1953 Canadian federal election

1953 Canadian federal election

August 10, 1953
265 seats in the House of Commons 133 seats needed for a majority
Turnout	67.5% (6.3pp)
First party Second party   Leader Louis St. Laurent George A. Drew Party Liberal Progressive Conservative Leader since August 7, 1948 October 2, 1948 Leader's seat Quebec East Carleton Last election 191 41 Seats won 169 51 Seat change 22 10 Popular vote 2,731,633 1,749,579 Percentage 48.43% 31.02% Swing 0.72pp 1.37pp   Third party Fourth party   Leader Major James Coldwell Solon Earl Low Party Co-operative Commonwealth Social Credit Leader since March 22, 1942 April 6, 1944 Leader's seat Rosetown—Biggar Peace River Last election 13 10 Seats won 23 15 Seat change 10 5 Popular vote 636,310 304,553 Percentage 11.28% 5.40% Swing 2.14pp 3.09pp
The Canadian parliament after the 1953 election
Prime Minister before election Louis St. Laurent Liberal Prime Minister after election Louis St. Laurent Liberal

The 1953 Canadian federal election was held on August 10, 1953, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 22nd Parliament of Canada. Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent led his Liberal Party of Canada to its second consecutive majority government, although the party lost seats to the other parties.

The Progressive Conservative Party, led by former Premier of Ontario, George Drew, formed the official opposition, but for the last time until 1993, the party was unable to win the popular vote in any of Canada's provinces or territories.

This was the last election until 1988 in which any party won back-to-back majorities, and the last until 1997 in which the Liberals would accomplish this feat. This election is the last time that the Liberals would win more seats in Alberta than the largest right-of-centre party in Canada, and the last time they would win more seats than the Tories in Alberta until 1993.

Overview

Liberal Party

Throughout the years since the previous federal election, St. Laurent had been an active and popular Prime Minister, increasing the country's autonomy from the United Kingdom, overseeing the construction of the Trans-Canada Highway, and introducing various welfare programmes. With the Liberals remaining well ahead in the polls, St. Laurent decided there was little to be gained by waiting out his whole mandate, and called an early federal election a year before his mandate was due to expire.

As with the previous election, the campaign was largely based around St. Laurent's personal image, and was light on any actual policies beyond a continuation of what his government had already been doing. While they would lose support in relatively equal measure to all the other three major parties, the majority that they had won four years earlier still held up, and delivered St. Laurent his second majority government.

Progressive Conservatives

While party leader George A. Drew had largely escaped blame for the poor showing at the previous election, the years ahead saw much debate about the party's future direction. Many believed that Ontario, where Drew remained personally very popular and his successor as Premier, Leslie Frost had maintained the party's heavy dominance of the provincial legislature, was key to any prospect of the Progressive Conservatives forming another government. Others within the party pointed out that even if they won every single seat in Ontario, it would leave them 48 seats short of a majority, and that they would need to make up the numbers elsewhere. Western Canada seemed the only realistic prospect of building a political base elsewhere in the country due to the Liberals' heavy domination of Quebec and (to a lesser degree) Atlantic Canada, but the party establishment largely dismissed this prospect, seeing the west as CCF and Socred territory. All the while, the party generally polled better than it had done in the 1945-1949 parliament, but there rarely looked to be any prospect of them forming the next government.

Ultimately, the election result would do little to settle these factional disputes, as the party made something of a recovery in Ontario, and won two extra seats apiece in Quebec and Manitoba, but saw a further drop in their popular vote share west of Manitoba.

Co-Operative Commonwealth Federation

For this election, the CCF scaled back the scope of their campaign. Having tried to win seats throughout the country in the previous two elections, this time the party's goal was to re-establish its political base in Western Canada and retake the seats that it had lost to the Liberals. The party therefore abandoned any pretence of trying to make a breakthrough in Ontario, nominating very few candidates east of Manitoba, and almost none in Quebec.

In the end, despite suffering the largest popular vote share loss of the major parties, the CCF's strategy paid off, largely reversing the losses they had suffered in the previous election. They earned a firm majority of seats in their political base of Saskachewan, and also performed well in British Columbia, coming a close second to the Liberals in the province's seat total. Their final total of 23 seats nationally was 5 fewer than they had earned in 1945, but still the second-best showing since the party's formation.

Social Credit Party

While little changed in the Social Credit Party's political base of Alberta, with them winning the same total of 10 seats that they had at the previous federal election, this election marked an important breakthrough for the Socreds, who were able to capitalise on the newly-formed Social Credit provincial government of W. A. C. Bennett in British Columbia, and win seats in the province for the first time. They won a total of five seats, while coming a very close third (within half a percentage point) behind the CCF in the province's popular vote. For the first time, the Socreds held more seats than the Progressive Conservatives in two provinces.

During the campaign, leader Solon Earl Low was largely able to side-step any questions of whether his party would be willing to prop up a potential minority Progressive Conservative government, as there was little doubt that the Liberals would win another majority. However, the Socreds' breakthrough into a new province and the PCs' seeming disinterest in the west soon resulted in much debate about Social Credit's potential role in a federal government (or at least supporting one on matters of confidence) in the years ahead.

