Ted Jolliffe
Encyclopedia
Edward Bigelow "Ted" Jolliffe, QC (March 2, 1909 – March 18, 1998) was a Canadian social democratic politician and lawyer from Ontario
. He was the first leader of the Ontario section of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation
(CCF) and leader of the Official Opposition in the Ontario Legislature
during the 1940s and 1950s. He was a Rhodes Scholar in the mid-1930s, and came back to Canada to help the CCF, after his studies were complete and being called to the bar in England and Ontario. After politics, he practised labour law in Toronto and would eventually become a labour adjudicator. In retirement, he moved to British Columbia
, where he died in 1998.
for the Methodist Church of Canada
, and were living near what was then known as Luchow
, China
. He was born at the Canadian Missionary hospital in Luchow, near Chunking
on March 2, 1909. He was home-schooled in China by his mother until his early teens. When his family returned to Ontario, he attend Rockwood Public School and then went to high school at Guelph Collegiate Institute. He was an undergraduate at the University of Toronto
's Victoria College
, the United Church College. He became the head of the Victoria Student Council, and was a member of the Hart House Debates Committee. In 1930, he won the Maurice Cody scholarship, and then became one of Ontario's Rhodes Scholars that same year. He attended Oxford University for three years, and was affiliated with its Christ Church
College. As a member of Oxford's Labour Club
, he met David Lewis
, the club's leader and a fellow Canadian. Together they fought the Communist Red October club and fascists like Lord Haw-Haw
–William Joyce
. Both he and Lewis planned a 'silent' protest at Joyce's February 1934 speech at Oxford. They carefully made sure that enough members from the Labour Club attended the meeting, and then in groups of two or three, strategically walked out of the speech, across the creaking wooden floors, effectively blotting out Joyce's speech. The Blackshirts
in the audience then caused riots in the street after the meeting and Jolliffe and Lewis were in the thick of it.
His Oxford experiences made him a socialist and he joined the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation
shortly after it was formed in 1932 during his summer vacation. He helped form an oversea's branch of the CCF at Oxford that year. He was called to the bar in England, and was the first Canadian to win the Arden scholarship. When Jolliffe permanently returned from Oxford, he was called to the bar in Ontario and practised law in Toronto from 1938 onwards.
He was a candidate in the 1935 Canadian election
in the Toronto
riding of St. Paul's, placing fourth. He ran again in the 1940 federal election
, this time in the York East
electoral district. He was noted for calling out the former federal Conservative government for neglecting WWI soldiers on their return home, and that this time, "proper measures be taken to protect the future of Canadian soldiers and their dependents." He countered that a C.C.F. government would stop war profiteering and the protect the interests of the country's soldiers and "small taxpayers." He was soundly defeated, like every other Ontario CCF candidate, placing a distant third.
that elected a Conservative minority government
under George Drew. He won the York South
seat, and became its Member of Provincial Parliament (MPP).
, Drew ran an anti-Semitic, union bashing, Red-baiting
campaign. The previous two years of anti-socialist attacks by the Conservatives and their supporters, like Gladstone Murray and Montague A. Sanderson, were devastatingly effective against the previously popular CCF. Much of the source material for the anti-CCF campaign came from the Ontario Provincial Police
(OPP)'s Special Investigation Branch's agent D-208: Captain William J. Osbourne-Dempster. His office was supposed to be investigating war-time 5th column saboteurs. Instead, starting in November 1943, he was investigating, almost exclusively, Ontario opposition MPPs, mainly focusing on the CCF caucus
. The fact that Jolliffe knew about these 'secret' investigations as early as February 1944 led to one of the most infamous incidents in 20th-century Canadian politics.
in Ontario. In the speech excerpt below, Jolliffe alleged that a secret department of the Ontario Provincial Police
was acting as a political police – spying on the opposition and the media.
The dramatic tone of the speech is Sinclair's, as at the time, he was a dramatist, mostly writing for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
(CBC). At the time, there was speculation among CCF supporters as to whether or not the speech damaged the party's reputation. But as Gerald Caplan maintains in his book The Dilemma of Canadian Socialism, the CCF was already at 21 percent in popular support in the Gallop poll just prior to the speech. On election day, they received 22 percent of the popular vote, so at best it added an extra percentage point of support. At worst, it didn't have an effect, which is highly unlikely.
