CANADIAN POLITICS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXI, Issue 14, 1 September 1911, Page 7

CANADIAN POLITICS.

Mr Joseph Martin, Liberal member of the British House of Commons for East St. Pancras, who is engaged in levelling serious charges of corruption against the Lanrier Government, is a native of Ontario, where he was born in 1852. He was educated at the Milton Public School and at the Toronto Normal School. He commenced work as a, telegraph operator, but, later, obtaining a first-class certificate as a teacher, was appointed principal of the public school at Edinburgh, Ottawa. Afterwards he entered upon the study of law at Ottawa. He removed to Portage la Prairie, Manitoba, early in 1882, ami in August of the same year was called to the bar. In January, 1883, he was elected a member of the Manitoba Legislature, and sat continuously till 1892, when he retired. From January, 1888, until May, 1891, ho was Attorney-General and Railway Commissioner of the Province. As Attorney-General he introduced and carried through the House the School Act of 1890, abolishing separate schools in the province of Manitoba. He was also responsible for the Act doing away with the official use of the French language in the province. He argued the question of the constitutionality of the School Act of 1890 before Judge Killarn in the first place, before the Full Court of the Queen’s Bench in Manitoba, and before the Supreme Court of Canada, and als.o appeared with Sir Horace i JDavey and Mr D’Alton McCarthy be-1 fore the Judicial Committee of the ! Privy Council in the same case. For a time he had charge of the Provincial Department of Education under the now arrangements. In February, 1891, ho temporarily retired from the Manitoba Cabinet to contest the SelKirk seat in the Dominion House of Commons, but was defeated, and was shortly afterwards re-elected to the local Legislature. In November, 1893,' he contested ."Winnipeg : for the. Dominion House and was elected. At the general election in 189 G he was defeated by the Hon. Hugh John Macdonald. He went to British Columbia in 1897, and was shortly afterwards elected as one of the representatives in the local Legislature for the city of Vancouver. He shortly afterwards became Attorney-General, and afterwards Premier of the province. In 1909 he gave up his practice iffi Vancouver and went to live in London. He contested a by-elec-tion for Stratford-on-Avon in the same year, but was unsuccessful. At the general election in January, 1910, he was returned for East St. Pancras, and was re-elected last December.