Commentary
Review of “Freedom Fighter: John Diefenbaker’s Battle for Canadian Liberties and Independence” by Bob Plamondon, published by the Aristotle Foundation for Public Policy on March 11, 2025. On April 28, after President Donald Trump again remarked that Canada should become the
51st U.S. state, Canadians voted in the federal election with one key concern—the preservation of Canadian sovereignty. Following his election victory, Prime Minister Mark Carney represented this concern with vigour and
clarity. “America wants our land, our resources, our water, our country,” he said. “But these are not idle threats. President Trump is trying to break us so that America can own us. That will never ever happen.” In the same address, Carney also emphasized the duty of all Canadians to “assert ourselves as a free, sovereign, and ambitious nation, to lead the path of democracy and freedom.”
The protection of Canadian nationhood and freedom is a recurring theme in True North history, as Bob Plamondon shows in his new biography of John Diefenbaker, “
Freedom Fighter: John Diefenbaker’s Battle for Canadian Liberties and Independence,” published by the
Aristotle Foundation for Public Policy. Although Carney and Diefenbaker are from different political parties, they share the same concern regarding the defence of Canadian interests and freedoms
Plamondon, author of other books such as
“The Truth about Trudeau” and “
The Shawinigan Fox: How Jean Chrétien Defied the Elites and Reshaped Canada,“ continues his masterful insight into the currents of Canadian history and politics. With ”Freedom Fighter,” he portrays John Diefenbaker as a man of the people who defied the odds to become the first Canadian without an English or French surname to become prime minister. In his highly readable biographical treatment of Diefenbaker, Plamondon demonstrates that populism and federalism need not conflict with individual rights and advocacy for freedom on the global stage.
As Plamondon recounts, when attending the United Nations General Assembly in 1960, Prime Minister Diefenbaker was outraged by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s attacks on the United States and his call for the U.N. to “uphold the sovereign rights of states and to press for the re-establishment of international relations on a sound legal basis.” The man they called “Dief the Chief” was unsparing in his response.
“Mr. Khrushchev, in a gigantic propaganda drama of destructive misrepresentation, launched a major offensive in the Cold War,” he said in his address. “I ask [Khrushchev] this question: how many human beings have been liberated by the U.S.S.R.? Do we forget how one of the postwar colonies of the U.S.S.R. sought to liberate itself four years ago and with what results? How are we to reconcile the tragedy of the Hungarian uprising in 1956 with Chairman Khruschev’s confident assertion of a few days ago in this Assembly?”
According to Plamondon, Diefenbaker “confronted the Russian bear and triumphed on the world stage by standing up for the rights of all people to freedom and democracy.” More importantly, the address was heard in Soviet prison camps, and was particularly inspiring to those in jail for advocating for Ukrainian independence.
With the freedom of Ukraine once again under threat by Russia, Carney should take up Diefenbaker’s example of defending democracy abroad. Additionally, Carney should learn also from Diefenbaker’s unyielding commitment to defending Canadian liberties at home. During the height of World War II, Diefenbaker’s anti-communist views did not prevent him from chastising the government for curtailing the rights of free speech for Canadians sympathetic to communism. As a member of Parliament, he criticized the federal government for its
use of the War Measures Act to detain
14 Canadian citizens on suspicion of espionage without due process or right to legal counsel. This was an opportunity for the future prime minister to remind the government of Canada’s great tradition of ordered liberty.
“Mr. Speaker, ... I do not believe the minds of liberty-loving Canadians, however much they hate communism, have become so apathetic in six years of domination by a state in a period when the political doctrines of regimentation have been in effect,” he said in the House of Commons
in 1946. “I believe the time has come for a declaration of liberties to be made by this Parliament. Magna Carta is part of our birthright. Habeas Corpus, the Bill of Rights, the Petition of Right, are all part of our tradition.
As prime minister, Diefenbaker would translate his lifelong commitment to Canadian liberties to his advocacy for a Canadian Bill of Rights. According to Plamondon, the bill was the signature achievement of Diefenbaker’s prime ministership: “There is little doubt that it would not have been enacted without his vision and leadership.”
The Bill of Rights was the first affirmation of individual rights and freedoms at the federal level in Canadian history; its
preamble stated clearly that Canada is “founded upon principles that acknowledge the supremacy of God, the dignity and worth of the human person and the position of the family in a society of free men and free institutions.” As Plamondon notes, the 1982 Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms would be “difficult to imagine” had it not been for the foundation laid by the 1960 Bill of Rights.
To further assert Canadian nationalism, Diefenbaker stressed the necessity for a unified Canadian identity which transcends race and ethnicity. His opposition to what we call “identity politics” today is demonstrated by his mantra of One Canada, eschewing hyphenated descriptions such as German-Canadian. As the first prime minister of neither British nor French ancestry, Diefenbaker “rejected the view that Canada’s founding was a coming together of two races,” according to Plamondon.
This conviction prompted Diefenbaker to extend voting rights to indigenous Canadians, as well as using the Bill of Rights to further guarantee protection of individual and civil liberties of First Nations and Inuit peoples. “I believe,” he proclaimed, “that today, our Indians should no longer be in the position of second-class citizens in the country in which they indeed were the first citizens.”
Diefenbaker’s respect for indigenous rights played out in the landmark 1970 Supreme Court case of
Joseph Drybones. The defendant was an indigenous man charged with violating Section 94 of the Indian Act—a law criminalizing intoxication off-reserve for an indigenous person. Thanks to the Canadian Bill of Rights, which put a ban on race-based legislation, the court ruled in favour of Drybones, and Section 94 was repealed.
As former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien wrote in the foreword to Freedom Fighter, Diefenbaker “was undeniably a proud and passionate Canadian. He devoted his life to public service and inspired others to do the same.” Although Chrétien and Diefenbaker were from opposing parties, both men understood the value of governing by common sense and trusting the judgment of the people.
In his victory speech, incumbent Prime Minister Mark Carney proclaimed that he would represent Canadian citizens “no matter where you live, no matter what language you speak, no matter how you voted.” This is something Diefenbaker would say—and mean. Dief the Chief is an example to follow, especially his unyielding fight for Canadian liberty and sovereignty.
Chuong Nguyen is the host of the Unlicensed Philosophy podcast. A Canadian expatriate, he is a graduate student in American Studies at the Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) in Budapest, Hungary. Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
