Pierre Elliott Trudeau (20 page)

BOOK: Pierre Elliott Trudeau
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CHRONOLOGY

1919
Joseph Philippe Pierre Yves Elliott Trudeau is born on October 18 in Montreal.
1921
Pierre’s father, Charles, gives up his law practice to found a string of service stations he will sell to Imperial Oil in 1932 for $1.2 million.
1932
Trudeau enrols in the new Collège Jean-de-Brébeuf in Montreal.
1935
Charles Trudeau suffers a fatal heart attack while vacationing in Florida.
1940
Trudeau completes his studies at Brébeuf at the top of his class. After failing to win a Rhodes Scholarship, he enters law school at the Université de Montréal.
1942–43
Trudeau takes part in an underground revolutionary sect known as
les X
.
1943
He graduates from law school and completes a year of articling at Hyde & Ahern in Montreal.
1944
Trudeau enrols in a master’s program in political studies at Harvard.
1946
After graduating from Harvard, Trudeau works at a gold mine in Abitibi, then begins a year of study at the Sorbonne.
1947
He begins a year of study under Harold Laski at the London School of Economics.
1948
Trudeau embarks on travels that take him through Europe, the Middle East, and the Far East.
1949
After his involvement in the Asbestos Strike, Trudeau is turned down for a teaching job at the Université de Montréal and becomes a junior clerk at the Privy Council Office in Ottawa.
1951
Trudeau quits the civil service and devotes himself to the journal
Cité libre
, founded by him and his friend Gérard Pelletier in 1950.
1956
Cité libre
publishes
The Asbestos Strike
, a collection of essays edited and introduced by Trudeau.
1960
The June election victory of Jean Lesage’s Liberals over the Union Nationale marks the beginning of Quebec’s Quiet Revolution.
1962
Trudeau publishes “The New Treason of the Intellectuals,” attacking the new Quebec nationalists and their growing separatism.
1965
Trudeau is elected to the federal Liberals, along with friends Gérard Pelletier and Jean Marchand.
1966
He takes a position as Lester Pearson’s parliamentary secretary.
1967
Trudeau is appointed justice minister and introduces controversial revisions to the Criminal Code that bring him national prominence.
1968
Trudeaumania carries Trudeau to the Liberal leadership in April. In a June election, Trudeau’s Liberals take 154 of 264 seats.
1969
Parliament passes the Official Languages Act, establishing English and French as Canada’s official languages.
1970
The FLQ kidnap British trade commissioner James Cross and Quebec labour minister Pierre Laporte from their Montreal homes. Laporte is killed after the Trudeau government invokes the War Measures Act.
1971
Trudeau, aged fifty-one, marries twenty-two-year-old Margaret Sinclair after a secret courtship. On Christmas Day, Margaret gives birth to son Justin. Two more sons will follow, Alexandre (“Sacha”), born
Christmas Day 1973, and Michel (“Micha”), born October 1975.
1972
After a lacklustre campaign, Trudeau’s Liberals are reelected with a slim minority.
1974
The Liberals regain their majority in a July election with the help of “the Margaret factor,” taking 141 seats to the Conservatives’ 95.
1975
Trudeau introduces wage and price controls to fight inflation after having ridiculed a similar Conservative proposal.
1976
The election of René Lévesque’s Parti Québécois raises the spectre of Quebec independence.
1977
Margaret Trudeau’s night with the Rolling Stones in Toronto makes international headlines.
1979
Trudeau announces his retirement after Joe Clark’s Progressive Conservatives form a minority government, then agrees to return as Liberal leader when the Conservatives bungle a confidence vote.
1980
Trudeau wins another majority, though with no seats west of Manitoba. In May, his promise to Quebecers to renew federalism helps defeat a referendum on sovereignty.
1981
The federal government signs the “Kitchen Accord” with all the provinces except Quebec.
1982
Canada patriates its constitution under the Constitution Act, entrenching within it the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
1984
Trudeau resigns for the second time. In a September election, the Liberals, under John Turner, suffer the worst defeat in their history, capturing only 40 seats to the 211 of Brian Mulroney’s Progressive Conservatives.
1985
Parti Québécois leader René Lévesque resigns. Lévesque will die of a heart attack in 1987.
1987
Brian Mulroney and the ten provincial premiers negotiate the Meech Lake Accord. Trudeau publicly denounces the accord.
1990
The Meech Lake Accord dies after Premier Clyde Wells refuses to put it to a vote in the Newfoundland legislature.
1991
Canadian constitutional lawyer Deborah Coyne gives birth to a daughter by Trudeau, Sarah Elisabeth.
1992
Trudeau speaks out against the Charlottetown Accord, which is subsequently defeated in a national referendum.
1998
Margaret and Pierre’s twenty-three-year-old son Michel dies while skiing in the B.C. Rockies.
2000
Trudeau dies on September 28, after battling Parkinson’s disease and prostate cancer.

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