Abbott, J. J. C. (John Joseph Caldwell), Sir, 1821-1893 : Prime Minister of Canada (1891-92)
John Joseph Caldwell Abbott was born on 12 March 1821 at St. Andrews, Lower Canada (Saint-André-d'Argenteuil, Quebec).
Abbott entered business at age seventeen, studied law at McGill University and became dean of the faculty in 1855. Future prime minister Wilfrid Laurier was one of his students.
Abbott also built a large commercial law practice. In a rare criminal case, he defended Confederate agents who raided Vermont from Canadian soil during the American Civil War. Investments, mainly in railways, made Abbott extremely wealthy.
In 1857, Abbott ran for the Legislative Assembly of Lower Canada for the riding of Argenteuil, winning only after a two-year legal challenge over voting irregularities. He was re-elected in 1861 and served for a year as solicitor general.
Abbott was elected to parliament as a Conservative for Argenteuil in 1867. He was a central figure in the Pacific Scandal that brought down Sir John A. Macdonald's government in 1873. Abbott was re-elected, but was removed by petition in 1874 for his role in the scandal.
Abbott was defeated in the 1878 general election and his 1880 by-election victory was voided for irregularities. He returned to parliament in an 1881 by-election.
Macdonald appointed Abbott to the Senate in 1887 as leader of the government and minister without portfolio. Abbott served concurrently as Mayor of Montreal (1887-89).
Abbott succeeded Macdonald in 1891. During seventeen months in office, he initiated civil service reforms, revised the Criminal Code, secured a Canadian diplomatic presence in Washington and tried to negotiate a reciprocity treaty with the United States.
As a cabinet minister and senator, Abbott endorsed the federal government's systematically racist relationship with Indigenous Peoples, which caused tremendous ongoing trauma, displacement, disenfranchisement and exclusion.
Abbott married Mary Bethune in 1849. He was knighted in May 1892, shortly before his health failed. He resigned at the end of the year, died at Montreal on 30 October 1893 and was buried in the city's Mount Royal Cemetery.
