The Great Depression
1929-1939
The Great Depression
Affected almost every economy in
the world
 Began with the Stock Market Crash
in October 1929
 Supply and demand problems
 Stock market speculation
 Tuesday, October 29, 1929 became
known as Black Tuesday
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Black Tuesday
1933- The worst year
GNP in 1933 had dropped 40% from
pre-crash levels
 Canada’s exports declined by half
 Over-dependence on natural
resource exports
 26.6% unemployment
 In some regions of Canada
unemployment was 30-50%
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“A Five-Cent Piece”
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Prime Minister King did not acknowledge
the crisis
Refused to give “a five-sent piece” to any
province with a Conservative gov’t
“What is needed today if we are to solve
any unemployment problem is to get
more capital into the country to increase
the investment of capital; and we will get
it as people come to have confidence in
conditions here.”
Government inaction
Government constrained by debt
from loans to the railway interests
 Most revenue came from tariffs and
sales taxes
 Aid would have to come from
provinces and municipalities
 The Conservatives won the 1930
election 137 to 91.
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Richard Bedford Bennett
The Depths of the
Depression
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Depression got worse not better after
1930 election
No welfare, UI or medicare
Bennett introduced the Unemployment
Relief Act $20 million for 1930 and 1931
The feds passed the responsibility of
distributing assistance to the municipal
gov’t
The provinces did not want to share the
cost of relief and the municipalities did
not have the resources to distribute
Relief
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Most relief funds came in the form of
public works
Disorganized attempt meant that only $4
million of the $20 million went in direct
relief to people
Registering for relief was humiliating and
difficult
Relief usually came in vouchers
See letters pp 408 and 409
Soup Kitchens
Depression in the Prairies
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Record low prices for grain
Most severe and prolonged drought in
history
1929-1937 drought in Paliser Triangle
WWI $2 a bushel for wheat
1932-33 39 and 3/8 cents
Bennett Buggies and Anderson Carts
See letters pp 412 and 413
The Dustbowl
Labour Camps
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Riding the Rods made government
nervous
Work camps for unemployed, single men
Under the jurisdiction of the Department
of National Defence
20 cents a day
1932 saw the establishment of the first
labour camps
Lack of funds
Single men could not get relief
Relief Camps
Unrest in the camps
In the four years of the camps there
were 359 strikes, riots and
disturbances
 RCWU was associated with the
Communist party and began to
organize protests for decent wages
 On to Ottawa began in BC
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On to Ottawa Trek
The On to Ottawa Trek
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April 1935 3000 relief camp workers
converged on Vancouver riots and
protests for weeks
1800 got on trains for Ottawa
June 14, 1935 2000 men converged on
Regina
Arthur Evans and seven of his men
agreed to a meeting with the Prime
Minister
The Six Demands of the
workers
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50 cents an hour wage for unskilled
labour and union rates for skilled labour
All workers must be covered by the
Compensation Act and adequate first aid
for the jobs
Elected committee of relief workers
Department of National Defence no
longer be in charge of the camps
A genuine system of social and
unemployment insurance
All workers guaranteed the right to vote
Regina Riot
The meeting ended in a stalemate
 Evans returned to Regina
 July 1, 1935 rally in Market Square
 Riot ensued
 1 police office dead and 100
protesters arrested
 8, including Evans were sent to jail
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Regina Riot
Confronting the Depression
Tariffs for protection
 Smoot-Hawley tariff devastated
Canada (30-60%)
 In July 1932 Bennett alienated the
Commonwealth at the Imperial
Economic Conference in Ottawa
 Half hearted attempt at Free Trade
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Bennett’s New Deal
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1935 election year
Laissez-faire had failed
Proposed a “New Deal” like FDR’s in the
US
Proposed a government program of
unemployment insurance
Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act
The Canadian Wheat Board
The Natural Products Marketing Board
New Deal
Thwarted in the courts, but also
proposed UI and national health
insurance
 Bank of Canada Act- created a
central bank
 Canadians did not trust Bennett
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1935 Election
Mackenzie King made few promises
 Promised to disband the work camps
 1935 the Conservatives lost 3/5 of
the vote capturing only 40 seats
 King won 125 seats
 King adopted some New Deal
policies, but not much changed for
Canadians
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New Political Parties
Social Credit- William Aberhart $25
a month to make up for the lack of
purchasing power
 56/63 Albertan seats
 15/17 seats in Ottawa from Alberta
 Certificates instead of cash were
given, but not accepted
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New Political Parties
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The Co-operative Commonwealth
Federation formed in 1932
Regina Manifesto- social democracy
Government control of key industries
Welfare state- medicare, welfare and UI
J.S. Woodsworth
1944 Tommy Douglas elected in
Saskatchewan
New Political Parties
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In Quebec the Church pushed for reform
Anti-socialist but proposed programs to
regulate monopolies and improve
conditions
Some Liberals broke away and formed the
Action Liberale nationale
Maurice Duplessis of the Conservative
party formed an alliance to create the
Union Nationale in 1935
Maurice Duplessis
After the election he dropped the
Liberal members and the reform
platform
 Duplessis became an ally of big
business
 Support came from rural Quebec
 Anti-communist= Padlock Act
 15 years as Premier
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Maurice Duplessis
The Antigonish Movement
Resisted revolution and anticapitalist ideology
 Two Catholic Priests founded it
 Credit unions and cooperatives to
sell seafood or farm products
 1930s saw many coops in the
Maritimes
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The Communist Party
Tim Buck leader
 Communist Party found an audience
during the Great Depression
 The Party was outlawed in 1931
 Tim Buck and other leaders jailed
from 1932-1934
 Protests, marches and hunger
strikes
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The Communist Party of
Canada
Aboriginal Peoples in the
Depression
Services cut back to bare minimum
as outlined by Treaties
 Birthrate twice as high
 Death rate 4x as high
 Metis had it worse as there were no
treaties
 1934 90% of Metis in Alberta had
TB, paralysis, blindness or syphilis
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Residential Schools
Residential Schools
1930 the number of residential
schools reached an all time high of
80
 Every province and territory except
NB and PEI
 Fed and prov in partnership with
Catholic, Anglican, Presbyterian and
United Churches
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Residential Schools cont’d
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Goal was to assimilate children into civicreligious values and ways of “typical”
Canadians
Manual labour and homemaking skills
Inadequate living conditions
Abuse
1990s before the last residential schools
were closed
Confronting the Outsider
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Relief for Chinese $1.12 versus $2.50 a
week for non-Chinese
Sections 40 and 41 of the Immigration
Act allowed for deportation of
unemployable recipients of relief
In Alberta 1930-1934 2547 immigrants
were deported
This discouraged many from applying for
relief
Immigration
Even before the Depression,
immigration was discouraged
 Jews were especially discouraged
 Canada not welcoming to Jews
escaping Nazi Germany
 Frederick Blair “none is too many”
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Jewish Refugees
Country admitting Jewish
Refugees from the Nazis 1933-45
Number of Refugees
United States
240 000
Great Britain
85 000
China
25 000
Argentina
25 000
Brazil
25 000
Columbia and Mexico 40 000
Canada
5000 (pathetic)
Canadian Culture
Canadian Culture
Canadian Culture
Canadian Culture
Conclusion
The demand for goods in World War
II finally pushed Canada out of the
Great Depression
 The growth of the welfare state and
gov’t supervision of vital aspects of
the economy continued into the
1980s as a result of the Great
Depression
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