By Tyler Brooks
Canadian conservatives spend a great deal of time searching for the true heirs of the Tory tradition. Some point to Sir John A. Macdonald and the Conservative Party. Others look to George Grant, Stephen Leacock, or progressive conservatism. Still others argue that conservatism’s future lies in populism, libertarianism, or some new political arrangement altogether.
Yet perhaps we are asking the wrong question.
What if Toryism is no longer found in any single political party?
On one episode of the podcast “Concepts with Shawn Whatley”, the host chatted with Professor Ron Dart on Red Toryism. Dart referred to the Tory tradition in Canada currently seen as being a broken vase with its fragments scattered across Canada’s political landscape. The Conservatives possess some of them while the Liberals preserve others. Even the New Democrats hold pieces of the inheritance. No party contains the whole tradition, but each reflects part of its original design.
While this may sound like heresy to many conservatives, this analogy is a deeply Tory conclusion.
Toryism has never been a narrow ideology. It is older than our contemporary political notions of left and right. As Cliff Clemotte shared in July, some of Toryism’s major tenets are “active governance, intervention and welfare, communitarianism, and internationalism.” Rooted in the common good, responsible government, social obligation, continuity, and prudence, the Tory tradition helped shape the Canadian nation long before modern political labels emerged. Over time, however, different aspects of this inheritance migrated into different political homes.
A Tory looking honestly at Canada today will therefore find himself reflected in places he least expects.
Conservative Party of Canada
The most obvious fragments remain within the Conservative Party of Canada. This connection is not merely ideological but historical. The Conservative Party traces its lineage back to the political tradition that built the country under Sir John A. Macdonald. The Conservative instinct has always valued continuity over revolution, reform over rupture, and inheritance over reinvention. Even during Confederation, Canada was recognized as being built by the “dreadful Tory” Conservatives led by Macdonald.
Conservatives today continue to advocate for responsible government and Canada’s constitutional tradition. They continue to show respect, not shame, for institutions that link us to our history: Parliament, the Crown, and the Westminster system. These are not merely ceremonial relics. They are manifestations of the Tory belief that political wisdom develops over generations and should not be casually discarded.
The party also carries elements of traditional social values. Whether through support for families, local communities, voluntary associations, or personal responsibility, Conservatives preserve the older Tory conviction that freedom flourishes within healthy institutions rather than apart from them. While their influence rises and falls over time, social conservatives continue to find their most natural political home within the CPC.
Liberal Party of Canada
Ironically, the very opponents of Toryism also safeguard fragments of the old Tory tradition, whether it recognizes them as such or not.
One of these is internationalism. Canada’s Tory founders understood themselves as participants in a broader civilization stretching across the Atlantic world. They looked beyond their borders and understood that national identity did not require isolation from international responsibilities. For Tories, the obvious internationalism was their affinity towards the British Empire and their place in it. Their loyalty to the Crown and its subjects reflected their domestic belief in international terms: one is never truly isolated but connected to a wider community. Although modern Liberal internationalism differs from the outlook of Macdonald’s generation, it reflects a similar belief that Canada has obligations that extend beyond itself.
The Liberal Party also carries a sense of civic responsibility, as they tend to remind everyone that they are the party that brought in the Charter. The idea that citizenship involves duties as well as rights would have been perfectly familiar to earlier Tories. Society was never understood as merely a collection of individuals pursuing private interests. Citizens owed obligations to one another, and public institutions existed to support social cohesion. Whether conservatives like to admit it or not, the Liberal Party helped reinforce a shared understanding of Canadian citizenship within the country’s constitutional framework.
Liberal pragmatism is perhaps the most overlooked Tory inheritance of all. Traditional Toryism has rarely been doctrinaire. It has preferred practical solutions to abstract theory and has generally judged policies by their consequences rather than by their ideological purity. In this respect, the Canadian Liberal tradition often displays a characteristically Tory flexibility. Say what you want about the Liberal Party’s lack of principles (and perhaps that is true!) but one can argue that their flexibility shows a Tory disposition.
New Democratic Party
Surprisingly, there exists a Tory lineage with the NDP. Stephen Leacock, whom many would consider a torch bearer of the Canadian Tory tradition, held the chair of economics at McGill University where many of his students went on to become founders of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF). With the CCF later becoming the NDP, there is arguably a “Tory Touch” to the principles guiding the NDP.
Foremost among them is their primary concern for the common good. Long before the emergence of modern socialism, Tory thinkers argued that society was more than a marketplace. Political communities existed to pursue shared goods and mutual obligations. The well-being of the vulnerable, the importance of social cohesion, and the belief that prosperity should serve society rather than dominate it were all concerns present within the Tory tradition. Read any of Benjamin Disraeli’s works and you will find that a Tory’s concern for the common good is his primary driver.
The NDP’s skepticism toward large corporations and concentrated economic power also possesses unmistakable Tory echoes. High Tories from Britain to Canada frequently warned that private concentrations of power could become just as dangerous as public ones. Economic institutions were necessary, but they were never meant to become objects of worship. They were means to an end, not the end itself.
Even modern environmentalism contains a recognizably Tory impulse. Conservatives are often thought of as defenders of the past, but at their best they are also defenders of the future. Stewardship, conservation, and the belief that we have obligations to generations yet unborn are deeply rooted in Tory thought. The desire to preserve what has been entrusted to us is not a rejection of conservatism, but one of its oldest expressions. I believe a Tory’s concern for the environment is currently expressed with our current sovereign, His Majesty Charles III.
This does not mean that Canada’s political parties are interchangeable or that these fragments are perfectly expressed in each political party. Thanks to the lust for power and collective amnesia of our history, our political class disagree profoundly about how these principles should be applied.
Yet these differences should not blind us to a deeper reality.
Canadians often speak as though our political camps inhabit entirely different worlds. We imagine that one side cares only about freedom while another cares only about community. One values tradition while another values compassion. One prioritizes order while another seeks liberty.
The Tory inheritance reminds us that these supposed opposites were never meant to be enemies. Historically, they emerged from the same political civilization.
That is why many Canadian conservatives feel politically homeless. They encounter pieces of themselves in every party. They recognize the importance of tradition championed by Conservatives, the civic-mindedness often expressed by Liberals, and the concern for the common good articulated (though imperfectly) by New Democrats.
A Tory does not fit neatly into any ideological box because Toryism was never a box to begin with.
It was a vase, and it was truly our vase.
What we now call the Canadian political spectrum consists largely of fragments from that original inheritance. Some pieces are preserved better than others. Some have been altered by time. Some no longer fit together as they once did, but the pattern remains visible.
Now, what broke this vase and dispersed its fragments? Perhaps that is the next question that needs to be answered.