Humphrey Mitchell, (September 9, 1894 – August 1, 1950) was a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

politician and

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ist.

Life and career

A land surveyor employed with

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Hydro, Mitchell was active with the union movement in the city. Upon the death of Hamilton East's Conservative

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

(MP), George Septimus Rennie in 1931, Mitchell was approached to run in the

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to fill the seat as a Labour candidate. Hamilton East was a strong

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riding that had elected Labour candidates to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario and to city council. The Liberals, in

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having lost the previous year's general election did not run a candidate against Mitchell in order to avoid dividing the anti-Conservative vote. Given future events, it is also possible the Liberals believed that Mitchell would support the Liberal Party unofficially if elected. Mitchell won the by-election, and entered the

House of Commons of Canada The House of Commons of Canada (french: Chambre des communes du Canada) is the lower house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Crown and the Senate of Canada, they comprise the bicameral legislature of Canada. The House of Commo ...

. He did not get along well with the rump of Independent Labour MPs led informally by

J.S. Woodsworth James Shaver Woodsworth (July 29, 1874 – March 21, 1942) was a pre– First World War pioneer of the Canadian Social Gospel, a Christian religious movement with social democratic values and links to organized labour. He was a long-time leader ...

and referred to as the " Ginger Group". While Mitchell attended the "founding meeting" of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation in William Irvine's office, he refused to join the new party when Labour MPs joined with farmers groups,

socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...

groups and others to officially launch the CCF in 1932 and refused to work with its supporters in Parliament. In the 1935 general election, the CCF ran a candidate against Mitchell in Hamilton East (while the Liberals, again, ran no candidate). The split in the labour and anti-Tory vote resulted in the Conservative candidate defeating Mitchell despite the nationwide trend against the Conservatives. Mitchell did not run in the 1940 election, however, following the death of Welland's Liberal MP in late 1941, Mitchell was appointed to the

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of William Lyon Mackenzie King as Minister of Labour, and was elected shortly thereafter as the new Liberal MP for Welland. He served as Welland's MP and as Labour minister in the governments of King and Louis St. Laurent until his death in 1950. Mitchell became Labour minister just over a year after the introduction of unemployment insurance in Canada, and oversaw the early implementation and expansion of the program. He also oversaw the mobilization of the labour force during

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, and the widespread introduction of women into war production. With the responsibilities his department had for immigration, he also had a controversial role in advocating and implementing the deportation or detention of tens of thousands of Japanese Canadians during the war.

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Mitchell, Humphrey 1894 births 1950 deaths Labour MPs in Canada Liberal Party of Canada MPs Members of the House of Commons of Canada from Ontario Members of the King's Privy Council for Canada