This opinion piece by Senator Don Plett appeared in the Ottawa Citizen on Monday February 27, 2023.
Earlier this year, the National Capital Commission announced that it was dropping the name of Sir John A. Macdonald from a parkway in our nation’s capital.
Sir John A. Macdonald is our nation’s first prime minister. He is the founder of the country. He is the man who was most instrumental in writing our Constitution. He is the man who unified the country and expanded it from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
Yet in the last few years, Macdonald has been vilified in an organized campaign. He has been subject to relentless and endless media attacks, principally for his involvement in the creation of residential schools. Statues have been pulled down and an effort is underway to erase his memory from our history.
There is no question that residential schools are a dark chapter in our nation’s history, but that history is complex. Many learned scholars have analyzed and investigated the issue. Yet there is an effort to condense that complex history into simplistic assertions, assertions which some proponents argue cannot be debated.
To read the rest of this article, click on this link: Plett: ‘Cancelling’ Sir John A. Macdonald denies Canada’s rich past (msn.com)