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After the war, Canada's economy used its war-built industry to take off like a three-stage rocket. Powering the first big surge was a tremendous demand for durable and consumer goods. Next, the Korean war touched off a boom in aircraft, armaments, strategic materials. Two years ago, the third big surge cut in, powered by the development of vast new natural-resources industries—pipelines, waterpower projects, uranium and iron-ore developments, the St. Lawrence Seaway. Between 1946 and 1956 the gross national product leaped from $12 billion to $29 billion. The booming Toronto Stock Exchange spawned a new crop of millionaires who blossomed out in yachts and swimming pools.
As Canada's material wealth multiplied, so did her self-confidence and national pride. Canadians spoke up with a stronger voice at the United Nations and NATO. The government at Ottawa quietly dropped the word "Dominion" from Canada's name and most official usage, asked for and got a native-born Canadian—Vincent Massey—to serve as Governor General. Old Mackenzie King stepped down in 1948. The Liberals chose scholarly Louis St. Laurent to lead the party, and his father-of-a-family dignity carried general elections in 1949 and 1953.
Politician's Rise. Through the cold years, Tory Diefenbaker grew as a politician. Challenging a government move, he would stand near his desk in the oak-paneled House of Commons, hands on hips. His penetrating, nasal voice rose, his deep-set blue eyes flashed angrily. Up went the long accusatory forefinger, down it came aimed squarely at an erring Liberal. He learned to draw out Cabinet ministers with deceptively simple questions, clobber them with carefully researched facts. He argued for a national bill of rights, was quick and eloquent at the defense of private citizens he thought the government was pushing around, e.g., Japanese-Canadians relocated from their West Coast homes under war powers.
His continuing law practice helped his political buildup. In 1951, though mourning the death of his wife Edna, he took a case that put him before the nation as never before. A British Columbia railroad telegrapher was charged with manslaughter after a mixed-up message resulted in a train wreck that killed four crewmen and 21 Korea-bound soldiers. The telegrapher appealed to Diefenbaker, who promptly paid the $1,500 fee for membership in the B.C. bar and took the defense.
Because of legal technicalities, the crown based its charge on one fireman's death alone. But Diefenbaker returned again and again to the troops, who apparently died because officials of the government-run railroad had assigned them to wooden coaches on the train—the only coaches that were wrecked. At length the annoyed prosecuting attorney, a reserve colonel, cried: "We're not concerned with the deaths of a few privates going to Korea." Said a juror, later: "I was a sergeant. I always knew those colonels were not concerned with the death of ordinary soldiers." By effectively shifting the major negligence to the government, Diefenbaker won the case, made himself a workingman's hero.