Sir Richard John CartwrightGCMGPC (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]
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]
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
Sir Richard J. Cartwright
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.
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
By-election: On Mr. Cartwright being named Minister of Trade and Commerce, 30 July 1896: South Riding of Oxford
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