Tommy Douglas

Who was Tommy Douglas?

Thomas Clement "Tommy" Douglas, PC CC SOM was a Scottish-born Canadian social-democratic politician and Baptist minister. He was elected to the Canadian House of Commons in 1935 as a member of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation. He left federal politics to become the Saskatchewan CCF's leader and then the seventh Premier of Saskatchewan from 1944 to 1961. His government was the first democratic socialist government in North America, and it introduced the continent's first single-payer, universal health care program.

After setting up Saskatchewan's medicare program, Douglas stepped down as premier and ran to lead the newly formed federal New Democratic Party, the successor party of the National CCF. Douglas was elected as its first federal leader in 1961.

Although Douglas never led the party to government, through much of his tenure, the party held the balance of power in the House of Commons. He was noted as being the main opposition to the imposition of the War Measures Act during the 1970 October Crisis. He resigned as leader the next year, but remained as a Member of Parliament until 1979.