Bankers' Toadies incident

The Bankers' Toadies incident occurred in 1937 in the Canadian province of Alberta when a pamphlet advocating the extermination of nine men identified as "bankers' toadies" was distributed to Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs). The men were opponents of the Social Credit government of Premier William Aberhart, which had been elected on a promise of giving Albertans monthly dividends. Aberhart blamed the banking system for his failure to follow through on this pledge.

David Duggan, leader of the Conservative Party of Alberta and one of the men named, raised concerns on the pamphlet's contents in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta. Police raided the Social Credit League's Edmonton headquarters and seized thousands of copies of the pamphlet. Joseph Unwin, an MLA and Social Credit whip, and George Frederick Powell, a Social Credit Board advisor, were arrested and charged with defamatory libel and counselling to murder. Both were convicted of the libel charge, and Justice William Carlos Ives sentenced them to hard labour. The incident contributed to Aberhart's reduced authority within his caucus and negatively affected his ability to pass his legislative agenda.

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.