The New Way Of Life In Canada During The 20th Century

Canada’s New Way of Life
Canadians went under dramatic changes of their identity throughout the 20th century. Throughout Canada’s existence has created quite a reputation. New factories arose across Canada over the late 19th and early 20th century allowing thousands of Canadians, including women, to find a job being able to support their family. The Canadian society saw a huge transformation of farmers, loggers and fur traders during the 20th century. New provinces were settling in as well as colonizing in the late 1800s. New cities began to spring up and by the 1910s over 50% of Canadians were living in the urban areas, rather than rural areas. The revolution saw a dramatic growth in city based factory worked. Canada’s raw natural resources
were being processed into products such as lumber, meat, and textiles. This created many jobs that would help farmers get off the farm and others out of the woods. Many immigrants decided that they would settle in the uninhabited parts in the west of Canada. The area no longer consisted of simply the French and English but have brought in many numbers of Canadians who were Irish, Italian, Polish, Dutch, Ukrainian, Scandinavian and even some Japanese and Chinese people too. Under the leadership of Prime Minister Wilfred Laurier, Canada pursued policies that yielded great economic growth, and a rising standard of living for almost everyone. Some people were wealthier than others but overall, Canada seemed like a nice place to live.
1900 to 1928 was known as the Birth of an identity for Canada. Canada gained independence during these years. After the war, consecutive Canadian governments, backed up by the governments of other English British colonies such as Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand, aggressively lobbies Britain to restructure the Empire to allow it’s colonies to gain greater independence. Britain was known as the country that always knew best, or even how Britain was in some way superior to others. This made less and less sense in a world where the British were become wealthier with important world powers in their own right. Even after gaining political independence from Britain, Canada kept its connection with the British Crown. In 1926, the Imperial Conference in London featuring all the colonial prime ministers passes a resolution declaring that Britain and its dominions were all “equal in status.” In 1931, the British Parliament went one step further and passed a law known as the Statute of Westminster. This formally took away Britain’s ability to make laws for Canada and the other advanced colonies.
After the First World War, Canada was still having issues regarding The Great Depression.
After the economic boom in the 1920s, a severe depression hit in the 1930s, putting millions out of work and putting even more into poverty. Desperate Canadian workers and voters became extremely interested into the radical ideas and political parties and new movements including socialism, communism, fascism and more. This was a time of radicalism. Early feminists’ protests earned Canadian women the right vote in 1918, and union activists helped abolish child labour in the 1920s. However, by 1939, the nation’s leader become distracted by political happenings in Europe. Britain had declared war on Adolph Hitler’s fanatic Nazi regime in Germany which took place between 1889 and 1945. Although Canada was no longer obligate to do anything about it, the pro-British sentiment continued to stay strong. The government of Prime Minister Mackenzie King passed a declaration of war against Germany one week later. Canadian troops were once again sent to Europe. When Britain declared war on Germany’s Asian ally Japan in 1941, Canada once again followed suit, and the war expanded to the
Pacific.
Though the war’s end in 1945 would be celebrated, one fact remained. The bulk of Canada’s fighting was done by English-Canadians. French-Canadians once again largely opposed the war. Canadians of Japanese decent, meanwhile had little choice one way or another for the duration of the war they had been rounded up and placed in internment camps in rural communities far away from big cities, an episode of racism that today remains one of the country’s darkest shames.
There was a conflict with Quebec between 1959 and 1980.
The idea that Quebec was too different from the rest of Canada to exist as a province, and realized that it’s full potential could only be reached as an independent country. This idea received quite some popularity, but was not able to come through because of Quebec’s poor economy. This being the sixties, a certain vein of Quebec separatists turned into communists and took place in terrorism, with the Front de Liberation du Quebec emerging as the movement’s main terror group, setting off hundreds of bombs in government buildings across the province. In 1970, the FLQ terrorists kidnapped and killed the vice premier of Quebec, Pierre LaPorte, prompting Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau to declare martial law in the province, deploying the military to restore order. Hundreds of Quebeckers with suspected separatist were rounded up and thrown in jail. An openly separatist Quebec government, led by Premier Rene Levesque was elected in 1976, and a referendum on separation from Canada was held in 1980. It failed, but the dynamic of Canadian-Quebec relations had forever been
changed.
Canada has evolved in many ways through the 20th century. Canada has formed a well-known identity for itself as well. They gained a large amount of independence during the time period of 1900-1928, they pushed through The Great Depression, and even changed the laws in Quebec. Canada has changed in many positive ways which has helped a lot in the present.