The great Paul Martin Sr. is celebrating his birthday in the House of Commons in the sky. He has long been a hero of mine – particularly for his role in bringing the Salk vaccine to Canada – and it was my high honour, as a young man, to correspond with him. On more than one occasion he helped me with political science essays when I was a youthful undergraduate in the 1980s.
A lawyer who was first elected as a Liberal MP in the 1935 election, Mr. Martin went on to serve with distinction – helping craft many of the social policies that Canadians still rely upon – in the cabinets of Prime Ministers Mackenzie King, Louis St. Laurent, Lester Pearson and Pierre Trudeau. He served as Minister of National Health and Welfare for an astounding 11 years, and during the Pearson Government was Secretary of State for External Affairs.
Mr. Martin sought his party’s leadership three times. While not successful, his leadership campaigns served to inspire generations of young Canadians. Though he passed away in 1992, he lived long enough to watch proudly as his son, Paul Martin Jr., entered politics in 1988.
Happy birthday Mr. Martin Sr.!
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.