It is definitely a big day on the political history calendar as we pause to mark the birthdays of Sir Wilfrid Laurier – today is officially known as Sir Wilfrid Laurier Day by an Act of Parliament – President Joe Biden and Ontario Premier Doug Ford. Laurier, of course, will be celebrating his special day from his perch at the great House of Commons in the sky. To mark Laurier Day, you will find below the Hansard report from this date in 1911 when a rookie MP from Calgary, R.B. Bennett, was brave and confident enough to take on Laurier in his maiden address. But, of course, Sir Wilfrid, who had been sitting in Parliament for almost 40 years at that point, had the last laugh. At the same time one has to admire the courage displayed by Bennett, himself a future Prime Minister.   Bennett making his maiden address to the House: While I men­tion the name of the Right Honourable Gentleman, may I be per­mitted to tender to him my sincere congratulations upon his having attained another anniversary of his natal day Laurier turned sev­enty on this day, with the expression of the hope that he may be long spared faithfully and illustriously to serve the state in the posi­tion which he at present occupies as Leader of the Opposition. Laurier later in the day: Mr. Speaker, the House has listened with more than ordinary interest to the two addresses in support of the motion now in your hands. We can congratulate ourselves upon the fact that we welcome to our ranks two members, young in years and of eminent ability, ability which might accomplish a great deal for this country if the hope could be entertained that these young men would direct their ability in the proper direction – a hope, however, which judging not from the manner but from the matter of their speeches, I fear I must not be too sanguine of. The Honourable Member for Calgary (Mr. Bennett) was pre­ceded to this House by a high reputation for fluent oratory, and the speech with which he has favoured us has not only sustained but enhanced that reputation. I think I can with perfect appositeness compare his speech on the present occasion – judging from its easy and copious flow of sentences – with the crystal waters of the Bow River rushing down from the summit of the Rocky Mountains towards that young and enterprising city which he has the honour to represent in this House. Nor is my Honourable Friend the member for Dorchester (Mr. Sévigny) new to political life. I am unaware that he has ever served in any legislative body as has the member for Calgary, but my Honourable Friend (Mr. Sévigny) is well known to us in the Province of Quebec as amongst the most brilliant and ardent ora­tors of the Nationalist party. . . . My Honourable Friend, as did the member for Calgary, was kind enough to offer me his congratulations upon the fact that this is my seventieth birthday. I tender to both gentlemen my sincere thanks, and I thank Honourable Members on both sides, and espe­cially Honourable Gentlemen on the opposite side of the House, for the kind manner in which they received these compliments. The Honourable Member for Calgary was profuse in his good wishes towards me, and he concluded by hoping that for a long time I shall occupy the position which I now do, meaning of course that for a long time to come I should remain Leader of the Opposition discharging the difficult task of watching and criticizing the acts of the Government. I must say in all candour to my Honourable Friends, that judging from the manner in which the present Government has commenced its career I feel that task will be too great for my advancing years. caption id="attachment_1361" align="alignleft" width="583" Sir Wilfrid Laurier, circa 1906./caption Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist.  He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy.  A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.