Jolliffe's inflammatory speech became the main issue of the campaign, and dominated coverage in the media for the rest of the election. Drew, and his Attorney-General Leslie Blackwell vehemently denied Jolliffe's accusations, but the public outcry was too much for them to abate. On May 28, 1945 they appointed a Royal Commission to investigate these charges. Jolliffe's CCF and the Ontario Liberal party wanted the election suspended until the Commission tabled its report. Drew ignored these requests and continued to hold the election on its original date, despite it being many months before the Commission's findings could be made available.
Monday, June 4, 1945, was one of Ontario's most important elections in the 20th century according to Caplan and David Lewis
. It shaped the province for the next 40 years, as the Conservatives
won a massive majority in the Legislature, and would remain in government for the next 40 consecutive years.
After going from 34 seats to 8, as Caplan puts it, "June 4 and June 11 [federal election], 1945, proved to be black days in CCF annuals: Socialism was effectively removed from the Canadian political agenda." The CCF would never fully recover from this defeat and would eventually cease as a party and morph into the Ontario New Democratic Party
. Only then, and in the 1970s, did a social democratic party attain the popularity it had under Jolliffe in 1943.
For Ted Jolliffe, another election consequence was his tenure as the MPP from York South ended, at least for the time being. He lost the election but did better than any other CCF candidate in Toronto or in the outlying Yorks.
Jolliffe would act as his own counsel throughout the commission, but was assisted by fellow CCF lawyer, Andrew Brewin
. Both he and Brewin were able to establish, from several eye-witnesses, that agent D-208, Dempster, was spying on the CCF. What they could not prove, because they did not have access to the information in 1945, were the letters that Drew wrote to his supporter M.A. (Bugsy) Sanderson suggesting that he would finance any lawsuits or other charges stemming from the information provided by Dempster in his advertisements. Sanderson was, in late 1943 to 1945, along with Gladstone Murray, leading the libelous advertisement campaigns against the CCF in newspapers and bill-boards, with information gleaned from Dempster's briefings. Jolliffe presented several witnesses that claimed to have seen these documents. But Jolliffe could not produce the actual letter, and Drew would deny ever writing it.
On October 11, 1945 Justice LeBel issued his report that essentially exonerated Drew and Blackwell. Due to Jolliffe presenting only circumstantial evidence that linked Drew to Dempster, Murray and Sanderson, the Commissioner found the information unconvincing, even though LeBel believed Dempster's interaction with Sanderson and Murray was inappropriate.
Jolliffe's motives regarding his accusations, as well as his choice of words, would be questioned for many years afterwards. That would change. In the late 1970s, when David Lewis
was doing research for his Memoirs he came across archival evidence proving the charge. Due to Lewis's discovery, Drew's son Edward, placed extremely restrictive conditions on his father's papers housed in the Public Archives of Canada
that continue as of 2010.
As Lewis pointed out in his memoirs, "We found that Premier Drew and Gladstone Murray did not disclose all information to the Lebel Commission; indeed, they deliberately prevaricated throughout. The head of the Government of Ontario
had given false witness under testimony.... The perpetrator of Ontario's Watergate
got away with it."
Jolliffe faced a leadership challenge in 1946, but was re-elected CCF leader.
, the CCF recovered, winning 21 seats. Jolliffe again became Leader of the Opposition
in Ontario and Member of Provincial Parliament (MPP) for York South. In 1951, however, as a result of the Cold War
and the "red scare", the CCF and labour movement acted to purge individuals (including CCF MPP Robert Carlin
) suspected of being under Communist influence. Among the general public, support for socialism suffered: the CCF was reduced to only two seats in the 1951 election
. Jolliffe lost his own seat and resigned as party leader in 1953.
leader, David Lewis
in 1945. In the 1950s and 1960s, the firm assisted the United Steelworkers
union in their fight with the Mine, Mill & Smelter Workers union in Sudbury, Ontario
. In 1968, he was appointed Chief Adjudicator under the (federal) Public Service Staff Relations Act, a position he held until 1978. He then became active as a labour arbitrator until his retirement. In 1972, an historical novel he wrote, entitled The First Hundred, was published by McClelland and Stewart Limited.
