I teach at Queen’s University’s law school, housed in Sir John A. Macdonald Hall, named after Canada’s first prime minister. On Sept. 18, our faculty board, consisting of professors, students, administrators and staff, voted 29 to three to remove Macdonald’s name from the building. Macdonald is likely to become another casualty of the cultural revolution currently underway in Canada.
Facts will not matter. Macdonald is accused, among other things, of forcing Indigenous children to go to residential schools and letting Aboriginal people on the Prairies starve when the buffalo disappeared. The historical record says otherwise. Residential schools already existed before Macdonald came to power, and they did not become compulsory until the 1920s, 30 years after his death. When the famine struck, Macdonald sent aid to save Indigenous lives and was condemned in the House of Commons for providing too much: looking after people was not something governments commonly did until the welfare state emerged well into the 20th century. In fact, Macdonald was enlightened for his time, but that will make no difference. The test for tearing down statues and cancelling historical figures has become whether their values and behaviour conform to modern progressive sensibilities. Only monuments to the likes of Castro, Lenin and Mao have a shot at satisfying that criterion.
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