Penguin Canada, Toronto, 2011 235 pp., $26 hardcover A double
review with Canada 1911: The Decisive Election that Shaped the
Country by Patrice Dutil and David MacKenzie Dundurn Press,
Toronto, 2011 378 pp., illus., $29.99 paperback Amid all the
talk in recent months about the bicentennial of the War of 1812,
the anniversary of an equally significant moment in our history
has passed almost unnoticed: that of the “reciprocity election”
of 1911. Fortunately, Patrice Dutil and David MacKenzie have
marked the occasion by publishing Canada 1911, a study of the
pivotal campaign in which one of our iconic prime ministers,
Wilfrid Laurier, ran out of luck. Laurier had won four
consecutive majority governments, but by 1911 he was no longer
able to reconcile the tensions pulling at the young nation. His
Naval Services Bill would create a Canadian navy but put it at
the service of Britain in time of war. For English Canadians,
this was insufficiently loyal to Britain; for Quebeckers, it was
too much so. At the same time