William Lyon Mackenzie King Biography

William Lyon Mackenzie King, or Mackenzie King, was born on December 17, 1874, in Berlin (now known as Kitchener), Ontario, Canada, to lawyer John King and Isabel Grace Mackenzie. His mother was the daughter of William Lyon Mackenzie, a prominent leader of the Rebellion of 1837, geared toward establishing independent self-government in Upper Canada.

King joined the University of Toronto in 1891 and graduated with a BA degree in 1895. During this time, he was a major force behind a students' strike at the university.

He then obtained an LLB degree from the Osgoode Hall Law School in 1896, followed by an MA degree in 1897 from the University of Toronto. He was also part of the Kappa Alpha Society.

During his university years, he wrote for university paper, The Varsity. He later also penned articles for The Mail and Empire, The Globe, and the Toronto News.

King joined the University of Chicago later and worked with settlement activist and reformer Jane Addams at Hull House. He then joined Harvard and obtained an MA in political economy in 1898.

In 1909, he received his PhD from Harvard. He thus later scripted history as the only Canadian prime minister with a PhD.

King remained single till his death but had many close female friends, such as Joan Patteson, a married woman who often hosted his dinner parties. Passages in his diaries hint at King having indulged in physical relationships with many prostitutes.

Others suggest that King was probably in love with Lord Tweedsmuir, whom, in 1935, he chose for appointment as Governor General. He was also known to be markedly eccentric and often tried to connect to his dead mother. His personal diary was later transcribed and published as a series of books.

In 1900, King rejected an academic position at Harvard. Instead, he became the Deputy Minister of Labor under Ottawa’s new government department. He worked as an editor of the Labour Gazette too and tried solving industrial disputes.

He was the prime figure behind the 1907 Industrial Disputes Investigation Act, which brought in legislation to delay strikes or lockouts in mines or public utilities until a settlement was approached or a report was published by a conciliation board.

In 1908, he resigned from his civil service position and contested as the Liberal candidate for the Parliament, for North Waterloo, which was his native county. He was elected and joined Liberal prime minister Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s cabinet as Canada’s first full-time Minister of Labor on June 2, 1909. In 1911, he lost his seat when his government lost the election.

He focused on his party’s publicity for the next 3 years. In 1914, King joined Rockefeller Foundation to study industrial relations in the US. His research resulted in the publication of Industry and Humanity in 1918.

He remained in Canada. In 1917, he ran for the North York constituency as a Liberal but lost.

After Laurier died in 1919, King took over as the leader of the Liberal Party. During World War I, the party had developed cracks over conscription along the English-French lines. Following this, many leading Liberals had joined the Conservatives to form a Union Government.

Additionally, the Liberals were threatened by the rise of the agrarian party, the Progressives. In 1921, the Union Government lost the election.

Following this, King took over as the 10th Prime Minister of Canada on December 29, 1921, although his party lacked a majority in the Parliament. In the 1925 election, King appealed for a majority but ended up with fewer seats than the Conservatives. Despite this, the Conservatives, too, failed to get a majority.

Thus, King, instead of resigning, met with the Parliament and, with the support of the Independent and Progressive members, managed to win a vote of confidence. The government continued.

However, a customs department scandal harmed the image of his party. The support for his party declined, as a result.

King then requested the governor general to dissolve the Parliament, though his advice was not accepted. Following this, King resigned and Conservative leader Arthur Meighen formed a new government. Nevertheless, Meighen’s government was defeated in 2 days after it was formed.

The Parliament was dissolved. In the 1926 election, the country witnessed alliances between the Liberals and the Progressives in many constituencies. King eventually won with a decisive majority in the Parliament.

He started his new term as the prime minister on September 25, 1926. King’s government soon reduced the federal debt but introduced an old-age pension scheme.

King focused on improving Canada’s autonomy in its relations with the UK. At the 1926 Imperial Conference, he had a significant contribution to the definition of the Dominion status, thus resulting in the recognition of British dominions as equal members of the British Commonwealth of Nations.

In 1930, King’s party lost the election. He was the leader of the opposition during the worst period of the Great Depression. In 1935, he won with a huge margin.

King took over as the prime minister for the third time, on October 23, 1935 and continued in the position till his retirement on November 15, 1948. His exemplary leadership during 6 years of war and 3 years of post-war rehabilitation and reconstruction made him an influential figure in Canadian history.

Though Canada was split over external policies, King managed to unite its people and enter World War II in 1939. His government organized strong military, financial, and industrial supplies during the war and focused on economic development and social welfare in the post-war period, too. After King’s, retirement, Louis Saint Laurent succeeded him.

King’s 22-year stint as the prime minister of Canada also made him the nation’s longest-serving prime minister. By the time he resigned, owing to his policies as the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State of External Affairs, Canada was less dependent on Britain and had acquired a prominent place in the international political scene.

Apart from avoiding an economic relapse, King introduced unemployment insurance in 1940. The national debt remained under control, while King launched a national child benefits plan and put in efforts for the rehabilitation of war veterans and their absorption into civilian life.

King died on July 22, 1950, in Chelsea, Quebec, Canada, at age 75. He lies buried at Mount Pleasant Cemetery in Toronto, Ontario.

King appears on the Canadian 50-dollar note. Several fictional works, such as Elizabeth Gourlay's novel Isabel, Allan Stratton's play Rexy, and Donald Jack's novel Me Too, feature King.

The 1988 miniseries The King Chronicle and the 2019 film The Twentieth Century feature him, too. Several places in Canada, such as the Mackenzie King Bridge, have been named after him.