Pierre Trudeau Quotes
We must now establish the basic principles, the basic values and beliefs which hold us together as Canadians so that beyond our regional loyalties there is a way of life and a system of values which make us proud of the country that has given us such freedom and such immeasurable joy.
Trudeau, Pierre Elliott. The Essential Trudeau. Edited by Ron Graham, McClelland & Stewart, 1998, p. 64.
The phrase “Loyalty to the government is our national creed” was advocated by almost all politicians after the Civil War. There were a few communists of the left and libertarians on the right who would disagree but every president tool this position until the administration of Ronald Reagan who then many politicians claimed that the government was a problem and even an enemy of the people. Loyalty was in their view, not to be given to the Government, but to the ideas and ideals of America (as they saw them.) Since then many politicians would talk of “loyalty to America” but not use the McKinley phrase “loyalty to the government.”
His belief is that the vast majority of Americans have a set of values in common including tolerance of alternative religions. In this sense, he considers the common values as an American Religion.
In a House debate in 1923 on the Nordic or Latin discovery of America, Congressman Summers of Washington asked Italian-American Congressman La Guardia to yield to ask whether or not Christopher Columbus had come from "your country."
Joseph Philippe Pierre Yves Elliott Trudeau PC CC CH QC FRSC, also referred to by the initials PET, was a Canadian politician who was the 15th prime minister of Canada and leader of the Liberal Party of Canada from 1968 to 1984, with a brief period instead as Leader of the Opposition between 1979 and 1980. His tenure of 15 years and 164 days makes him Canada's third longest-serving Prime Minister, behind William Lyon Mackenzie King and John A. Macdonald.
