Canadian federal election, 1958

The Canadian parliament after the 1958 election.

The Canadian federal election of 1958 was the 24th general election in Canada's history. It was held to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 24th Parliament of Canada on March 31, 1958, just nine months after the 23rd election. It transformed Prime Minister John Diefenbaker's minority into the largest ever majority government (by percentage of seats) in Canadian history and the second largest percentage of the popular vote.

Diefenbaker had called a snap election and capitalized on two factors:

Nationally, the Liberals had just chosen a new leader, Lester Pearson, who had given an ill-advised speech in Commons that asked Diefenbaker to give power back to the Liberals without an election because of a recent economic downturn. Diefenbaker seized on the error by showing a classified Liberal document saying that the economy would face a downturn in that year. This contrasted heavily with the Liberal's 1957 campaign promises, and would make sure the "arrogant" label would remain attached to the Liberal party.

A turnaround in Quebec: Quebec had been largely Liberal since the Conscription Crisis of 1917, but upon the resignation of former Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent, the province had no favourite son leader, as they had since 1948, and were open to new options. Diefenbaker used Quebec Premier Maurice Duplessis's Union Nationale party machine, allowing Diefenbaker's Progressive Conservatives to sweep what had been a Liberal stronghold for a generation.

[edit] National results

Party		Party leader	# of candidates	Seats			Popular vote
Party		Party leader	# of candidates	1957	Elected	% Change	#	%	% Change
	Progressive Conservative	John Diefenbaker	265	111	208	+87.4%	3,908,633	53.66%	+14.85%
	Liberal	Lester B. Pearson	264	104	48	-53.8%	2,432,953	33.40%	-7.35%
	Co-operative Commonwealth	M.J. Coldwell	169	25	8	-68.0%	692,668	9.51%	-1.20%
	Liberal-Labour		1	1	1	-	11,956	0.16%	-
	Social Credit	Solon Low	82	19	-	-	188,356	2.59%	-3.99%
	Independent		9	2	-	-	14,211	0.20%	-0.87%
	Independent Liberal		10	2	-	-	12,054	0.17%	-1.25%
	Labour Progressive	Tim Buck	18	-	-	-	9,769	0.13%	+0.02%
	Candidats des électeurs	Réal Caouette	1	-	-	-	8,276	0.11%	-0.01%
	Independent PC		5	1	-	-100%	2,097	0.03%	-0.19%
	Socialist		2	*	-	*	1,113	0.02%	*
	Capital familial	H-G Grenier	1	*	-	*	968	0.01%	*
	Radical chrétien		1	*	-	*	687	0.01%	*
	Independent SC		1	-	-	-	361	x	-0.04%
	Ouvrier canadien		1	*	-	*	243	x	*
	Independent Conservative		1	*	-	*	122	x	*
Total			831	265	265	-	7,284,467	100.00%
Sources: http://www.elections.ca History of Federal Ridings since 1867

Notes:

"Previous" refers to standings at previous election, not to standings in the House of Commons at dissolution.

* The party did not nominate candidates in the previous election.

x - less than 0.005% of the popular vote