John Turner was born in England, but arrived in Canada in 1932 with his sister and widowed Canadian mother. In Ottawa, his mother found a job in the civil service and supported her children by herself until she remarried when John was 16. The family then moved to British Columbia where Turner's stepfather would become Lieutenant Governor.
Turner returned to Ottawa as a Liberal Member of Parliament for the riding of St.Laurent-St.Georges, Quebec. He had been a Rhodes scholar, was fluently bilingual, and was a successful lawyer in Montreal when Lester Pearson asked him to run in the 1962 election. Turner held cabinet positions in Pearson's Government, and ran for the Party leadership in 1968 when Pierre Trudeau became Leader.
In Trudeau's first ministry, John Turner held several cabinet positions. He was appointed Solicitor General(1968), and as Minister of Justice (1968-72), Turner enacted Criminal Code reforms. He held the Justice position during the October Crisis (1970), during which he invoked the War Measures Act (1914). As Minister of Justice, he also introduced the Official Languages Act (1969) and came close to repatriating the Constitution at Victoria in 1971.
After the Liberal win in 1972, Turner was moved to Finance (1972-75), a post he held until 1975 when he resigned from cabinet. Although the economy was strong, Turner's policies as Finance Minister were blamed for the high rate of inflation which plagued the Canadian economy through the early 1970's. He left politics in 1975 and went to work for a Toronto law firm.
Turner returned again to Ottawa upon Pierre Trudeau's resignation as Liberal Party Leader in 1984. Sixteen years after he first ran for the leadership in 1968, Turner won the position that Pearson and others thought he was destined to have. He assumed his duties as Leader on June 30, 1984, and dissolved Parliament on July 9, calling an election for September.
Turner may have been the Liberal Leader, but he inherited Trudeau's Party, which was unpopular after having been in power for over 16 years excepting the brief interlude of the Clark Government. The election campaign did not go well for Turner, and the weight of Trudeau's legacy became obvious when Turner found himself defending political appointments which Trudeau had left for him. The Liberals lost by one of the greatest margins in Canadian politics. Of 282 seats in the House of Commons, the Conservatives took 211 and the Liberals won 40. Turner was Prime Minister for 80 days, the shortest Canadian federal administration thus far in the 20th century.
Turner won his seat in Vancouver Quadra, and remained in the House of Commons until 1993. He resigned as Party Leader in 1990, and returned to his law practice.
Reading: J.Cahill (1984) John Turner : The Long Run.
