Andrew Brewin
Francis Andrew Brewin QC (1907–1983), also known as Andy Brewin, was a lawyer and Canadian politician and Member of Parliament. He was the grandson of Liberal cabinet minister Andrew George Blair. His son John Brewin also served in the House of Commons of Canada.
Andrew Brewin | |
|---|---|
| Member of the Canadian Parliament for Greenwood | |
| In office 1962–1979 | |
| Preceded by | James Macdonnell |
| Succeeded by | Riding redistributed into Beaches and York East |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Francis Andrew Brewin 3 September 1907 Brighton, England |
| Died | 21 September 1983 (aged 76) |
| Political party | |
| Spouse(s) | Peggy Biggar (m. 1935) [1] |
| Residence | Toronto, Ontario, Canada |
| Profession | Lawyer |
Born on 3 September 1907 in Brighton, England,[2][3] Brewin was a stalwart in the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) and ran numerous times at the federal and provincial levels in the 1940 and 1950s. As a lawyer in the 1940s, he was retained by the Co-operative Committee on Japanese Canadians to contest the federal government's deportation orders affecting thousands of Japanese Canadians. Led by Brewin, the "Japanese Canadian Reference Case" was heard by the Supreme Court of Canada and later, on appeal, by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. Brewin was also retained by a committee of Japanese Canadians who had been detained during the Second World War as "enemy aliens" in order to try to have their property restored. He succeeded in persuading the government to call a royal commission to investigate the question.[4]
In 1945, he was asked by Ontario CCF leader Ted Jolliffe to be co-counsel during the infamous LeBel Royal Commission that was looking into whether or not Ontario's premier at the time was employing a secret political police force.[5] He was, for a time, the President of the Ontario CCF[6] and was a candidate for the leadership of the Ontario CCF at the party's 1953 leadership convention, but lost to Donald C. MacDonald.
Brewin stood as a CCF candidate several times, starting with the 1945 Canadian federal election in the riding of Toronto—St. Paul's, but was unsuccessful. He was first elected to the House of Commons of Canada on behalf of the CCF's successor, the New Democratic Party.[3] Brewin sat as Member of Parliament for the Toronto riding of Greenwood from the 1962 election until his retirement in 1979.[3]
Coming from the theological tradition of figures such as Richard Hooker, F. D. Maurice, and William Temple,[7] Andrew Brewin considered himself a Christian socialist and wrote a number of books and pamphlets on the topic. He was a member of the Fellowship for a Christian Social Order[8] and the League for Social Reconstruction.[9]
Andrew Brewin wrote the book Stand on Guard: The Search for a Canadian Defence Policy, published by McClelland & Stewart in 1965,[3][10] that explored Canada's military's changing role in the mid-twentieth century, including its participation in the then new concept of United Nations peacekeeping.
Brewin died on 21 September 1983.[3]
See also
References
Footnotes
- J. Brewin 2000, p. 83.
- J. Brewin 1999, p. 7.
- "Francis Andrew Brewin, Q.C." Parlinfo. Ottawa: Parliament of Canada. Retrieved 20 February 2019.
- Bangarth 2008.
- "Jolliffe Protests Probe into How He Obtained Confidential Police Data". The Globe and Mail. Toronto. 21 June 1945. p. 3.
- Abella 1973, p. 101.
- J. Brewin 2000, p. 80.
- Wright 1990, p. 178.
- J. Brewin 2000, p. 85.
- A. Brewin 1965.
Bibliography
- Abella, Irving Martin (1973). Nationalism, Communism, and Canadian Labour: The CIO, the Communist Party, and the Canadian Congress of Labour, 1935–1956. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-0-8020-6150-8.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
- Bangarth, Stephanie (2008). Voices Raised in Protest: Defending North American Citizens of Japanese Ancestry, 1942–1949. Victoria, British Columbia: University of British Columbia Press.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
- Brewin, Andrew (1965). Stand on Guard: The Search for a Canadian Defence Policy. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart. OCLC 490764486.
- Brewin, John (1999). Francis Andrew Brewin: "He Who Would Valiant Be"; The Makings of a Canadian Anglican Christian Socialist (PDF) (MTS thesis). Vancouver: Vancouver School of Theology. ISBN 978-0-612-47521-2.
- ——— (2000). "Francis Andrew Brewin, 'He Who Would Valiant Be': The Makings of a Canadian Anglican Christian Socialist". In Guenther, Bruce L. (ed.). Historical Papers. Canadian Society of Church History. pp. 73–92. ISBN 978-0-9696744-0-5. ISSN 0848-1563. Retrieved 20 February 2019.CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link)
- Wright, Robert A. (1990). "The Canadian Protestant Tradition, 1914–1945". In Rawlyk, G. A. (ed.). The Canadian Protestant Experience, 1760 to 1990. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press. pp. 139–197. ISBN 978-0-7735-1132-3.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)