Clifford Sifton (1861-1929)

Lawyer, MLA (1888-1892), MLA (1892-1895), MP (1896-1900), MP (1900-1904), MP (1904-1908), MP (1908-1911).

Born in Middlesex County, Ontario on 10 March 1861, son of John W. Sifton, brother of Arthur Lewis Sifton, he was educated at London High School, Boy’s College (Dundas), and Victoria University (Cobourg). He was called to the Manitoba bar in 1882 and practiced as a lawyer at Brandon.

He was first elected to the Manitoba Legislature for North Brandon in 1888, serving as Attorney General and Minister of Education from 1891 to 1896. While in office, he introduced and carried through the act abolishing divisions between law and equity procedure in the Court of King’s Bench and codifying and simplifying civil procedure. He was responsible for dealing with the federal government over the Manitoba School Question, and was a constant opponent of the principle of separate schools.

In November 1896, Sifton was appointed to the Federal Cabinet, holding the portfolios of Minister of the Interior and Superintendant-General of Indian Affairs. In 1898 he introduced and carried through legislation giving responsible government to North-West Territories. He is associated with an aggressive immigration policy that brought many settlers, including those from eastern Europe, to the Prairie region. He was elected for the City of Brandon in the 1900 federal election, being re-elected in 1904 and 1908. He resigned from the government in February 1905, on account of differences of opinion over educational clauses of the N.W.T. Autonomy Bill that created the provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta. Although he broke with the Liberals over reciprocity in 1911, as owner of the Manitoba Free Press, he continued to have an influential voice in Canadian affairs, and was awarded a knighthood.

In August 1884, he married Elizabeth Arma Burrows (daughter of H. T. Burrows and sister to Theodore Arthur Burrows) with whom he had five sons. He was a founding member, in 1905, of the St. Charles Country Club.

His papers are in Library and Archives Canada.

More information:

Review: D. J. Hall, Cifford Sifton, Volume One, The Young Napoleon, 1861-1900 by Lovell Clark
Manitoba History, Number 4, 1982

For a favourable biography, see Clifford Sifton in Relation to His Times by J. W. Dafoe (1931). A more balanced effort is David Hall’s Clifford Sifton (1981, 1985). (2 volumes).

Sources:

Who’s Who in Western Canada: A Biographical Dictionary of Notable Living Men and Women of Western Canada, Volume 1, 1911. C. W. Parker, editor. Canadian Press Association, Vancouver.

Profile revised: 28 May 2009

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