Ted Jolliffe was the first social democratic leader of the opposition in Ontario's Legislature
in 1943. He lived long enough to see Bob Rae
and the NDP
form the Ontario government in September 1990
. He died on March 18, 1998 in Salt Spring Island, British Columbia
.
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....
. He was the first leader of the Ontario section of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation
Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (Ontario Section)
The Co-operative Commonwealth Federation – The Farmer-Labor Party of Ontario, or more informally and commonly known as The Ontario CCF, was a democratic socialist political party that existed from 1932 to 1961. It was the provincial wing of the National CCF. The party officially had no leader in...
(CCF) and leader of the Official Opposition in the Ontario Legislature
Legislative Assembly of Ontario
The Legislative Assembly of Ontario , is the legislature of the Canadian province of Ontario, and is the second largest provincial legislature of Canada...
during the 1940s and 1950s. He was a Rhodes Scholar in the mid-1930s, and came back to Canada to help the CCF, after his studies were complete and being called to the bar in England and Ontario. After politics, he practised labour law in Toronto and would eventually become a labour adjudicator. In retirement, he moved to British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
, where he died in 1998.
Early life and education
His family had lived in Ontario for generations. His parents, the Reverend Charles and Gertrude Jolliffe, were missionariesMissionary
A missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to do evangelism or ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care and economic development. The word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin...
for the Methodist Church of Canada
Methodist Church of Canada
The Methodist Church of Canada was a united church formed in 1884 and comprising most former Methodist denominations in Canada including some that had been active along Canada's eastern coast and north of the St...
, and were living near what was then known as Luchow
Luzhou
-History:The history of Luzhou dates back to Xia and Shang Dynasties. Luzhou became a prefecture level city in 1983.-History of Luzhou:...
, China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
. He was born at the Canadian Missionary hospital in Luchow, near Chunking
Chongqing
Chongqing is a major city in Southwest China and one of the five national central cities of China. Administratively, it is one of the PRC's four direct-controlled municipalities , and the only such municipality in inland China.The municipality was created on 14 March 1997, succeeding the...
on March 2, 1909. He was home-schooled in China by his mother until his early teens. When his family returned to Ontario, he attend Rockwood Public School and then went to high school at Guelph Collegiate Institute. He was an undergraduate at the University of Toronto
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...
's Victoria College
Victoria University in the University of Toronto
Victoria University is a constituent college of the University of Toronto, founded in 1836 and named for Queen Victoria. It is commonly called Victoria College, informally Vic, after the original academic component that now forms its undergraduate division...
, the United Church College. He became the head of the Victoria Student Council, and was a member of the Hart House Debates Committee. In 1930, he won the Maurice Cody scholarship, and then became one of Ontario's Rhodes Scholars that same year. He attended Oxford University for three years, and was affiliated with its Christ Church
Christ Church, Oxford
Christ Church or house of Christ, and thus sometimes known as The House), is one of the largest constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England...
College. As a member of Oxford's Labour Club
Oxford University Labour Club
Oxford University Labour Club was founded in 1919 to provide a voice for Labour Party values and for socialism and social democracy at Oxford University, England...
, he met David Lewis
David Lewis (politician)
David Lewis, CC was a Russian-born Canadian labour lawyer and social democratic politician. He was national secretary of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation from 1936 to 1950, and one of the key architects of the New Democratic Party in 1961...
, the club's leader and a fellow Canadian. Together they fought the Communist Red October club and fascists like Lord Haw-Haw
Lord Haw-Haw
Lord Haw-Haw was the nickname of several announcers on the English-language propaganda radio programme Germany Calling, broadcast by Nazi German radio to audiences in Great Britain on the medium wave station Reichssender Hamburg and by shortwave to the United States...
–William Joyce
William Joyce
William Joyce , nicknamed Lord Haw-Haw, was an Irish-American fascist politician and Nazi propaganda broadcaster to the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He was hanged for treason by the British as a result of his wartime activities, even though he had renounced his British nationality...
. Both he and Lewis planned a 'silent' protest at Joyce's February 1934 speech at Oxford. They carefully made sure that enough members from the Labour Club attended the meeting, and then in groups of two or three, strategically walked out of the speech, across the creaking wooden floors, effectively blotting out Joyce's speech. The Blackshirts
British Union of Fascists
The British Union was a political party in the United Kingdom formed in 1932 by Sir Oswald Mosley as the British Union of Fascists, in 1936 it changed its name to the British Union of Fascists and National Socialists and then in 1937 to simply the British Union...
in the audience then caused riots in the street after the meeting and Jolliffe and Lewis were in the thick of it.
