J. S. Woodsworth - Political Involvement

Political Involvement

Woodsworth and his family remained in British Columbia, where, despite his slight stature, he took work as a stevedore. He joined the union, helped organize the Federated Labour Party of British Columbia, and wrote for the labour newspaper.

In 1919, he set out on a tour of Western Canada, arriving in Winnipeg just as the Winnipeg General Strike was underway. He immediately began presenting addresses at strike meetings. When the Royal Canadian Mounted Police charged into a crowd of strikers demonstrating in the centre of Winnipeg, killing one person and injuring 30, Woodsworth led the campaign of protest, and soon became involved in organising the Manitoba Independent Labour Party (ILP).

Woodsworth briefly returned to British Columbia in 1920 to campaign as a Federated Labour Party candidate in Vancouver. He received 7444 votes, but was not elected to the provincial legislature.

He became editor of the Western Labour News. A week after the editor of the strike bulletin was arrested and charged with seditious libel, Woodsworth found himself in the same position, but was released on bail after five days' imprisonment, and the charges were never filed. These events were instrumental in establishing Woodsworth's credentials with the labour movement and in propelling him to a twenty-year tenure in public office. They also affirmed his beliefs in the importance of social activism.

In December 1921, Woodsworth was elected as the Independent Labour Party Member of Parliament for the riding of Winnipeg North, a constituency he served until his death. The first bill he proposed concerned unemployment insurance and, even though he was informed by the Clerk of the House of Commons that bills involving federal spending had to be presented by the government, he nonetheless continued to press his case for constitutional reform. Fourteen years later, the government agreed to strike a committee to discuss possible constitutional reforms. During this time, Woodsworth was an unflagging advocate for the worker, the farmer, and the immigrant.

In 1929, Woodsworth was a keynote speaker at the annual conference of the Student Christian Movement of Canada, a fledgling social justice movement founded in 1921, and inspired Stanley Knowles, then 21, who later became ordained and helped found the New Democratic Party.

Rejecting violent revolution and any association with the new Communist Party of Canada, Woodsworth became a master of parliamentary procedure and used the House of Commons as a public platform. He sat with the Progressive Party of Canada and was a leader of its radical faction, the Ginger Group.

When the Canadian Liberal Party nearly lost the 1925 election, Woodsworth was able to bargain his vote in the House for a promise from the Liberal government to enact an old age pension plan. Introduced in 1927, the plan is the cornerstone of Canada's social security system. In 1932, Woodsworth toured Europe as a member of the League of Nations Assembly in Geneva.