan
George MacLachlan was a provincial level politician from Alberta, Canada.-Early life:MacLachlan and his family would move to the area of Clyde, Alberta in 1904. The edge of his homestead would later be surveyed by the government and become part of Highway 2, when construction began in 1906...
, William Shield
William H. Shield
William Hetherington Shield was a provincial politician from Alberta, Canada. He served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1921 to 1935 sitting with the United Farmers caucus in government.-Political career:...
, Donald Cameron, Oran McPherson
Oran McPherson
Oran Leo "Tony" McPherson was a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta for Little Bow from 1921 to 1935 as a member of the United Farmers of Alberta.-Early life:...
, and Austin Claypool
Austin Claypool
Austin Bingley Claypool was a provincial politician from Alberta, Canada. He served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1921 to 1935 sitting with the United Farmers caucus in government.-Political career:...
—contacted Brownlee to alert him to their intentions and were taken aback when the Attorney-General told them that if Greenfield resigned, so would he.
The following year, the group approached Greenfield directly to ask for his resignation. He initially agreed, but then vacillated long enough for Brownlee to once again pledge his loyalty to the Premier. This time, Henry Wise Wood
Henry Wise Wood
Henry Wise Wood was an American-born Canadian agrarian thinker and activist. He became director in 1914 and was elected president of the United Farmers of Alberta in 1916. Under his leadership the UFA became the most powerful political lobby group in the province...
intervened to ask Brownlee to reconsider, which he agreed to do only if Greenfield himself made the request. The Premier immediately did so, saying that he had never wanted the job in the first place. On November 23, Greenfield resigned as Premier of Alberta, tearfully telling the media that he was "through with politics".
The media judged the rebellion harshly. The Calgary Herald
Calgary Herald
The Calgary Herald is a daily newspaper published in the Canadian city of Calgary, Alberta.- History :The paper was first published on August 31, 1883 by Andrew Armour and Thomas Braden as The Calgary Herald, Mining and Ranche Advocate and General Advertiser. It started as a weekly paper with only...
mocked the rebels as a "group of farmer politicians who have always claimed to be purer than those of other parties" and yet "
Later life
In 1927, Greenfield was appointed Alberta's Agent General in LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, England. The appointment was controversial and was perceived as a patronage reward even by some UFA backbenchers. Liberals also accused the government of benefiting the Hudson's Bay Company
Hudson's Bay Company
The Hudson's Bay Company , abbreviated HBC, or "The Bay" is the oldest commercial corporation in North America and one of the oldest in the world. A fur trading business for much of its existence, today Hudson's Bay Company owns and operates retail stores throughout Canada...
, which owned the London office that the government leased, more than Alberta. Even so, Greenfield's performance in the position was well regarded: his personality was better-suited for his duties there, which included the promotion of Alberta's burgeoning oil and gas industry, attracting English immigration to Alberta, and acting as a guide for Albertans visiting London. It was in this last capacity that he welcomed Brownlee to London, where the two met together with British immigration and financial officials.
In 1931, the Agent General's office closed, and Greenfield returned to Alberta, settling in Calgary
Calgary
Calgary is a city in the Province of Alberta, Canada. It is located in the south of the province, in an area of foothills and prairie, approximately east of the front ranges of the Canadian Rockies...
. There he entered the oil and gas business, serving as a director (and later vice president) of Calmont Oils, president of the Oil and Gas Association, president of the Alberta Petroleum Association, and director of Home Oil. He also served as managing director of the British Dominion Land Settlement Corporation and as president of the Calgary Board of Trade. He spent the rest of his life in the city, maintaining an office in the General Trusts Building.
Greenfield died at 8:25 in the morning of August 23, 1949. His funeral took place at Grace Presbyterian Church and he is buried in Union Cemetery, both of which are in Calgary. In 1968, Greenfield School, an elementary school in Edmonton
Edmonton
Edmonton is the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta and is the province's second-largest city. Edmonton is located on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Capital Region, which is surrounded by the central region of the province.The city and its census...
, was named in his honour.