Trudeau's Influence on Equality

In a just society Trudeau envisioned that all Canadian would have equal opportunity's. To try and follow this Trudeau introduced the Official Languages Act in 1969, This gave an equal status to the English and French Canadians. Trudeau fought for equality between French and English cultures, wealthy and poor provinces, women and men in politics. He also wanted a renewed federation where French and English Canada were full and equal partners. To create equality between French and English communism made three major recommendations: make services for federal government more widely available in French across the country, open the federal civil service equally to English and French Canadians and improve and expand the teaching of French as a second language. This led Trudeau to introduce the Official Languages Act. 

Canadian Home Front

Since many men were off at war the government need to recruit women into factories to do the work of a man. They only targeted unmarried women, but even married women found away around that role by lying about their families. By many these jobs were seen only as temporary, men did not believe that women were capable of doing the job. Women thought they were better workers than the men because they showed up to work everyday. Although the women were not paid the same as men they did the job anyway, and well. If women weren't working on factories they were working on farms, sewed uniforms for soldiers, and worked for the Canadian Red Cross. When the war was coming to an end the women started to be laid off. Even before the war had ended because there wasn't the same need for supplies. When the war ended the women gave their jobs back to the men who had worked there before. Most women were fine about giving the job back, but others were devastated. The war is what planted the seeds for the women's rights movement.   

The Geneva Convention

The Geneva Conventions comprised of four treaties. The first Geneva Convention: "for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded in Armies in the Field," it defines that there has to be certain protection of the victims of armed conflicts. It was first adopted in 1864, but was updated in 1906, 1929, and 1949. Second Geneva Convention: "for the Amelioration of the Condition of Wounded, Sick and Shipwrecked Members of Armed Forces at Sea," it was first adopted in 1906 but was updated in 1929 and 1949 it applies the main protecting of the First Geneva Convention.Third Geneva Convention: it is relative to the treatment of prisoners of war, it was first adopted in 1929 and updated in 1949. It describes humanitarian protection of POWs. Fourth Geneva Conventio: "relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War," It was adopted in 1949 and explains humanitarian protection for civilians in war zones. These conventions were created for the international humanitarian law, they protect people who are not taking part in the hostilities, those who are no longer taking part in hostilities, the wounded, sick, ship wrecked, and prisoners of war.  

Canadian Prisoner's of War

In Germany Canadians were treated fairly well, POWs were segregated by service. Officers were held in camps operated by their German counterparts. In Italy the camps were generally more relaxed than the Germans. In 1943 when Italy surrendered POWs were mostly taken to North America. The Japanese situation was very different they did not sign the Geneva Conventions. They believed that surrendering meant you were weak and it was a soldiers duty to die in battle.  

S.S. St. Louis Tragedy

The St. Louis ship set sail May 13 1939 for Cuba when the ship was not able to dock because each refugee needed a visa and was required to pay a $500 bond, so they tried to get into Canada. Canada did not except the Jews into Canada because they were economically scared that there wasn't enough jobs as is from the depression and Canada couldn't afford any more people. This meant that the 947 Jews on board the ship had to try and go to other European countries and were not able to really escape for WWII. Canada took in fewer Jews then a lot of other countries, this reveals that Canada was very discriminative and did not want to get involved with the war.