[LINK] "A case for coalition"

[rfmcdonald]

Over at Eye Weekly, Chris Bilton summarizes the interesting history of party mergers and occasional coalitions in Canadian political history.

Since our government simply refers to "the party with the most seats," and we don’t directly elect a prime minister, the definition of both is somewhat malleable. First off, each party chooses its leader, and the party with the most seats is in charge. Consequently, the party’s leader becomes Prime Minster.

But if Stephen Harper decided to step down as PM, and the party embarked on an epic game of paper-scissors-rock to determine the new leader, that’s their prerogative. Or, if more than half the MPs suddenly abandoned their respective parties and became independents, we’d have anarchy. Come to think of it, it doesn’t really seem all that responsible on our part as voters. But it does mean that at least the government is responsible to whomever we voted into office. And when any majority of parliament members disagrees with the government, they have the option of voting it down or taking over.

Usually, the former happens and we have an election — something annoyingly familiar during this century’s brief political history. Actually, the latter has never happened, until now. But that’s not to say that a coalition is totally unprecedented. Since Canada’s infancy, inter-party mergers have occurred at least as often as we get to host the Olympics.

Towards the end of the American Civil War, Canada’s main parties got together in an effort to reform the entire political system and alleviate the deadlock of French versus English voting. This was also probably not a bad idea if things in the US went, ah, south, and the proto-provinces had to make some diplomatic decisions about their neighbour. Setting aside political feuding, they created what was dubbed The Great Coalition; essentially the precursor to Confederation.

Again during wartime, PM Robert Borden’s efforts to introduce conscription (Canada’s version of the draft) and top up the troops during WWI required a bit of bolstering from some willing opposition members. Creating the Union Government out of Conservative, Liberal and Independent MPs, Borden was able to win the 1917 election, and send more young men to slaughter. OK, so maybe coalitions aren’t always awesome.