Real Caouette, Deputy Leader of Canada’s Social Credit Party, assured a party convention last night that he was “completely opposed” to anti-Semitism and that his public expressions of praise for Hitler and Mussolini in a press interview recently had been taken out of context. The interview was published in MacLean’s Magazine’s French edition.
His praise of the two dictators was particularly embarrassing to the party because it has been trying to counter the impression that its political views once had traces of anti-Semitism. Robert Thompson of Alberta, national leader, said that Mr. Caouette’s views did not represent the views of the party. Speaking at the convention last night in Three Rivers, Mr. Thompson said “everybody knows there is no fascism in us, nor is there any trace of racism.”
In offering his praise for Hitler and Mussolini, M. Caouette said he admired what the two dictators had done in the 1930’s to increase employment and bring their countries out of depression, In the interview, he denied being a fascist on grounds that fascism, like socialism and communism, “is a dictatorship” and his party sought “the freedom of the individual.” Mr. Caouette is the leader of the Quebec section of the party which elected 26 members to Canada’s Parliament in the June election.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
