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The Rod Young affair in the B.C. Co-operative Commonwealth Federation

University of British Columbia

The years 1949 to 1956 saw a period of constant warfare between two factions within the British Columbia Co-operative Commonwealth Federation. These groups represented basically the right and left in the party. The left wing challenged what they considered to be a continuing rightward drift of the party. Fearing that the party was on the road to becoming "Liberals-in-a-hurry" the left attempted to organize an opposition to this rightward drift, and to rally support for socialist policies within the party. As early as 1949, the right wing was trying to blame the left for the party's failure in the provincial election of that year. The right argued that the left kept the party divided organizationally and that it frightened off supporters and potential supporters with its rhetoric. In the factional battles the name of Rod Young figured prominently as a widely recognized leader of the left wing. During his twenty-one year party membership, Young held such important elected positions as national Vice-President of the Co-operative Commonwealth Youth Movement, Second Vice-President of the BC party, and CCF member of Parliament from Vancouver Centre. He was disciplined by the party on three separate occasions, each one arising out of a major ideological dispute: in 1937 the united front question, in 1950 the organizing of the Socialist Fellowship and in 1954 the debate on relations between Communists and the CCF. It was the last of these episodes which led to Young's resignation from the CCF. The disciplining of Rod Young in 1954 and his subsequent resignation from the party was a key victory for the right wing. Young came under attack for his left wing views and his criticism of trends within the party. The motive for the attack was clearly ideological differences, but injudicious actions by Rod Young enabled the right wing to characterize a principled opposition as "personal idiosyncracy" and "an organizational question." By thus avoiding direct ideological confrontation the right wing was able to defuse membership opposition to action against the left. Rod Young became the stick with which the right successfully beat the left.

Text

2010-03-05

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http://hdl.handle.net/2429/21581

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University of British Columbia

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