His Oxford experiences made him a socialist and he joined the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation
Co-operative Commonwealth Federation
The Co-operative Commonwealth Federation was a Canadian political party founded in 1932 in Calgary, Alberta, by a number of socialist, farm, co-operative and labour groups, and the League for Social Reconstruction...
shortly after it was formed in 1932 during his summer vacation. He helped form an oversea's branch of the CCF at Oxford that year. He was called to the bar in England, and was the first Canadian to win the Arden scholarship. When Jolliffe permanently returned from Oxford, he was called to the bar in Ontario and practised law in Toronto from 1938 onwards.
He was a candidate in the 1935 Canadian election
Canadian federal election, 1935
The Canadian federal election of 1935 was held on October 14, 1935 to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 18th Parliament of Canada. The Liberal Party of William Lyon Mackenzie King won a majority government, defeating Prime Minister R.B. Bennett's Conservative Party.The central...
in the Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
riding of St. Paul's, placing fourth. He ran again in the 1940 federal election
Canadian federal election, 1940
The Canadian federal election of 1940 was the 19th general election in Canadian history. It was held March 26, 1940 to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 19th Parliament of Canada...
, this time in the York East
York East
York East was a federal electoral district represented in the Canadian House of Commons at different times, and a provincial electoral district. It was located in the province of Ontario.-Federal electoral district :...
electoral district. He was noted for calling out the former federal Conservative government for neglecting WWI soldiers on their return home, and that this time, "proper measures be taken to protect the future of Canadian soldiers and their dependents." He countered that a C.C.F. government would stop war profiteering and the protect the interests of the country's soldiers and "small taxpayers." He was soundly defeated, like every other Ontario CCF candidate, placing a distant third.
Leader and 1943 election
He became the first leader of the Ontario CCF in 1942. The following year, he led the party to within five seats of victory with 34 seats and 32% of the vote in the election of 1943Ontario general election, 1943
The Ontario general election of 1943 was held on August 4, 1943, to elect the 90 Members of the 21st Legislative Assembly of Ontario of the Province of Ontario, Canada....
that elected a Conservative minority government
Minority government
A minority government or a minority cabinet is a cabinet of a parliamentary system formed when a political party or coalition of parties does not have a majority of overall seats in the parliament but is sworn into government to break a Hung Parliament election result. It is also known as a...
under George Drew. He won the York South
York South
York South was an electoral district in Ontario, Canada, that was represented in the Canadian House of Commons from 1904 to 1979, and in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1926 to 1999....
seat, and became its Member of Provincial Parliament (MPP).
1945 "Gestapo" campaign
In the 1945 Ontario electionOntario general election, 1945
The Ontario general election of 1945 was held on June 4, 1945, to elect the 90 members of the 22nd Legislative Assembly of Ontario of the Province of Ontario, Canada....
, Drew ran an anti-Semitic, union bashing, Red-baiting
Red-baiting
Red-baiting is the act of accusing, denouncing, attacking or persecuting an individual or group as communist, socialist, or anarchist, or sympathetic toward communism, socialism, or anarchism. The word "red" in "red-baiting" is derived from the red flag signifying radical left-wing politics. In the...
campaign. The previous two years of anti-socialist attacks by the Conservatives and their supporters, like Gladstone Murray and Montague A. Sanderson, were devastatingly effective against the previously popular CCF. Much of the source material for the anti-CCF campaign came from the Ontario Provincial Police
Ontario Provincial Police
The Ontario Provincial Police is the Provincial Police service for the province of Ontario, Canada.-Overview:The OPP is the the largest deployed police force in Ontario, and the second largest in Canada. The service is responsible for providing policing services throughout the province in areas...
(OPP)'s Special Investigation Branch's agent D-208: Captain William J. Osbourne-Dempster. His office was supposed to be investigating war-time 5th column saboteurs. Instead, starting in November 1943, he was investigating, almost exclusively, Ontario opposition MPPs, mainly focusing on the CCF 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:...
