The Montreal Star and the CCF: Another Monopoly at Work

A reprint of a 1944 pamphlet that Frank Scott (1899-1985), Montreal constitutional lawyer, McGill University law professor, and national chairman of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) as well as president of the party's Quebec section, wrote against the policy of the Montreal Star of pretending that the CCF did not exist except when the newspaper wished to attach the social democratic party editorially. The policy was reportedly dictated by the newspaper's owner, J.W. McConnell (1877-1963), a member of the McGill Board of Governors since 1928 and a determined anti-socialist. The book's editor points out that the newspaper's policy struck Scott as annoying at the best of times, but was particularly outrageous when the Montreal Star charged that the CCF refused to answer editorial attacks. Scott undertook to reply on behalf of the political party. In order to secure distribution of the pamphlet, Scott organized a committee to address copies to every professional man in Montreal who was listed in the yellow pages of the telephone directory. Scott personally addressed copies to each member of McGill's Board of Governors, including to McConnell himself. Not only did McConnell refuse to print the letter of February 18, 1944, incorporated in Scott's pamphlet, but the Montreal Star's owner banned Scott's name from the paper's columns for years after.

A New Endeavour : Selected Political Essays, Letters, and Addresses

Toronto, ON

University of Toronto Press

1986

74-77

en

0-8020-6603-8