Michigan’s Gerald Ford, the 38th President of the United States, stood up for Canada on this date in 1976. As chair of the second-ever meeting of what would become known as the G7, President Ford made it clear that he supported Canada’s membership in this powerful body. This pitted against France and other European members of the group.
On this date in 1975 Ford wrote the letter below to France’s Valery d'Estaing.
“Dear Mr. President: I have reflected further on our recent exchange of messages concerning the economic summit and, particularly, the question of Canadian participation,” he wrote. “From the contacts that I or my associates have had with the other participants it appears that there is considerable sentiment among them favoring Canadian participation in the kind of summit that has now emerged from the preparatory work and the decisions of the original group. I continue to feel strongly that Canadian participation is justified given Canada’s role in the world. As I have already pointed out to you, Canada is our largest trading partner; our economies are intimately connected. Its absence from our deliberations would not be understood in this country. The Canadians, to their credit, have not so far made a public issue of this problem; it is clear from our contacts with them that they would wish the summit to be productive, in precisely the spirit you and I have agreed in the past... I am convinced that the purposes you and I would like to see served by the summit would be advanced if the Canadian issue were solved in a positive sense so that it will not become a matter of public debate and cloud the very promising prospects of the summit enterprise.”
And sure enough when President Ford hosted the 1976 summit, Canada’s Pierre Trudeau was at that all-important table. We have remained there ever since. Thank-you Gerald Ford!
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.