Mark Carney could replace Sir Charles Tupper as Canada’s shortest-serving prime minister

If Mark Carney and the Liberals fail to retain power in this election, the former banker and economist will add a new entry to his much-ballyhooed resume: Canada’s shortest-serving prime minister ever. Carney, who has served 31 days as head of government as of April 14, is technically already the shortest-serving, but with his political future undetermined until April 28, Sir Charles Tupper’s 68 days in office as Canada’s sixth prime minister in 1896 still stands as the official record. Should Carney lose, he’ll have spent a mere 45 days as prime minister. But who was Sir Charles Tupper, and why was his time in power so brief?

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From health care to the House Born in Amherst, N.S., in 1821, Tupper was first schooled in the province before obtaining his medical degree in Scotland in 1843, after which he promptly returned to his hometown and opened a practice and pharmacy, per the Dictionary of Canadian Biography and the Canadian Encyclopedia . He is the only Canadian prime minister to have been a trained physician. He also joins fellow Nova Scotians Robert Borden and John Thompson as the only prime ministers from Atlantic Canada. Tupper first entered politics at the provincial level by defeating popular Liberal incumbent Joseph Howe to win a seat for the Conservative Party of Nova Scotia under leader James William Johnston in 1855. After Liberal Premier William Young was forced to resign in 1857 after being reduced to a minority government — due in part to Tupper’s efforts to get Grits to cross the floor of the province’s House of Assembly — the doctor was named provincial secretary when Johnston won the subsequent election. When the latter retired in 1864, Tupper was the logical successor and was sworn in as Nova Scotia’s premier. A true father of Confederation Early in his premiership, Tupper began pushing for a Maritime Union with New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island. In his mind, it was the first step toward achieving a larger union of British colonies, something for which he’d long advocated. The notion of a Maritime Union was quickly abandoned at the 1865 Charlottetown Conference in P.E.I. when John A. Macdonald, then premier of the Province of Canada, asked to attend. The rest is quite literally Canadian history. Tupper convinced the N.S. House of Assembly to vote in favour of a federal union the next year, and Confederation was born in 1867. He resigned as premier and successfully won a federal seat in the new country’s first election, becoming the only pro-Confederate candidate in 19 Nova Scotian ridings. He was appointed to Macdonald’s cabinet in 1970, first as president of the privy council, then to ministerial positions in inland revenue and customs. After four years in opposition, Tupper was appointed minister of public works in Macdonald’s second term, starting in 1878. Less than a year later, he took over the railways and canals portfolio and held it through the 1882 election. He maintained his cabinet post even after moving to London, England, in 1883 to become the unpaid Canadian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom. Tupper surrendered his seat the following year, but Macdonald wooed him back for a successful 1887 election bid and handed him the reins of the finance portfolio. Within 18 months, he’d resigned and returned to London and stayed there until 1895. Please come home, Charles After Prime Minister Sir John Thompson died suddenly in 1894, Sir Mackenzie Bowell was appointed as his replacement. But when he was unable to unite the party on the issue of educational rights for Manitoba’s Francophone minority in 1895, Tupper was asked to return and serve as secretary of state with the understanding he would become prime minister when parliament dissolved. Sure enough, a bill addressing the Manitoba schools question failed to pass, and Tupper had Governor General Lord Aberdeen John Hamilton-Gordon call an election on April 24. At 74, he became the oldest person to serve as prime minister. While the Conservatives won more votes in the eighth Canadian election, Wilfred Laurier and the Liberals won more seats to secure a minority government. At first, Tupper refused to surrender power, suggesting that Laurier wasn’t able to form a government. He even began making appointments, none of which were approved by Lord Aberdeen. Tupper resigned, having never sat in the House as the prime minister. (Only three other people have held that dubious honour: Liberal John Turner, Conservative Kim Campbell, and, so far, Mark Carney.) He stayed on as opposition leader until being defeated in 1901, after which he returned to England, where he remained until his death in 1915. He is buried in Halifax’s St. John’s Cemetery. Other short prime ministerial tenures As for Campbell and Turner, they are third and fifth on the list of shortest terms for a prime minister. Turner, a cabinet minister for Pierre Trudeau, returned to politics in 1984 upon his former boss’s retirement, successfully winning the Liberal leadership and becoming prime minister. He quickly called an election in which Brian Mulroney and the Conservatives collected a landslide victory, thereby ending Turner’s time in office after 79 days. Campbell, meanwhile, succeeded Mulroney after his 1993 retirement and was also quick to send Canadians to the polls in an election that saw her lose her own seat and the party reduced to a historic low of two. She promptly resigned, having been prime minister for 132 days from June 25 to November 4. In between is two-time prime minister Arthur Meighen, who was asked by Governor General Julian Hedworth George Byng to form a government following William Lyon Mackenzie King’s abrupt resignation in 1926. Meighen’s government lasted four days before falling and triggering an election, which he lost, ending his second term in office after 88 days. His first term, a majority government, spanned one year and 172 days between 1920 and 1921 and came about when then-prime minister Borden retired and he won the party leadership. The only other prime minister to serve under a year is Joe Clark. The former Progressive Conservative boss won a minority government in 1979, but lost an 1980 election forced by a non-confidence vote on its budget. Other notable short terms include Bowell’s one year and 128 days (1894-1896) and Sir John Abbott’s one year and 161 days (1891-1892), which ended early due to health reasons. Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here.