A.E.
SMITH
Tombstone,
Prospect Cemetery (Section 7, Lot 24) St. Clair Ave. West, near
Lansdowne Ave., Toronto
“The
Great Defender: Fearless Leader of the Canadian Labor Defence
League”
are the words inscribed on this gravestone. A.E. Smith (1871-1947)
began his
activist life as a Methodist minister in Manitoba. In the 1920s he
founded the Canadian Labour Defence League and became a driving force
in defending the civil rights and liberties of those victimized in
strikes and labour struggles. An eloquent speaker, he played a major
role in the struggle to remove the hated Section 98 from
Canada’s
Criminal Code, and campaigned successfully for the release of Tim
Buck, head of the Communist Party, who had been imprisoned in
Kingston Penitentiary under the arbitrary powers of this law.
His
autobiography All My Life
records his early life in Hamilton where he began preaching as a
student Methodist, apprenticed as a bookbinder and worked at many
trades. He held ministries in Manitoba, then went to the
People’s
Church at 450 Spadina Ave. in Toronto. As a member of the Communist
Party, he became educational director of the Canadian Labour Party
and worked to make it an inclusive united front.