George Nowlan

George Nowlan.

George Clyde Nowlan, PC (14 August 1898 – 31 May 1965) was a Canadian member of Parliament and Cabinet Minister. A member of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada, he served from 9 August 1962–21 April 1963 as the Minister of Finance in the administration of John Diefenbaker, and was also responsible for the CBC.

In addition to serving as an MP, Nowlan was a soldier in the Canadian Expeditionary Force during the First World War. After the war ended, he returned to the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia and attended Acadia University to study for a BA, graduating in 1920. He then studied law at Dalhousie University.

Nowlan was an MLA in the Nova Scotia Legislature in the 1920s, and was always known for his reputation as a hard worker and a Party Man. He served a term as the Progressive Conservative Party's president. While serving as Minister of National Revenue in 1962, he forbid Customs to censor or ban entrance to any publication unless a Canadian court had already ruled it to be "obscene", rather than using their own discretion. Five years later, this was overturned.

Disagreements between Nowlan and Diefenbaker are widely believed to have been at the heart of the PC government, allowing it to be reduced to a minority government in the 1962 federal election and then defeated a year later by a vote of no confidence by Lester Pearson and the Liberal Party in the 1963 election.

His son Pat Nowlan later became a Progressive Conservative (and later Independent Progressive Conservative) MP in Nowlan's riding of Kings County.

References

• Margaret Conrad, George Nowlan: Maritime Conservative in National Politics. University of Toronto press, 1986. ISBN 0-8020-2600-1
• George Nowlan – Parliament of Canada biography