George VI’s 1939 Royal Tour of Canada: Context and the Constitution

Abstract

Canada has had a long tradition of tours by members of the royal family, beginning with the 1860 visit of the Prince of Wales. But George VI’s 1939 royal tour of Canada was the first by a reigning British monarch, and its real significance can only be fully understood in context. World events, most notably the looming threat from Hitler’s Germany, made Canada’s attachment to the Commonwealth vitally important. Canada’s Prime Minister Mackenzie King revered the Crown but was a prickly Canadian nationalist who was loath to make any defence commitments to the mother country. The institution of the Crown had weathered a series of crises in the period preceding the visit: the 1931 Statute of Westminster marked a fundamental change in the Crown’s relationship to the dominion governments, and the 1936 abdication sullied the sovereign’s image. The 1939 visit also raised the practical issue of how the duties of the Crown ought to be fulfilled when both the king and his dominion representative were present in the dominion. The 1939 visit represented a vital test of the institution of the Crown, and the true import of the five-week tour must be assessed in light of its political, foreign policy, and constitutional significance.