Pragmatism Over Principle: The Canadian Neutrality League, 1938-39

Abstract

In the latter half of the 1930s, a loose and informal grouping of English-Canadian intellectuals became determined to keep Canada neutral in a British war or at least to have the Dominion’s right of neutrality recognized. The war-scare associated with the Munich crisis of September 1938 provided the catalyst for the most ambitious and organized campaign launched by these non-interventionists. However, the compromise strategy which differences among the non-interventionists forced them to adopt, the irreducible pro-British sentiment of the bulk of English Canadians, and the blatantly treacherous actions of Adolf Hitler combined to defeat the non-interventionist intellectuals by the spring of 1939.