. The fact that Jolliffe knew about these 'secret' investigations as early as February 1944 led to one of the most infamous incidents in 20th-century Canadian politics.
May 24, 1945 radio speech
As can be discerned from the previous description, the 1945 campaign was anything but genteel and polite. Jolliffe replied by giving a radio speech (written with the assistance of Lister Sinclair) that accused Drew of running a political GestapoGestapo
The Gestapo was the official secret police of Nazi Germany. Beginning on 20 April 1934, it was under the administration of the SS leader Heinrich Himmler in his position as Chief of German Police...
in Ontario. In the speech excerpt below, Jolliffe alleged that a secret department of the Ontario Provincial Police
Ontario Provincial Police
The Ontario Provincial Police is the Provincial Police service for the province of Ontario, Canada.-Overview:The OPP is the the largest deployed police force in Ontario, and the second largest in Canada. The service is responsible for providing policing services throughout the province in areas...
was acting as a political police – spying on the opposition and the media.
The dramatic tone of the speech is Sinclair's, as at the time, he was a dramatist, mostly writing for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly known as CBC and officially as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian crown corporation that serves as the national public radio and television broadcaster...
(CBC). At the time, there was speculation among CCF supporters as to whether or not the speech damaged the party's reputation. But as Gerald Caplan maintains in his book The Dilemma of Canadian Socialism, the CCF was already at 21 percent in popular support in the Gallop poll just prior to the speech. On election day, they received 22 percent of the popular vote, so at best it added an extra percentage point of support. At worst, it didn't have an effect, which is highly unlikely.
Jolliffe's inflammatory speech became the main issue of the campaign, and dominated coverage in the media for the rest of the election. Drew, and his Attorney-General Leslie Blackwell vehemently denied Jolliffe's accusations, but the public outcry was too much for them to abate. On May 28, 1945 they appointed a Royal Commission to investigate these charges. Jolliffe's CCF and the Ontario Liberal party wanted the election suspended until the Commission tabled its report. Drew ignored these requests and continued to hold the election on its original date, despite it being many months before the Commission's findings could be made available.
Election Day, June 4, 1945
Jolliffe's CCF went from 34 seats to 8, but almost garnering the same number of actual votes cast, though their percentage of the popular vote dropped from 32 to 22 percent. Drew, with his attack campaign, successfully drove the voter turn-out up, thereby driving the CCF's percentage and seat totals down.Monday, June 4, 1945, was one of Ontario's most important elections in the 20th century according to Caplan and David Lewis
David Lewis (politician)
David Lewis, CC was a Russian-born Canadian labour lawyer and social democratic politician. He was national secretary of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation from 1936 to 1950, and one of the key architects of the New Democratic Party in 1961...
. It shaped the province for the next 40 years, as the Conservatives
Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario
The Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario , is a right-of-centre political party in Ontario, Canada. The party was known for many years as "Ontario's natural governing party." It has ruled the province for 80 of the years since Confederation, including an uninterrupted run from 1943 to 1985...
won a massive majority in the Legislature, and would remain in government for the next 40 consecutive years.
After going from 34 seats to 8, as Caplan puts it, "June 4 and June 11 [federal election], 1945, proved to be black days in CCF annuals: Socialism was effectively removed from the Canadian political agenda." The CCF would never fully recover from this defeat and would eventually cease as a party and morph into the Ontario New Democratic Party
Ontario New Democratic Party
The Ontario New Democratic Party or , formally known as New Democratic Party of Ontario, is a social democratic political party in Ontario, Canada. It is a provincial section of the federal New Democratic Party. It was formed in October 1961, a few months after the federal party. The ONDP had its...
. Only then, and in the 1970s, did a social democratic party attain the popularity it had under Jolliffe in 1943.
