Trudeau’s War Measures Act: A Reminiscence On Friday, Oct. 16,
1970, I woke up at about 7:00 a.m. and turned on the radio. At
the time, I was living in Winnipeg, Manitoba. The news I heard
shocked me. In the middle of the night, Canada’s Prime Minister
Pierre Trudeau had invoked the War Measures Act. What was that?
I had never heard of it. The radio announcer explained that by
invoking this law, Trudeau had given himself the power to arrest
anyone he wished and to hold any people he wished in jail
indefinitely without charging them with a crime. My thoughts on
Trudeau’s invocation of the War Measures Act are relevant today
because of what I learned from this: that my instinctive
distrust of government officials who claim vast discretionary
powers over their citizens is likely to be justified. I learned
in the newspaper the next day that the law also gave Trudeau the
powers of: (a) censorship, and the control and suppression of
publications, writings, maps, plans, photographs,
communications, and means of comm