He divides us still. John English's well-publicized new volume on Pierre Trudeau's years as Prime Minister reminds us that he was among the most fascinating and difficult public figures in Canadian history.
I've long believed that Trudeau committed two unpardonable acts during those years: his introduction of the War Measures Act during the FLQ crisis and his marriage to Margaret Sinclair. Both were reprehensible, and by themselves should have put a stop to the endlessly repeated, adulatory myth about his exquisite rationalism. Since the War Measures Act has attracted so much attention, let me deal here only with his relationship with his wife.
Even at the time, anyone with his or her head on straight knew that while the romance between Pierre and Margaret was charming and, yes, enviable, any long-term relation was utterly doomed to failure from the get-go. But the man of infinite reason could not see it at all. Don't tell me he was blinded by love, or even passion. He was blinded by the egotistic thrill, the macho satisfaction, of having successfully wooed such a desirable young beauty, his very own trophy bride.
Prof. English reminds us what we've long known from the Stephen Clarkson-Christina McCall study of Trudeau: that his personal and public lives were inseparable. First, his personal activities go to character, revealing a great deal about Trudeau the man. As well, the disintegration of the marriage, much of it carried out in the most public of ways, deeply unbalanced Trudeau for several years and badly hurt his capacity to govern. It's not an exaggeration to say his loss to Joe Clark in 1979 was a result of his personal agonies.
While many were sympathetic to Trudeau for the way Margaret comported herself in the public's eye, in truth he had no one to blame but himself. Not only should they never have married, all attempts at reconciliation were undermined by his intransigent insistence at every stage that in order to stay together, she must change to adapt to him. His needs would never change, nor would he ever try to change to accommodate her needs. Everything was her fault. No marriage could have been more unequal, no spouse more blind and unreasonable, than Pierre Trudeau was with Margaret.
When they married in 1971, he was already prime minister, a 52-year old icon, and she a 22-year old flower child of the hippie era, both, in the words of Clarkson and McCall, “emotionally arrested in adolescence.” If that was not obvious about him, it was only too apparent about her. Even she knew it, describing herself as a “dizzy, distracted girl.” What was most notable about their interests was how wholly incompatible they were.
He didn't seem to think it mattered. She spoke no French, he often lived in it. At one dinner party early on he announced to the group, in French: “Don't worry. She wouldn't know what we were saying even if we were speaking English.” A fine basis for happily ever after. Once the thrill of the courtship and the fantasy of the marriage had passed, he disappeared into his official duties and totally ignored her unfulfilled needs. Lashing out, she made a world-class public spectacle of herself. In 1977, they announced their trial separation.
He was deeply hurt and performed erratically. He could have called an early election and won easily but he couldn't cope. By the time it was forced on him in 1979, Joe Who? was able to defeat him and he briefly stepped down as Liberal leader.
After the defeat a few friends gathered up the courage to tell him he had treated Margaret too harshly and censoriously. He didn't understand. He couldn't forgive her for being her. Clarkson and McCall: “He did not appear to have come to grips with his own role in his marriage breakdown. Margaret was mentally disturbed, he kept saying, she needed treatment for her disorders.”
But if she had “disorders,” he exacerbated them. When she asked for an allowance for her and the three boys while he was campaigning, he said “I don't think I've much on me, Margaret. Will $50 dollars do?” She was humiliated and went at him. He ended up pinning her down forcefully but her screams brought the kids in as witnesses. “Daddy, don't hurt Mommy,” Sacha kept pleading.
Not only was the marriage kaput, so were what remained of his political principles. In the 1980 election, so determined was he to wipe out the sting of a beating by Joe Clark that he accepted his handlers' strategy for a completely substance-less campaign. He would spend the campaign mocking the hapless Clark — hardly an arduous or elevated task — and avoiding all issues. Even the constitutional matters that still obsessed him got the silent treatment. Image over reason. He easily won the campaign with no mandate of any kind and immediately roiled the country with years of constitutional turmoil.
When he stepped down in 1984, Canada breathed a huge sigh of relief.
Gerald Caplan is a former national campaign director for the New Democratic Party and author of The Betrayal of Africa
