Turner, John Napier (1929-2020), served as prime minister of Canada for 2 1/2 months in 1984. Turner, a Liberal, succeeded Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, who had resigned. Turner called for a general election soon after he took office. But Brian Mulroney, the leader of the Progressive Conservatives, led his party to a landslide victory and replaced Turner as prime minister.
In 1988, Turner led the Liberal Party in another general election. But the Progressive Conservatives won the election, and Mulroney remained as prime minister.
Turner had been a corporation lawyer before he entered politics. He first held office in 1962, when voters from Montreal, Quebec, elected him to the Canadian House of Commons. Turner later served as registrar general and minister of consumer and corporate affairs in the Cabinet of Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson. Trudeau succeeded Pearson in 1968. Under Trudeau, Turner served as solicitor general and as minister of justice and attorney general before becoming minister of finance.
Turner liked to ski, go canoeing, and play squash and tennis. He also enjoyed music, especially opera, and reading biographies.
Early life
Boyhood.
John Napier Turner was born on June 7, 1929, in Richmond, England, near London. His father, Leonard Turner, was a British gunsmith. His mother, Phyllis Gregory Turner of Rossland, B.C., was an economist and a miner’s daughter. She was studying at the London School of Economics and Political Science when she met her future husband. They were married in England. John had a sister, Brenda, born in 1931.
When John was 2 years old, his father died. The family then moved to Canada, and John’s mother in time got a job as an economist with the federal tariff board in Ottawa, Ontario. Later, during World War II (1939-1945), she became federal administrator of oils and fats. Various ministers in the Cabinet of W. L. Mackenzie King often discussed government activities in the family home. Partly as a result of these meetings, John developed an interest in public service at an early age.
John attended schools in Ottawa. He went to Normal Model Public School, Ashbury College, and St. Patrick’s College. He was a bright, popular student, and he was active in sports. In 1945, John’s mother married Frank Ross, a Vancouver industrialist.
College years.
Turner graduated from St. Patrick’s in 1945 and then entered the University of British Columbia. He was an outstanding student and won honors in political science. Turner also became a star sprinter on the track and field team. An injury ruined his chances to qualify for Canada’s 1948 Olympic team. Turner received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1949. He was named the most popular student in his class.
Turner won a Rhodes Scholarship to study at Oxford University in England. He studied law there and earned a bachelor’s degree in jurisprudence in 1951 and a bachelor’s degree in civil law in 1952. In 1952 and 1953, he took graduate courses in French civil law at the Sorbonne in Paris. He also became fluent in French. In 1954, he joined the Stikeman, Elliott law firm in Montreal.
Early political career
Entry into politics.
Turner’s government career began in June 1962, when he was elected to the Canadian House of Commons. Turner had run for office as a Liberal from the Montreal riding (district) of St. Lawrence-St. George. Turner represented Montreal in Parliament until 1968, when he began representing the Ottawa-Carleton riding in Ontario.
On May 11, 1963, Turner married Geills McCrae Kilgour of Winnipeg, one of his campaign workers. Turner and his wife had four children, Elizabeth, Michael, David, and James.
Early Cabinet posts.
As a member of Parliament, Turner impressed Prime Minister Pearson. Pearson brought Turner into his Cabinet in 1965 as minister without portfolio. In April 1967, Pearson appointed Turner registrar general. In December 1967, Turner became minister of consumer and corporate affairs.
Pearson resigned as party leader and prime minister in April 1968. Turner campaigned hard to succeed him. But the party chose Pierre Trudeau, a Montreal professor. Turner ran third in the balloting.
In Trudeau’s Cabinet.
In April 1968, Trudeau gave Turner the additional office of solicitor general. Later in 1968, Trudeau made Turner minister of justice and attorney general. In this position, Turner introduced changes in criminal law that guaranteed legal services and eased bail requirements for the poor. He also established the Law Reform Commission of Canada. Many reforms proposed by this agency have become part of Canada’s civil and criminal law.
In 1969, Turner helped push the Official Languages Act through the House of Commons. This act required federal facilities to provide service in both French and English if 10 percent of the people in a particular area spoke either language. In 1970, a crisis arose when the Front de Liberation du Quebec (FLQ), a terrorist group, kidnapped two officials. Turner worked to win parliamentary permission to put the War Measures Act into effect. This act allowed the government to suspend civil liberties. Trudeau felt the act was necessary to help police deal with the crisis.
In January 1972, Trudeau appointed Turner minister of finance. In 1974, Turner introduced inflation-indexed personal tax exemptions. This system allowed individuals to make income tax deductions that reflected increases in the rate of inflation.
Return to private life.
In September 1975, Turner surprised the nation by resigning from his powerful position in the Cabinet. In February 1976, he resigned from the House of Commons. Turner’s once promising political career appeared to be finished.
Political comeback
After ending his government service, Turner became a partner in the law firm of McMillan, Binch in Toronto, Ontario. He greatly increased his personal wealth and was chosen to serve as a director by 10 large companies.
Return to politics.
In February 1984, Trudeau announced his desire to resign as party leader and prime minister. Turner declared his candidacy for the leadership in March. During the leadership campaign, he promised programs to strengthen the then stalled Canadian economy. In June, the Liberal Party leadership convention chose Turner on the second ballot. Turner became prime minister on June 30.
The 1984 election.
Early in July, Turner called a general election for Sept. 4, 1984. His rival party leaders were Brian Mulroney of the Progressive Conservative Party and Edward Broadbent of the New Democratic Party. In the campaign, Turner said his first major goal as prime minister would be to lower the unemployment rate, which stood at 11 per cent. Mulroney and Broadbent charged that the Liberals did not know how to strengthen the economy.
In the election, the Liberals won only 40 of the 282 seats in the House of Commons—their worst defeat. Turner won a seat representing the Vancouver Quadra riding in British Columbia. The Conservatives won 211 seats. Mulroney succeeded Turner as prime minister on September 17.
The 1988 election.
In 1988, Turner forced Mulroney to call another general election. He did so by asking Liberal Party members of the Canadian Senate to delay Parliament’s ratification of a major U.S.-Canadian free-trade pact. Mulroney and U.S. President Ronald Reagan had signed the agreement in January 1988. The pact was to go into effect on Jan. 1, 1989, but Turner declared that the Liberal senators would delay ratification until after that date. He promised that the senators would ratify the agreement before January 1 if the Progressive Conservatives won the election.
Mulroney called a general election for Nov. 21, 1988. The Progressive Conservatives won the election, and Mulroney remained as prime minister. Turner retained his seat in the House of Commons. After the election, the Canadian Senate approved the U.S.-Canadian free-trade agreement, and the pact went into effect on schedule.
Resignation as party head.
In 1990, Turner joined the law firm of Miller Thomson in Toronto and resigned as leader of the Liberal Party. He was succeeded as Liberal Party leader by Jean Chrétien. Turner continued serving in the House of Commons until 1993. He died on Sept. 19, 2020, and was honored with a state funeral.
