The Speakers of the Senate of Canada

Hon. Arthur Charles Hardy
P.C., Q.C., B.A., LL.B. (1930)

Perhaps it was inevitable that Arthur Hardy should have been drawn to a political career: he was the son of an Ontario premier, grandson of a Cabinet minister in the pre-Confederation Province of Canada, and son-in-law of a senator.

Although he was a lawyer, his real interest seemed to be breeding cattle, at which he was an expert. His Holstein–Friesian May Echo Sylvia was the first of any breed to produce 1,000 pounds of milk in seven days, and his Jersey Rosebay’s Jolly Rose produced a record 1,004 pounds of butterfat over a year.

Hardy ran unsuccessfully in the 1917 federal general election. He headed the Ontario Liberal Association from 1919 to 1932, and was nominated to the Senate by Liberal Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King in 1922.

King appointed him to the Speakership of the Senate in May 1930, but his term ended in September when King was defeated by Conservative leader R. B. Bennett in the 1930 general election. Hardy’s tenure was the shortest in Senate history other than Speakers appointed temporarily to replace an absent Speaker. He was inducted into the Privy Council the next year, when he was also appointed as Honourary Lieutenant Colonel of the Governor General’s Foot Guards, Canada’s senior Militia infantry regiment.

On his death at 89 in 1962, he was the longest-serving member of the Senate.

A notable cattle breeder, Hardy sold a Holstein–Friesian calf in 1918 for $106,000 (roughly $1.1 million today).

Next Speaker: Hon. Pierre Édouard Blondin

Previous Speaker: Hon. Hewitt Bostock

© Library of Parliament  |  Revised: 2011-12

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