M997.63.65 | Il serait temps qu'il repose en paix
Il serait temps qu'il repose en paix
Normand Hudon
1949, 20th century
30.2 x 19.3 cm
Gift of Mme Arlette Hudon
M997.63.65
© McCord Museum
Description
Keywords: Cartoon (19139) , Drawing (18637) , drawing (18379) , politics (10928)
Keys to History
Journalist, propagandist, political organizer and bigot, Adrien Arcand (1899-1967) led the largest of several small fascist parties in Canada. Arcand's fascism originated in his virulent anti-Semitism. In publications like Le Goglu, Le Miroir and Le Chameau, he claimed that Jews were economic parasites who were largely responsible for the Depression.
Originally a Conservative, Arcand approved of Italian Fascism. His greatest admiration was for Adolf Hitler (1889-1945), leader of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (better known as the Nazis). Hitler took office in January 1933. A year later Arcand founded the Parti national social Chrétien (PNSC), which identified its enemies as communists, socialists, liberals, Jews and Freemasons (members of a worldwide fraternity dedicated to mutual help and fellowship and having an elaborate set of secret rituals).
In July 1938, he allied the PNSC with the Nationalist Party of Canada to form the National Unity Party, of which he became the leader. Its program was anti-Communist, anti-Semitic and authoritarian. The party had no perceptible electoral success.
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What
Anti-Semitism was regrettably common in 1930s Canada, affecting both English- and French-speaking Canadians.
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Where
The Nationalist Party of Canada, led by William Whittaker (1875-1939), was active in Winnipeg in the 1930s. Its logo, like the PNSC's, was a swastika surmounted by a beaver.
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When
From May 1940 to the end of the Second World War, Arcand was interned for security reasons.
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Who
The cartoon is by the Quebec painter and caricaturist Normand Hudon (1929-1997), who drew it some time after the Second World War.
Exhibition Label
References
- Martin Robin, Shades of Right: Nativist and Fascist Politics in Canada 1920-1940 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1992), pp. 145-8.
- Frederick Edwards, "Fascism in Canada," Maclean's Magazine, April 15 and May 1, 1938, reproduced in part in: Michiel Horn, The Dirty Thirties: Canadians in the Great Depression (Toronto: Copp Clark, 1972), pp 525-33.
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