Our democracy owes much to soldiers’ sacrifices

By JOHN BOILEAU Guest Columnist

Sarah Cooke, eight, stands next to veteran John Bannan, 85, who salutes during the playing of the Last Post during a Remembrance service in Bridgenorth, Ont. on Nov. 5. (CLIFFORD SKARSTEDT JR / Peterborough Examiner)

ALTHOUGH the adage that "democracies don’t attack democracies" doesn’t hold true in all cases (for example, the War of 1812), it does have some basis in fact. Far more often than not, totalitarian states are the aggressors in war. And in the few examples of democracies starting war, it has usually been against dictatorial countries.

This year we honour two key anniversaries, one pertaining to democracy and the other relating to war. Canadian parliamentary democracy began in Nova Scotia 250 years ago, while the First World War — the so-called "war to end all wars"— ended 90 years ago. But apart from the accidental coincidence of these two anniversaries, are democracy and war connected?

I believe they are. Although there is no such thing as a good war, there can be a just war. And while there is no glory in war, there can certainly be pride — pride in the achievements of human beings tested to their limits under the most deplorable conditions imaginable while fighting for a higher cause.

Canada’s wars were fought not only to defend democracy; they actually advanced democracy on several occasions. One of the broadest advancements in our democratic system was essentially a side-effect of the First World War.

The question of female suffrage became an issue in the late 19th century, advocated in many countries by the Women’s Christian Temperance Union. In Nova Scotia, the process began in the 1880s, spurred on by the union. Although unmarried women who owned property gained the municipal franchise in 1887, subsequent bills in 1893 and 1897 to allow women to vote provincially were blocked by Attorney General James Longley.

In Canada, women received the franchise during the First World War. Prime Minister Sir Robert Borden’s 1917 Wartime Elections Act — enacted to gain support for his controversial conscription policy — extended the vote to women in the Armed Forces and to female relatives of military men. Then, on May 24, 1918, before the war ended, all female citizens aged 21 and over became eligible to vote in federal elections.

Surprisingly, throughout the debates that immediately preceded the granting of female suffrage, the key argument and the one that won the day was women’s service, sacrifice and competence during the war. Women’s service, both overseas and on the home front, even trumped any arguments based on the belief that half of the population was entitled to vote.

Female property owners attained the provincial franchise on April 26, 1918, while the war was still being fought. Two years later the property restriction was removed and universal suffrage finally arrived for everyone over 21. Women first voted provincially in July 1920.

No one could ever suggest that the horrendous death and destruction caused by the war was justified by the development of female suffrage, but it was a fortuitous side-effect, just as the Second World War led to the widespread use of penicillin.

When female suffrage would eventually have occurred if the war hadn’t happened is pure speculation. Even with the extension of the franchise in 1918, it took until 1949 before women ran as MLAs, 1960 until one was elected and 1985 until one became a cabinet minister.

Although voting for others to represent Nova Scotians has taken place in the province for 250 years, the freedom to do so has not gone unchallenged. In the 20th century, besides the First World War, Nova Scotian men and women — overwhelmingly young people — crossed the Atlantic and Pacific oceans to fight in the Second World War, the Korean War and the Cold War.

These wars were started by others, all of them totalitarian states. No matter why they started, in the final analysis they were fought to ensure our continuing freedoms. The contribution of our military personnel to democracy is recognized in the recent addition to the road signs for the province’s Veterans’ Memorial Highway: "They stood firm for democracy."

Sadly, the teachings of Canada’s proud war history and its links to democracy have too frequently been hijacked by the naïve and muddled thinking of the politically correct. Not only do these people dishonour the men and women who served and died, they deny or reinterpret the past simply to serve their own preconceived ideas and self-absorbed ends, in the process creating a myth of Canadian military history as one solely of peacekeeping. Nothing could be further from the truth.

No one could ever suggest that the deaths of 66,655 Canadian and nine million other military personnel, as well as countless civilians, during the First World War, were something good. But conceivably they were unavoidable in view of Germany’s militaristic aggression.

On this Nov. 11, 90 years after the war that established Remembrance Day to honour those who made the supreme sacrifice, we should all reflect more deeply on what their deeds mean to us and our democracy today.

Retired Canadian Army colonel John Boileau is author of The Peaceful Revolution: 250 Years of Democracy in Nova Scotia.