National results

See also Results of the 1953 Canadian federal election

Party		Party leader	# of candidates	Seats			Popular vote
				1949	Elected	% Change	#	%	pp Change
	Liberal	Louis St. Laurent	262	191	169	-11.5%	2,731,633	48.43%	-0.72
	Progressive Conservative	George Drew	248	41	51	+24.4%	1,749,579	31.02%	+1.37
	Co-operative Commonwealth	M.J. Coldwell	170	13	23	+76.9%	636,310	11.28%	-2.14
	Social Credit	Solon Low	71	10	15	+50%	304,553	5.40%	+3.09
	Independent		14	4	3	-25.0%	58,458	1.04%	-1.01
	Independent Liberal		19	1	2	+100%	68,506	1.21%	+0.69
	Liberal-Labour1		1	1	1	-	11,380	0.20%	-
	Liberal–Progressive		1	1	1	-	8,958	0.16%	-
	Labor–Progressive	Tim Buck	100	-	-	-	59,622	1.06%	+0.50
	Nationalist	Adrien Arcand	1	*	-	*	7,496	0.13%	*
	Independent Progressive Conservative		3	-	-	-	1,636	0.03%	-0.11
	Christian Liberal		1	*	-	*	1,505	0.03%	*
	Independent Social Credit		1	-	-	-	422	0.01%	-0.07
	Locataire (candidat)		1	*	-	*	417	0.01%	*
	Anti-Communist		1	*	-	*	333	0.01%	*
	Socialist Labour		1	-	-	-	130	x	x
Total			897	262	265	+1.1%	5,640,938	100%
Sources: http://www.elections.ca History of Federal Ridings since 1867 Archived 2008-12-04 at the Wayback Machine

Notes:

* - not applicable - the party was not recognized in the previous election

x - less than 0.005% of the popular vote

¹ The Liberal-Labour MP sat with the Liberal caucus.

Vote and seat summaries

Popular vote Liberal   48.43% PC   31.02% CCF   11.28% Social Credit   5.40% Others   3.87%

Seat totals Liberal   64.15% PC   19.24% CCF   8.67% Social Credit   5.66% Others   2.26%

Results by province

Party name			BC	AB	SK	MB	ON	QC	NB	NS	PE	NL	NW	YK	Total
	Liberal	Seats:	8	4	5	7	50	66	7	10	3	7	1	1	169
		Vote (%):	30.9	35.1	37.3	37.0	46.0	61.0	52.7	53.0	51.1	67.2	49.4	78.7	48.4
	Progressive Conservative	Seats:	3	2	1	3	33	4	3	1	1	0	-	-	51
		Vote (%):	14.1	14.5	11.7	27.0	40.3	29.4	41.9	40.1	48.0	28.1	38.5	21.3	31.0
	Co-operative Commonwealth	Seats:	7	-	11	3	1	-	-	1	-	-			23
		Vote (%):	26.6	6.9	44.2	23.6	11.1	1.5	3.0	6.7	0.8	0.6			11.3
	Social Credit	Seats:	4	11	-	-	-		-						15
		Vote (%):	26.1	40.7	5.3	6.3	0.3		0.4						5.4
	Independent	Seats:		-		-	-	3				-	-		3
		Vote (%):		0.1		0.2	0.3	3.0				4.0	12.4		1.0
	Independent Liberal	Seats:				-	-	2	-						2
		Vote (%):				4.0	0.3	3.7	1.9						1.2
	Liberal–Labour	Seats:					1								1
		Vote (%):					0.6								0.2
	Liberal-Progressive	Seats:				1									1
		Vote (%):				3.3									0.2
Total Seats			22	17	17	14	85	75	10	12	4	7	1	1	265
Parties that won no seats:
	Labor–Progressive	Vote (%):	2.2	2.7	1.1	2.3	1.0	0.7		0.2					1.1
	Nationalist	Vote (%):						0.5							0.1
	Independent PC	Vote (%):						0.1							xx
	Christian Liberal	Vote (%):					0.1								xx
	Independent Social Credit	Vote (%):		0.1											xx
	Locataire (candidat)	Vote (%):						xx							xx
	Anti-Communist	Vote (%):						xx							xx
	Socialist Labour	Vote (%):					xx								xx

• xx - less than 0.05% of the popular vote

See also

• List of Canadian federal general elections
• List of political parties in Canada
• 22nd Canadian Parliament

Further reading

• LeDuc, Lawrence; Pammett, Jon H.; McKenzie, Judith L.; Turcotte, André (2010). Dynasties and Interludes: Past and Present in Canadian Electoral Politics. Toronto: Dundurn Press. ISBN 978-1-55488-886-3.
• Beck, James Murray (1968). Pendulum of Power; Canada's Federal Elections. Scarborough: Prentice-Hall of Canada. ISBN 978-0-13-655670-1.
• Argyle, Ray (2004). Turning Points: The Campaigns that Changed Canada 2004 and Before. Toronto: White Knight Publications. ISBN 978-0-9734186-6-8.