Review of The Honourable John Norquay: Indigenous Premier, Canadian Statesman by Gerald Friesen
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: GeraldFriesen's compelling book is not just a biography of Manitoba's first Indigenous premier but also a meditation on the vagaries of political fame, and who gets to be remembered by future generations and who does not.The Honourable John Norquay: Indigenous Premier, Canadian Statesman is both lucidly written and learned.It includes several maps, the subject's family tree and those of his mother and his wife, and a wide assortment of photographs and political cartoons.It is also prodigiously documented, with 120 pages of endnotes.Yet hovering over this life of Norquay is the shadow of another Indigenous leader, Louis Riel-a situation that Friesen further complicates by generally describing both men as Métis.Even though he is attempting to reclaim Norquay as a major historical figure, Friesen seems unable to position Norquay except in relation to Riel.Tellingly, the publication of his book coincided with Premier Wab Kinew's official recognition of Riel as Manitoba's honorary first premier, with the nominal premier once again eclipsing the actual one.John Norquay (1841-1889) was born in the Red River Settlement parish of St. Andrews, approximately 30 km north of present-day Winnipeg.Of mixed Cree and Scottish (Orkney) ancestry, and with deep roots in the fur trade, he grew up on the family farm.Despite his father's untimely death when Norquay was only eight years old, he was able to acquire an exceptional education, thanks in no little measure to the support of leading Red River Anglican clergy such as Bishop David Anderson.Among other professions, Norquay was a farmer, teacher, and politician.The last is unquestionably the most important.He was first elected to Manitoba's Legislative Assembly in 1871 and would join the cabinet within a year.He became premier in 1878 and would govern the province for the next nine years, a period of explosive demographic and economic growth during which Manitoba's "settler population multiplied more than tenfold and the economy grew proportionately" (p.432), upending the sociocultural dynamics that had characterized the Red River Settlement.Friesen, is a prominent scholar of Canadian history in general and of the Prairie West in particular, details Norquay's private life, including his not overly successful speculative financial ventures.He excels in his depiction of Norquay's relentless efforts to gain rights over public lands and natural resources for Manitoba, a campaign that was sometimes encumbered by his complex relationship with Canada's first prime minister, John A. Macdonald.Friesen's main thesis is that Norquay embodied a third way of doing politics, between the polarizing visions of Ontario-born Orangemen and Riel's Métis.In both his political and private life, Friesen writes, "Norquay chose the path of negotiation and compromise . . .He rejected what he regarded as Louis Riel's extreme path, instead working within the economic and political constraints imposed on their homeland by big money and big government.Living through the phases of the west's transition from Indigenous to Canadian sovereignty, he managed to maintain his perch atop Manitoba politics while adjusting to a new nation-state and global capital movements" (p.3).As he elaborates, "It is clear that Norquay was not a rebel" (p.28), being the epitome of moderation.It is hard not to detect a certain defensiveness in Friesen's portrait of Norquay, a tension that points to a possible conflict between the two adjectives of his subtitle: "Indigenous" premier and "Canadian" statesman.As Friesen asks of Norquay at the outset, "Was he merely a collaborator, a quisling?"(p.3).But Friesen's defensiveness may also reflect his uncertainty about Norquay's collective identity, as well as envy of Riel's factional Métis nationalism.When To cite the subtitle of Jean Teillet's 2019 book The North-West Is Our Mother, it is a history of Louis Riel's People, the Métis Nation.
Author: Albert Braz
Institution: University of Alberta
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W4411080048