Daniel Roland Michener (April 19, 1900 – August 6, 1991) was a Canadian lawyer, politician, and diplomat who served as Governor General of Canada, the 20th since Canadian Confederation.
Michener was born and educated in Alberta. In 1917 he served briefly in the Royal Air Force. He acquired a university degree, then attended the University of Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. Michener then returned to Canada and practised law before entering politics. He was elected to the House of Commons in 1957, where he served as speaker until 1962, and then served in diplomatic postings between 1964 and 1967. After that he was appointed Governor General by Queen Elizabeth II on the recommendation of Prime Minister of Canada Lester B. Pearson, to replace Georges Vanier, and he occupied the post until succeeded by Jules Léger in 1974. Michener proved to be a populist governor general whose tenure is considered to be a key turning point in the history of his office.
On October 15, 1962, Michener was sworn into the Queen's Privy Council for Canada. He then served on the boards of various corporations and charities and sat as Chancellor of Queen's University.
Youth and education
Michener was born in Lacombe, Alberta (then part of the Northwest Territories), to Senator Edward Michener and Mary E. Roland. He attended the University of Alberta, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree and a Rhodes Scholarship that took him to Hertford College at the University of Oxford. There, he played for the Oxford University Ice Hockey Club and met Lester B. Pearson, who was his lifelong friend. After completing his Master of Arts and Bachelor of Civil Law degrees, Michener returned to Canada, settled in Toronto and practised law. At the same time, he acted as the general secretary for the Rhodes Foundation in Canada between 1936 and 1964 and sat as chairman of the Manitoba Royal Commission on Local Government.
On February 26, 1927, in St. Mary Magdalene Anglican Church, Michener married Norah Willis; the couple had three daughters.
Political career
Michener first ran for political office in Ontario's 1943 election as the Progressive Conservative candidate in the riding of St. David, but was defeated by William Dennison of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF). Michener ran in St. David again in the 1945 election and defeated Dennison this time Michener was then appointed to Premier George Drew's cabinet as provincial secretary and registrar of Ontario, being responsible for formalizing cabinet procedures, including agenda and minutes. In the 1948 provincial election, Dennison took St. David back from Michener.
Michener then tried to enter federal politics in the 1949 election but was unsuccessful. He tried again in the election of 1953 and was elected in the riding of St. Paul's. In 1956, the Progressive Conservative party chose John Diefenbaker as its leader at its leadership convention, and in the election the following year the Tories attained a minority government. Michener was appointed speaker of the House of Commons, after the post was turned down by Stanley Knowles.
As Speaker, Michener angered Diefenbaker by allowing the opposition a great degree of latitude during Question Period; at one point, on May 25, 1959, Diefenbaker was so flustered that he refused to sit down when called to order by Michener. Actions like these, among others, impressed parliamentary observers and a group of university professors initiated a campaign to make Michener's position as speaker permanent; they proposed that, as is the tradition with the Speaker of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, Michener run as an independent in general elections and that the political parties agree not to run candidates against him. No such agreement, however came to pass, and when Michener ran for re-election in 1962 he was defeated. This was the first time since 1867 that a speaker had lost his riding in an election in which his party formed the government. Michener returned to Toronto and dedicated his time to his law practice, Lang Michener LLP.