For Ted Jolliffe, another election consequence was his tenure as the MPP from York South ended, at least for the time being. He lost the election but did better than any other CCF candidate in Toronto or in the outlying Yorks.
| Party | Leader | 1943 Ontario general election, 1943 The Ontario general election of 1943 was held on August 4, 1943, to elect the 90 Members of the 21st Legislative Assembly of Ontario of the Province of Ontario, Canada.... |
Elected | % change | Popular vote | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| % | change |
Progressive Conservative | George Drew | 38 | 66 | +73.7% | 44.3% | +8.6% |
Liberal Ontario Liberal Party The Ontario Liberal Party is a provincial political party in the province of Ontario, Canada. It has formed the Government of Ontario since the provincial election of 2003. The party is ideologically aligned with the Liberal Party of Canada but the two parties are organizationally independent and... |
Mitchell Hepburn Mitchell Hepburn Mitchell Frederick Hepburn was the 11th Premier of Ontario, Canada, from 1934 to 1942. He was the youngest Premier in Ontario history, appointed at age 37.... |
15 | 11 | -26.7% | 29.8% | -1.4% |
Liberal-Labour Liberal-Labour (Canada) The Liberal-Labour banner has also been used several times by candidates in Canadian elections:In the early twentieth century when the idea of trade unionists running for elected office under their own banner gained ground, several working class candidates on the provincial or federal level were... |
- | 3 | |
Co-operative Commonwealth Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (Ontario Section) The Co-operative Commonwealth Federation – The Farmer-Labor Party of Ontario, or more informally and commonly known as The Ontario CCF, was a democratic socialist political party that existed from 1932 to 1961. It was the provincial wing of the National CCF. The party officially had no leader in... |
Ted Jolliffe | 34 | 8 | -76.5% | 22.4% | -9.3% |
Labour-Progressive Party | Leslie Morris Leslie Morris Leslie Tim Morris was a Welsh-Canadian politician, journalist and long time member of the Communist Party of Canada and, its front group, the Labour-Progressive Party.... |
2 | 2 | - | 2.4% | |
Liberal Independent | 1 | - | - | |||
| Total Seats | 90 | 90 | - | 100% | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
LeBel Royal Commission
Drew appointed Justice A.M. LeBel as the Royal Commissioner. His terms of reference were restricted to the question of whether Drew was personally responsible for the establishment of "a secret political police organization, for the purpose of collecting, by secret spying, material to be used in attempt to keep him in power." Wider questions like why the OPP, Ontario Civil Servants, were keeping files on MPPs were not allowed.Jolliffe would act as his own counsel throughout the commission, but was assisted by fellow CCF lawyer, Andrew Brewin
Andrew Brewin
Francis Andrew Brewin was a lawyer and Canadian politician.Brewin was a stalwart in the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and ran numerous times at the federal and provincial levels in the 1940 and 1950s...
. Both he and Brewin were able to establish, from several eye-witnesses, that agent D-208, Dempster, was spying on the CCF. What they could not prove, because they did not have access to the information in 1945, were the letters that Drew wrote to his supporter M.A. (Bugsy) Sanderson suggesting that he would finance any lawsuits or other charges stemming from the information provided by Dempster in his advertisements. Sanderson was, in late 1943 to 1945, along with Gladstone Murray, leading the libelous advertisement campaigns against the CCF in newspapers and bill-boards, with information gleaned from Dempster's briefings. Jolliffe presented several witnesses that claimed to have seen these documents. But Jolliffe could not produce the actual letter, and Drew would deny ever writing it.
On October 11, 1945 Justice LeBel issued his report that essentially exonerated Drew and Blackwell. Due to Jolliffe presenting only circumstantial evidence that linked Drew to Dempster, Murray and Sanderson, the Commissioner found the information unconvincing, even though LeBel believed Dempster's interaction with Sanderson and Murray was inappropriate.
Jolliffe's motives regarding his accusations, as well as his choice of words, would be questioned for many years afterwards. That would change. In the late 1970s, when David Lewis
David Lewis (politician)
David Lewis, CC was a Russian-born Canadian labour lawyer and social democratic politician. He was national secretary of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation from 1936 to 1950, and one of the key architects of the New Democratic Party in 1961...
was doing research for his Memoirs he came across archival evidence proving the charge. Due to Lewis's discovery, Drew's son Edward, placed extremely restrictive conditions on his father's papers housed in the Public Archives of Canada
Library and Archives Canada
Library and Archives Canada is a national memory institution dedicated to providing the best possible account of Canadian life through acquiring, preserving and making Canada's documentary heritage accessible for use in the 21st century and beyond...
that continue as of 2010.
