Our Canada: The Story of the New Democratic Party Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

Graeme S. Mount is a history professor at Laurentian University.

A sentence on the back cover summarizes the book’s thrust: “The New
Democratic Party is a different kind of political party—one where
idealism comes before opportunism.” Hence, the 24 authors—most of
them NDP activists and all of them NDP admirers—fail to mention the
NDP’s alliance with “international” unions at a time when the
party was highly critical of multinational corporations. There is more
about Tommy Douglas and medicare than about Allan Blakeney and the
Constitution’s “notwithstanding” clause. (The book went to press
too soon to deal with the Rae government’s acceptance of Sunday
shopping and casino gambling.) Apart from a suggestion that the CCF’s
World War II policy on conscription was unclear and unrealistic (p. 32),
the 24 writers offer an almost unbroken chorus of praise to the NDP and
its predecessor, the CCF. In reviewing the history of the NDP in
Newfoundland and Labrador, Memorial University professor Gerry Panting
actually uses the first-person-plural pronoun and refers to “our
candidate” (p. 175).

Nevertheless, the book has considerable merit. Crowded into fewer than
200 pages of text are many facts. The team of writers includes such
notables as Kenneth McNaught, Michael Oliver, Charles Taylor, and Pierre
Berton. Who could be better informed about the party’s history in
Ontario than Donald C. MacDonald, an MPP from 1955 to 1982 and
provincial leader from 1953 to 1970? Tony Penikett, “Premier” of the
Yukon, co-authors the chapter on his territory.

The book contains three sections: biographies of the party’s
founders, from J.S. Woodsworth to David Lewis; reviews of the party’s
achievements in each province and territory; and visions of Canada’s
future by Audrey McLaughlin, Shirley Carr, and Ed Broadbent. These make
it useful to political scientists as well as historians. The NDP has
many achievements to its credit and many proud memories, and this book
provides a succinct summary. It is, nonetheless, an insider’s account.