CANADIAN SOCIALISTS CAMPAIGN AGAINST WAR IN VIETNAM
Toronto
While Canada's labor party, the New Democratic party [NDP], has now, according to the latest Gallup poll, the support of 26% of the electorate ~~ equal to that of the official capitalist opposition party, the Progressive Conservative party -- it is continuing to leave the important arena of municipal politics to the practitioners of the Liberal-Tory shell game.
In the center of its strength in the country, Toronto, it failed to present a slate in the December 5 elections and it is presenting only a partial one in the Decenber 14 elections in Vancouver, British Columbia, where it has been the official provincial opposition for decades.
The Foronto branch of the League for Socialist Action boldly stepped into the gap there by running its organizer Arthur Young for Board of Control. The Young Socialist Forum, Canada's most widely read publication of the student left, entered its editor John Riddell in the Board of Education contest in one of the central wards. Both candidates were backed by the Workers Vanguard, which is edited by Ross Dowson, the executive secretary of the League for Socialist Action.
In Vancouver, Jean Rands, another editor of the Young Socialist Forum was endorsed by the youth magazine and the League for Socialist Action as a candidate for mayor. -
In the Toronto contest, Arthur Young polled some 10,000 votes. This compares with 88,036 votes cast for the highest of the four candidates who won. Only 35.4% of the electorate went to the polls. Despite this low turnout, the "Youth for Riddell" campaign generated considerable enthusiasm among students and was endorsed by 7.1% of those who voted.
In Vancouver, the campaign waged by 2l-year-old Jean Rands has aroused widespread interest. Her two opponents are both millionaires. The incumbent Mayor Rathie has declared that public housing is "like creeping socialism."
Columnist.Bud Elsie of the Vancouver daily Province commented:-"It is odd, perhaps, that she is a better speaker than either Mayor Rathie or Alderman Tom Campbell. But it is what she says, not how she says it, that they are more likely to remember."
A similar comment about Arthur Young was made in. Toronto by the Globe and Mail which grudgingly admitted that he "delivers in terms of oratorical style some of the best speeches in the present campaign." The Globe and Mail nevertheless joined with the other two dailies and the management of the government-owned Canadian Broadcasting Cor-
poration in blacking out Young's message.
All three candidates centered their campaigns against the war in Vietnam. Arthur Young charged. that the inflationary pressures that are causing prices to escalate reflect the escalation of the murderous war against the Vietnamese people which is supported by the Canadian ruling class. ;
Inurging a vote for the three youthful candidates, the League for Socialist Action declared in a leaflet, of which 60,000 copies were distributed: "A clear identity of the city administration with the anti-war movement in Canada could lead to the end of Canadian collusion in this dirty war and strengthen the forces in the U.S. urging withdrawal of U.S. troops from Vietnam.
"Strong support by city council to the protest launched by housewives against mounting food costs, which have already forced modest cuts in prices, firm identity with their call for a Prices Review Board, the moves to build consumers' co-operatives, and the developing demand that the books of the corporations be opened to public. scrutiny, would result in bigger price cuts, and more lasting results."
The British Columbia president. of the New Democratic party, stung by the interest in the dynamic campaign for Jean Rands, told an all-candidates meeting that in the next election the NDP will run a full slate. His comment that the "2l-year-old Marxist mayoralty candidate Jean Rands should be running after boys instead of after the mayor's office" aroused considerable hostility.
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