The Right Honourable Sir Richard John Cartwright GCMG PC
(Image from the Library of Parliament)
Personal details
Born	(1835-12-04)December 4, 1835 Kingston, Upper Canada
Died	September 12, 1912(1912-09-12) (aged 76)
Occupation	politician
Known for	'the Rupert of debate'[why?] 'Blue Ruin Knight'

Sir Richard John Cartwright GCMG PC (December 4, 1835 – September 24, 1912) was a Canadian businessman and politician.

Cartwright was one of Canada's most distinguished federal politicians during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was a cabinet minister in five Liberal governments. He served in the Canadian Parliament for 43 years and 5 months, being an MP from 1867 to 1904 then a Senator until his death in 1912. Prior to Confederation, he had served 4 years, 1 month and 15 days in the Legislative Assembly of the old Province of Canada. Thus, he was a legislator for more than 47 and a half years. He was a vigorous and trenchant orator, and was known as 'the Rupert of debate'. In particular, his debates with his Conservative counterpart, Sir George Eulas Foster, are the stuff of Canadian Parliamentary legend.

He was a progressive. A free trader, he stood against the Conservatives' high-tariff policy. Often propounding on the inalienable right of Canadian freeman to vote for and in support of their patriotic convictions independent of any party,^[1] he favoured proportional representation via Single Transferable Voting. He supported the fight of western farmers for accessible terminal grain elevators in 1910.^[2]

Early life

He was born and raised in Kingston, Upper Canada in a United Empire Loyalist family, the son of Harriet Dobbs Cartwright and the grandson of Richard Cartwright, a Loyalist who was expelled from the U.S. at the time of the War of Independence.^[3] His father, Robert Cartwright, was an Anglican minister. His uncle, John Solomon Cartwright, was his father’s twin brother and a notable businessman, lawyer, banker, and politician, being a member of the last Legislative Assembly of Upper Canada and then a member of the first Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada.

Richard Cartwright was a major landowner in the area, and became prominent in Kingston's financial community as president of the Commercial Bank of Canada. He suffered a major blow when his bank failed in 1867.^[4]

Early political career

Cartwright entered politics when he was elected as a Conservative Party member and supporter of John A. Macdonald in the Province of Canada's legislative assembly in 1863. In 1867, the Province of Canada became part of the new Canadian Confederation.

In 1867, Cartwright was elected to the newly formed House of Commons of Canada, again as a Tory. He was MP for the riding of Lennox, Ontario.

Crosses floor to join Liberals

In the year 1869, he broke with the Conservatives over Macdonald's appointment of Sir Francis Hincks as Minister of Finance, and crossed the floor to join the Liberal Party of Canada.

Cabinet Minister for Mackenzie

With the Liberal party's victory in the 1874 election, Cartwright was appointed Minister of Finance by Prime Minister Alexander Mackenzie. He supported free trade, but sought limited tariffs as a means of generating government revenue.

Knighted

Cartwright was not elected in the 1878 general election but was successful in a Nov. 2, 1878 by-election in Huron Centre.

He sat in the opposition bench. (The Liberals were defeated in the 1878 election.)

In recognition of his service, he was awarded a knighthood in 1879.

From the 1887 election, he represented the riding of Oxford South.

In 1887, he called for the House of Commons to consider proportional representation.^[5]

In the 1890s, the Liberals moved away from support for unrestricted reciprocity with the United States, and Cartwright's influence in the party diminished.

Cabinet Minister for Laurier

With the victory of Wilfrid Laurier's Liberals in the 1896 election, Cartwright returned to Cabinet. Laurier denied Cartwright the finance ministry as a way of assuring Canada's business community that the government was not going to adopt free trade. Instead, he appointed Cartwright Minister of Trade and Commerce. Cartwright also served as a Canadian member of the Anglo-American Joint High Commission to resolve diplomatic problems between Canada and the United States in 1898. Cartwright was appointed to the Imperial Privy Council in 1902.

Senator

In 1904, he was elevated to the Senate of Canada, but remained Trade and Commerce minister until the fall of the Laurier government in the 1911 election. In this position he introduced, in 1908, a limited system of old age annuities. Additionally, he served as Leader of the Government in the Senate from 1909 until 1911, and as Leader of the Opposition in the Senate from 1911 until his death in 1912.

Legacy

In the Kingston, Ontario, area, Cartwright Street and Cartwright Point are named for him and his family, in recognition of their longstanding contributions to the region. He is honoured with commemorative plaques in Kingston on King Street (at his former residence) and in Memorial Hall, City Hall.

His memories were preserved in his book Reminiscences, published in 1912.

Family

Sir Richard Cartwright's eldest son, Lieutenant Colonel Robert Cartwright, studied at the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario from 1878 to 1881, where he won several academic prizes. He was a railway engineer in Manitoba. He served in the suppression of the 1885 Riel rebellion and in the Boer war in South Africa, where he was mentioned in dispatches four times. He served as assistant adjutant-general at militia headquarters and as a musketry officer during World War I.^[6]

Archives

There is a Cartwright Family Fonds with the Ontario provincial archives, consisting of documents from 1799 to 1913. The documents were generated by Richard Cartwright, his sons John Solomon Cartwright and the Reverend Robert David Cartwright, Robert's wife Harriet (Dobbs) Cartwright and their son, Sir Richard Cartwright.^[7]

Electoral record