This series reflects a consolidated and reorganized series created by the Department of Finance in pursuit of its role as an office of primary interest in relation to a series of related matters arising from war claims and other types of claims arising from arbitrary actions of foreign governments directed at citizens, 1916-1989. The primary relationships documented in the series relate to the Custodian of Enemy Property (1916-1985), the War Claims Commission, 1952-1970, and two separate but identically named "Foreign Claims Commissions," 1970-1987 and 1987-1989.
The origins of the Custodian of Enemy Property as a discrete administrative entity go back to the First World War. Until 1920, the Minister of the Finance was the Custodian and it was always the Department of Finance which, in the policy sense, had primary responsibility for the procedures related to seizing of property and settlement of claims, while the Custodian of Enemy Property played a largely administrative role, especially after 1952.
Some of the surviving records reflect activity stretching back to the First World War when the Custodian of Enemy Property (whose records are arranged in a separate fonds) was first constituted. During the interwar period (1920-1939), the Custodian of Enemy Property was administered through the Secretary of State. A greatly diminished office was revived in the context of the Second World War, with special responsibility for administering the Trading with the Enemy Regulations and administering confiscated property of Japanese Canadians, though its duties extended far beyond that class of property expropriations and compensation. (There is virtually no documentation of the administration of property of Japanese Canadians by Custodian of Enemy Property in the present series.) The Office of the Custodian ceased operations in 1985 and disappeared entirely, even as a paper entity, under changes to legislation governing the residual functions performed by the Department of Public Works and Government Services until 1996.
The Office of the Custodian continued after the Second World War with its administrative structure in tact and became a logical administrative support for the War Claims Commission created in 1952. This latter entity, composed of a Chief Commissioner, Thane A. Campbell, and several Deputy Commissioners, arose out of the recommendations of an antecedent "Advisory Commission [on War Claims]," 1951-1952, under the Chairmanship of Chief Justice of Nova Scotia and Ex-Minister of Finance, J. L. Ilsley. Though formally created under the Enquiries Act, the War Claims Commission was not a true autonomous entity, but rather a very simple deliberative body operating as a quasi-judicial Commission, administratively supported by the Office of the Custodian, with its entire modus operandi structured under the recommendations of the antecedent Advisory Committee of J. L. Ilsley as interpreted and refined by the Department of Finance through 1970.
The focus of the War Claims Commission was on claims for damage or loss in theatres of war anywhere in the world by Canadian citizens or corporate entities. As well as having a leading role in negotiating the treaties and financial agreements in which the settlements process operated internationally, the Department of Finance reviewed all precedent-setting cases and set out interpretations and directions by which the Commission was to determine settlements (in relation to Treaties and Agreements negotiated by personnel of the Department of Finance in conjunction with the Department of External Affairs). The Treasury Board (as a Committee of Cabinet) was the entity responsible for final approval of all settlements and had to approve the appropriations for each award by the Commission, but it was Department of Finance that was operating as the administrative head for the coordination of the claims fund and policy framework for the whole claims process. The administrative support role of the Office of the Custodian of Enemy Property is reflected in the residual case files series of selected War Claims preserved in a series for the "War Claims Branch" in the Custodian Fonds. The War Claims Commission was active from 1952 to 1960 and then revived from 1966 to 1970 for limited activity, including the production of a final published report incorporating and consolidating all the documentation of its governance, past summary reports of deliberations and results and selected decisions.
Just when the War Claims Commission was closing out its operations, a formal Commission entitled the Foreign Claims Commission was constitued under the Inquires Act in 1970 (initially with Thane J. Campbell again serving as Chief Commissioner, and succeeded by T. D. MadDonald). This Commission addressed the many issues of claims arising from nationalization of assets of corporate entities and persons who were, or subsequently became, Canadian citizens. It operated through 1987 under the authority of various orders-in-council and evolving terms of reference and personnel. [See the administrative history for the Foreign Claims Commission Fonds in Mikan record 167 for details.]
