Public affairs as well as private interests profited by the efforts, the sound judgment and keen discrimination of Mr. Smith. He was at one time alderman of Montreal; was a member of the finance committee and was again and again urged to become a candidate for the mayoralty. Native modesty, however, caused him to remain in private life even when it was almost a certainty that he would be elected to any office to which he might aspire. He was the only English member of the French Commercial School which was established by the Gouin government, and he belonged to the Board of Trade for five or six years, being first a member of the council and rising through the offices of treasurer and vice president to that of president, being elected by acclamation. He was also a vice president of the Dominion Express Company; managing director of the Laurentide Pulp Company; a director of the Merchants Bank; a director of the Montreal Trust Company; a director of the Dominion Textile Company; was at one time the president of the Western Hospital, and had been for years one of the governors of both the Notre Dame and General Hospitals, and vice president of the Royal Alexandra. He was a well known figure in the city’s fashionable clubs, belonging to the Mount Royal and St. James Clubs, the Royal Montreal Golf Club, the Forest and Stream Club and the Royal St. Lawrence Yacht Club. He was also a charter member of Canada Council of the Knights of Columbus; a prominent parishioner of St. Patrick’s church, as well as warden of the same; a director of St. Patrick’s Orphan Asylum, and president of the Catholic Sailors’ Club. He was also a well known member of St. George’s Society.
His kindness of heart was invariable, he was especially devoted to his home and shunned ostentation. At St. Andrews where he spent every summer, one of his greatest pleasures consisted in the companionship of those friends of his who lived near him, of whom Sir Thomas Shaughnessy was among the number. Taking a great interest in matters pertaining to education, he was one of the founders of the Catholic high school, and a member of the administration of Laval University, and though, well known in life as a conservative in politics, he was appointed by Hon. Lomer Gouin as governor of L’Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales. Besides being a practical manufacturer, Mr. Smith gave special attention to tariff matters, and his contributions to the campaign against unrestricted reciprocity in 1891, when Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Mr. Erastus Wiman and their friends endeavored to establish free trade between Canada and the United States, did more than a little to secure the protectionist victory of that year.