With UK PM Liz Truss (who?) out after 44 days people are asking; "So who was the shortest serving PM in history under the British Parliamentary System anyway"? And by “people” I of course mean “Nerds”. And who likes pointless historical trivia and has two thumbs to type with? This guy! So lets do this. Note by British Parliamentary System I am including those countries that inherited the same basic system (albeit with some changes over the years) which would include Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Israel, Malta, the Anglo Caribbean countries (Jamaica, Trinidad, Guyana etc), some former African colonies like South Africa and Zimbabwe as well as Newfoundland when it was briefly independent. So with that in mind I give you George Brown; Prime Minister of Pre-Confederation Canada for 4 days in 1858. Here's the story; Brown was the leader of the Liberal Party in the 1850's and 60's and his rival and leader of the Tory Party was John A MacDonald. Brown and MacDonald, in spite of both being Scottish immigrants (like many of Canada's early leaders) loathed each other, with Brown resembling his contemporary British Liberal leader William Gladstone (and most Victorian Liberals); a dour, grimly honest, puritanical, utterly humourless, hot tempered, teetotaler. Meanwhile MacDonald resembled his British counterpart Tory leader Benjamin Disraeli; a charming, clever, flashy, witty, charismatic, hard drinking rogue who took great delight in constantly out maneuvering the Liberals. Besides politics Brown was also the owner of the largest newspaper in the country, the Globe and one of the richest men in the country while MacDonald was a lawyer of modest means.
GEORGE BROWN
The burning issue in 1850's Pre-Confederation Canada (then consisting mostly of southern Ontario and Quebec) was where the capital would be. Toronto? Montreal? Kingston? Quebec City? Nobody would compromise. So the capital would rotate and every few years go from city to city. Eventually the Governor General tired of this colonial silliness and stepped in and suggested Ottawa, then a muddy logging town and trading post in the middle of nowhere (but notably the farthest from the US border and it had an army base) and MacDonald, then Prime Minister, agreed even though he was the MP from Kingston. But nobody else did so he resigned & instead of calling an election (there had just been one) the Governor General asked Brown to form a government which was sworn in on Aug 2 1858. Then the wily MacDonald staged a quick non-confidence vote that brought Brown down on Aug 6 and the Governor General invited MacDonald back in after 4 days in office. There's a record that will never be broken. Brown was predictably furious about being outfoxed by the dastardly MacDonald yet again and during the debate yelled out the MacDonald was playing tricks to “Avoid talking about his duplicity”. To which MacDonald blithely stated “Well we can hardly discuss yours, you weren’t in power long enough to do any”. The capital ended up moving to Ottawa permanently and Brown lost the next election and stepped down as Liberal leader. Then Brown came back and he and MacDonald put aside their rivalry long enough to oversee the Confederation of the four original provinces into a united Canada in 1867. In the subsequent general election Brown, in a shocking turn of events, quickly lost again to MacDonald and resigned once more. He would never get to be Prime Minister again and never forgave MacDonald saying that obviously to be Prime Minster one must have spent time as a “horse thief or similar profession”. To which MacDonald would shrug "Obviously the country prefers John A drunk to George Brown sober".
While extremely wealthy Brown was a staunch Presbyterian Scot and abolitionist who disdained the idle nobility and turned down a knighthood and returned to running his newspaper until he was assassinated by a laid-off Globe employee in 1880. The "Globe" still exists today albeit now as the "Globe & Mail". MacDonald put aside his own distaste for the snooty English to accept his knighthood and died, still in office in 1891.
OTTAWA IN 1858