As with the War Claims Commission, the Department of Finance played a central role in the governance of this quasi-judicial process and was intimately involved in setting up the foreign treaties and financial agreements which governed the procedures under which this second distinct Commission would make awards. The Department of Finance also set up the Foreign Claims Fund from which the settlements and awards were made by the Commission from monies secured from foreign governments under formal agreements. Actual applications and associated documentation of claims was submitted through the Department of External Affairs. Just as this Commission was winding down, a final Foreign Claims Commission was constituted (1987-1989) with Peter A. Hargadon acting as Chief Commissioner under new terms of reference to deal with claims related exclusively to property expropriations during or after the Second World War in East Germany and Yugoslavia. The current series is the only known documentation of the activities of this final Foreign Claims Commission.
For years after 1990, Hart Clark, a retired Finance Officer who had been active in the administration of Department of Finance responsibilities in these matters since 1945, continued to administer the occassional action required to settle a given outstanding account or verify past decisions. By the early 1990s, the activity was virtually dormant but, for various reasons, the general claims account was never finally closed and, therefore, under the terms of the relevant disposition authorities, the records were not deemed to have reached the end of their dormant stage.
Complicating the custodial history and clear provenance of this series, was the administrative evolution of the Custodian of Enemy Property after 1943 when the Custodian came to provide administrative support to the War Claims Commission. Nominally the Secretary of State and the Registrar General of Canada had responsibility for the Office of the Custodian, which was in turn transferred to the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs. Then in 1972, responsibility (and records) were transferred to the Department of Supply and Services with the Deputy Minister of that department assuming the title and limited residual responsibilities of the Custodian. As a real operational entity, the Custodian essentially disappeared apart from custody of residual records and the assumption of the title of Deputy Custodian by the Deputy Head of the Department of Supply and Services. It was in these circumstances that the records of the Custodian, the War Claims Commission and the related files created by Department of Finance became subject to disposition in a regime of distributed custody of the records divided between Supply and Services and Department of Finance.
Immediately after the War Claims Commission was wound down in 1970, the custody and administration of the records held by the Custodian were transferred to Supply and Services Canada (antecedent to Public Works and Government Services Canada) through the Government of Canada Accounting Branch, and then, when disposition was deferred, eventually a portion was transferred back to the custody of the Department of Finance. In the meantime, Finance consolidated the War Claims Commission records with records related to the Foreign Claims Commssions and the Office of the Custodian. These records were retained and reorganized as a consolidated "International Claims" series as required by the limited amount of continuing activity that arose from a few unsetttled claims and inquries. Finally, realizing that the reason for not closing out the disposition of the records was a technicality not readily resolved, the Department of Finance approached Library and Archives Canada to arrange a final transfer of the residual records that documented this sustained coordination by the Department of Finance of these activities for over 90 years.
The disposition of these records had been anticipated since 1969 under RDA 1969/021 as amended by 77/006 and 77/007. The original authority was granted to Department of Finance to cover records considered to have been created by the Secretary of State through the agency of the War Claims Commission. 77/006 was granted to Supply and Services to deal with the files originally in the custody of Finance in 1969 as well as some "policy" files, the origins of which are not clearly specified. 77/007 applies explicitly to records of the Office of the Custodian of Enemy Property related to activity under Trading with the Enemy Act. Both authorities in 1977 were granted at the time to the Department of Supply and Services (whjch was in physical possession of all records related to the Custodian, the two Commissions (and possibly some records originally generated by Department of Finance in coordinating the overall activity). These ambiguities in the authorities are largely irrelevant in that the small residual series amounts to a reorganized and integrated set of records documenting the activity of the Department of Finance with five separate entities and three related departments (Secretary of State re the Custodian, External Affairs --treaties and international financial agreements -- and Treasury Board which was a separate Secretariat after 1966).
At the time of transfer in 2009, Library and Archives Canada had been trying to complete the transfer of these records for almost 20 years. The original terms of the authorities anticipated a selection after transfer, but the surviving series is too small to warrant or risk such a selection. In addition, the nature of the documentation relating to negotiations and other matters goes beyond the anticipated scope of any of the records disposition authorities. The main case file series related to the Office of the Custodian, the War Claims Commission and the first Foreign Claims Commission appears variously elsewhere in the Finance fonds as a highly selected and very limited series as well as in the Foreign Claims Commission fonds and the Custodian of Enemy Property fonds. The current series reflects the activity, custody and rearrangements of the Department of Finance over a sustained period at the end of which the records were kept in an artificially extended dormant status.