In the report of the Citizens' Forum on Canada's Future (1991), Keith
Spicer suggested that the symbols of Canada are in need of some
renovation.27 In this
connection, it is worth pointing out that one of the general
conclusions of recent work in Canadian labour and working-class history
is that the working-class experience forms one of the unacknowledged
sources of achievement and solidarity in Canadian history. It is one
of the unifying identities that has the potential to counteract the
enormous pressures towards the privatization of public life in this
country.28 Certainly
greater attention to the history of workers and the role of labour
falls within the present terms of reference and guidelines of the
Canada Post stamp programme and should be considered a legitimate
subject for the attention of the Stamp Advisory Committee.
A more theoretical observation can also be advanced from the
perspective of a cultural history which attaches some strategic
significance to the accumulation of cultural capital of the kind
embodied in the public imagery and symbols of a society. The investment
in cultural capital, it is argued by theorists such as Pierre Bourdieu
(who is being paraphrased here), produces returns that bear directly on
the balance of forces in the class struggles of the late 20th century.
Because the structure of class relations itself is defined by the
distribution of capital of various kinds, including cultural capital,
working people have a continuing stake in the struggle over the
appropriation of cultural goods and
practices.29
An agenda for the more prominent inclusion of workers within a
renovated Canadian identity will not lack suggestions. Obvious
subjects might include highlights in labour history such as the
Trade Union Act (1872), Labour Day (1894), the Winnipeg General
Strike (1919),30 the
On-to-Ottawa Trek (1935), the Ford Strike
(1945), and the Asbestos Strike (1949). There are big themes such as
railway construction, the industrial revolution and child labour,
reforms such as workers' compensation, minimum wage, and equal pay
laws, organizations such as the Knights of Labour and the Fishermen's
Protective Union - and more. And there are appropriate individuals
connected to working-class causes such as Katie McVicar, Phillips
Thompson, Ginger Goodwin, J.S. Woodsworth, and J.B. McLachlan. An
interesting proposition for Canada Post, and one that might be of some
interest to philatelic specialists, would be to reproduce one of the
proposed postage stamps for the Canadian Republic
prepared (but never issued) by the Provisional Government of the Red
River in 1870.31
One of the postage stamps proposed for the Canadian Republic,
but never issued by the Provisional Government (Louis Riel) of
the Red River in 1870.
Private collection
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Such efforts would certainly need the support not simply of the
Canadian Committee on Labour History, which at its 1996 meeting
passed an appropriate resolution encouraging Canada Post to direct
more attention to workers and unions in the selection and design
of stamps. They would also need the support of union members,
their unions, labour councils, federations, and congresses.
Certainly there are signs that organized labour is aware of the
opportunity to assert the working-class presence in the form of
messages on metered postage. In 1995 the postage meter at the
Saskatchewan Federation of Labour was conveying its own customized
message: "Labour is the Great Producer of Wealth - It Moves
All Other Causes."32