THE NEW McCARTHYISM

Abstract

Canadians would do well to ponder the injustice they may be inflicting on fellow citizens, and the damage they may be doing to their future security, by the apparently never-ending investigation of RCMP alleged wrongdoings.' Close and efficient political control over covert security service activities is essential in any country, particularly a liberal democracy. Failure in this area manifestly occurred in Canada in the early years of the last decade. Anyone with the briefest experience of responsibilit y knows that when a system fails, and when the consequences are serious, the blame rests squarely on the shoulders of the most senior individual involved. The facts that no politician accepted respon­ sibility for this failure of leadership, and that instead the blame has been shifted down the chain of command to the men who are least able to protect themselves say something unpleasant about contemporary political morality. The human consequences were dramatically illustrated this May by the suicide of a 30-year veteran of the RCMP immediately after he had testified before the McDonald Commission.2 This was the second such incident within months. Whatever errors of judgement certain individuals may have made — and, on the face of it, there were some big errors — these men acted in accor­ dance with their understanding of their orders to protect the country from subversives, terrorists and spies. Although by the illegal style of some operations the security men may have damaged the values they were supposed to be pro­ tecting, no one has questioned the sincerity of their motives. The RCMP has undergone month upon month of "trial by commission" before the provincial (Keable) and federal (McDonald) Royal Commissions,' and this has been amplified and dramatized by the concurrent "trial by media". Commissions may provide a good means of uncovering facts: they are, however, poor guardians of the rights and reputations of their witnesses. If the RCMP witnesses had in fact been suspected subversives or terrorists, and we had kept them in suspense, exposed to questioning and public vilification for more than two years, without charge or trial, the hue and cry from liberal Canada would have been deafening. Apparently we see no need to bother our consciences over injustice that only affects law officers.4