Canada’s third Prime Minister, Sir John Abbott, led the nation from the Senate. A former Mayor of Montreal, he had been first elected to the House as a Tory in 1880. Abbott served in the Commons until 1887 when on the advice of Sir John A. Macdonald, he was sent to the Red Chamber. Upon Macdonald’s death in 1891, he was a compromise choice in becoming PM. He did not even want the job but, accepted only out of sense of duty.
Abbott spent 18 unhappy months in Canada’s top political job before resigning due to ill-health to make way for Sir John Thompson in December 1892. On this date in 1892, Abbott, as it turned out, delivered his last remarks in the Senate. A few months later, exhausted and ill, he made way for Sir John Thompson.
You will find the 3rd PM’s final words in the Senate below.
“I congratulate the House on the work we have succeeded in getting through this session,” he said as Parliament was about to adjourn. “Although our labours have not been so severe as might have been expected, excepting during the last week or ten days, I hope every hon. gentleman agrees with me that we did right in applying ourselves to the important work before us, and that we did fairly good work in amending it. I must express my indebtedness to members on both sides of the House for their fairness and moderation in all the debates which have taken place, and for the constant and absolute attention which they have given to every measure brought before us, as, I think, entirely without regard to party feeling, and it is very much to the credit of the House that I am able to say so. I move that the House do now adjourn.”
He would pass into history in October 1893 at age 72.
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.
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.