John A. Macdonald

Sir John Alexander Macdonald (10 or 11 January 1815 – 6 June 1891) was the first prime minister of Canada, serving from 1867 to 1873 and from 1878 until his death in 1891. He was the dominant figure of Canadian Confederation, and had a political career that spanned almost half a century.

Macdonald was born in Scotland; when he was a boy his family immigrated to Kingston in the Province of Upper Canada (today in eastern Ontario). As a lawyer, he was involved in several high-profile cases and quickly became prominent in Kingston, which elected him in 1844 to the legislature of the Province of Canada. By 1857, he had become premier under the colony's unstable political system. In 1864, when no party proved capable of governing for long, he agreed to a proposal from his political rival, George Brown, that the parties unite in a Great Coalition to seek federation and political reform. He was a leading figure in the subsequent discussions and conferences which resulted in the British North America Act and the establishment of Canada as a nation on 1 July 1867.

Macdonald was the first prime minister of the new nation, and served 19 years; only William Lyon Mackenzie King has served longer. In his first term, he established the North-West Mounted Police and expanded Canada by annexing the North-Western Territory, Rupert's Land, British Columbia, and Prince Edward Island. In 1873, he resigned from office over a scandal in which his party took bribes from businessmen seeking the contract to build the Canadian Pacific Railway. He was reelected in 1878. His greatest achievements were building and guiding a successful national government for the new Dominion, using patronage to forge a strong Conservative Party, promoting the protective tariff of the National Policy, and completing the railway. He fought to block provincial efforts to take power back from the national government in Ottawa. He approved the execution of Métis leader Louis Riel for treason in 1885 which alienated many francophones from his Conservative Party. He sat until his death in 1891 and remains the oldest Canadian prime minister.