As Lewis pointed out in his memoirs, "We found that Premier Drew and Gladstone Murray did not disclose all information to the Lebel Commission; indeed, they deliberately prevaricated throughout. The head of the Government of Ontario
Politics of Ontario
The Province of Ontario is governed by a unicameral legislature, the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, which operates in the Westminster system of government...
had given false witness under testimony.... The perpetrator of Ontario's Watergate
Watergate scandal
The Watergate scandal was a political scandal during the 1970s in the United States resulting from the break-in of the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., and the Nixon administration's attempted cover-up of its involvement...
got away with it."
Jolliffe faced a leadership challenge in 1946, but was re-elected CCF leader.
1948 re-elected MPP
As a result of the 1948 Ontario electionOntario general election, 1948
The Ontario general election of 1948 was held on June 7, 1948, to elect the 90 members of the 23rd Legislative Assembly of Ontario of the Province of Ontario, Canada....
, the CCF recovered, winning 21 seats. Jolliffe again became Leader of the Opposition
Leader of the Opposition (Ontario)
The Leader of the Opposition in Ontario is usually leader of the largest party in the Ontario legislature which is not the government. The current official opposition is formed by the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, and Tim Hudak is the current Leader of the Opposition.Ontario's first...
in Ontario and Member of Provincial Parliament (MPP) for York South. In 1951, however, as a result of the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
and the "red scare", the CCF and labour movement acted to purge individuals (including CCF MPP Robert Carlin
Robert Carlin
Robert Carlin was a Canadian labour union organizer and politician, who represented the electoral district of Sudbury in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1943 to 1948. He was a member of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation .Born in Buckingham, Quebec, Carlin moved to Cobalt in 1916...
) suspected of being under Communist influence. Among the general public, support for socialism suffered: the CCF was reduced to only two seats in the 1951 election
Ontario general election, 1951
The Ontario general election of 1951 was held on November 22, 1951, to elect the 90 members of the 24th Legislative Assembly of Ontario of the Province of Ontario, Canada....
. Jolliffe lost his own seat and resigned as party leader in 1953.
Post MPP career
He returned to his previous career as a labour lawyer, founding the firm Jolliffe, Lewis and Osler with fellow CCF activist and future New Democratic PartyNew Democratic Party
The New Democratic Party , commonly referred to as the NDP, is a federal social-democratic political party in Canada. The interim leader of the NDP is Nycole Turmel who was appointed to the position due to the illness of Jack Layton, who died on August 22, 2011. The provincial wings of the NDP in...
leader, David Lewis
David Lewis (politician)
David Lewis, CC was a Russian-born Canadian labour lawyer and social democratic politician. He was national secretary of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation from 1936 to 1950, and one of the key architects of the New Democratic Party in 1961...
in 1945. In the 1950s and 1960s, the firm assisted the United Steelworkers
United Steelworkers
The United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union is the largest industrial labor union in North America, with 705,000 members. Headquartered in Pittsburgh, U.S., the United Steelworkers represents workers in the United...
union in their fight with the Mine, Mill & Smelter Workers union in Sudbury, 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....
. In 1968, he was appointed Chief Adjudicator under the (federal) Public Service Staff Relations Act, a position he held until 1978. He then became active as a labour arbitrator until his retirement. In 1972, an historical novel he wrote, entitled The First Hundred, was published by McClelland and Stewart Limited.
Ted Jolliffe was the first social democratic leader of the opposition in Ontario's Legislature
Legislative Assembly of Ontario
The Legislative Assembly of Ontario , is the legislature of the Canadian province of Ontario, and is the second largest provincial legislature of Canada...
in 1943. He lived long enough to see Bob Rae
Bob Rae
Robert Keith "Bob" Rae, PC, OC, OOnt, QC, MP is a Canadian politician. He is the Member of Parliament for Toronto Centre and interim leader of the Liberal Party of Canada....
and the NDP
Ontario New Democratic Party
The Ontario New Democratic Party or , formally known as New Democratic Party of Ontario, is a social democratic political party in Ontario, Canada. It is a provincial section of the federal New Democratic Party. It was formed in October 1961, a few months after the federal party. The ONDP had its...
form the Ontario government in September 1990
Ontario general election, 1990
The Ontario general election of 1990 was held on September 6, 1990, to elect members of the 35th Legislative Assembly of the province of Ontario, Canada....
. He died on March 18, 1998 in Salt Spring Island, British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
.