Jeanne Mathilde Sauvé (; ; April 26, 1922 – January 26, 1993) was a Canadian politician, journalist and stateswoman who served as the 23rd governor general of Canada from 1984 to 1990 and as the 29th speaker of the House of Commons from 1980 to 1984. She was the first woman to hold either office, and is to date the only woman to serve as speaker of the House of Commons.
Sauvé was born in Prud'homme, Saskatchewan, and educated in Ottawa and Paris, prior to working as a journalist for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). She was then elected to the House of Commons in 1972, whereafter she served as a minister of the Crown until 1980, when she became the Speaker. She was in 1984 appointed by Queen Elizabeth II as the 23rd governor general since Canadian Confederation, on the recommendation of Prime Minister of Canada Pierre Trudeau, to replace Edward Schreyer as vicereine, and she occupied the post until succeeded by Ray Hnatyshyn in 1990. She was the first woman to serve as Canada's governor general and, while her appointment as the Queen's representative was initially and generally welcomed, Sauvé caused some controversy during her time as vicereine, mostly due to increased security around the office, as well as an anti-monarchist attitude towards the position.
On November 27, 1972, Sauvé was sworn into the Queen's Privy Council for Canada. She subsequently founded and worked with the Sauvé Foundation until her death, caused by Hodgkin's lymphoma, on January 26, 1993.
The highest trophy for the Canadian Ringette Championships, the major national competition for the sport of ringette, is named in her honour. Initially called the Jeanne Sauvé Cup, it was post-humously renamed the Jeanne Sauvé Memorial Cup.
Early life, youth, and first career Sauvé was born in the Fransaskois community of Prud'homme, Saskatchewan, to Charles Albert Benoît and Anna Vaillant, and three years later moved with them to Ottawa, where her family had previously lived. In Ottawa, her father would take her to see the bronze bust on Parliament Hill of Canada's first female Member of Parliament (MP), Agnes Macphail. Sauvé studied at Notre Dame du Rosaire Convent in Ottawa, becoming head of her class in her first year, and continued her education at the University of Ottawa, working for the government of Canada as a translator in order to pay her tuition. At the same time, Sauvé actively involved herself in student and political affairs; at the age of 20, she became the national president of the Young Catholic Students Group, which employed her in 1942, necessitating her move to Montreal.
It was there that Sauvé met Maurice Sauvé, and the two married on September 24, 1948, the same year the couple moved to London; Maurice had obtained a scholarship to the London School of Economics, and Sauvé worked as a teacher and tutor. Two years later, they moved to Paris, where Sauvé was employed as the assistant to the director of the Youth Secretariat at UNESCO, and in 1951, she enrolled for one year at the Sorbonne, graduating with a degree in French civilization. Sauvé and her husband returned to Canada near the end of 1952, where the couple settled in Saint-Hyacinthe, Quebec, and in 1959 had one child, Jean-François. Sauvé then became a founding member of the Institute of Political Research and was hired as a journalist and broadcaster with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's French-language broadcaster, Radio-Canada.
After success on her first radio programme, Fémina, Sauvé was moved to CBC television and focused her efforts on covering political topics on both radio and television, in both English and French. She soon drew attention to herself and was frequently invited by her friend Gérard Pelletier as a panellist on the controversial show Les Idées en Marche, there revealing her left-wing political ideologies. This absorption of a woman into the traditionally male world of political journalism and commentary was unusual, yet Sauvé managed to be taken seriously, even being given her own television show, Opinions, which covered "such taboo subjects as teenage sex, parental authority, and student discipline". On air from 1956 to 1963, "it was the show that made Jeanne famous". However, Sauvé also attracted negative attention due to her husband's eventual elevation as a Crown minister; in a piece in The Globe and Mail, Progressive Conservative MP Louis-Joseph Pigeon expressed concern over the wife of a minister being paid "fabulous sums by the CBC", calling the circumstances a "shame and a scandal".
Parliamentary career
It was the Liberal Party that wooed Sauvé into politics, asking her to run as a candidate in the Montreal riding of Ahuntsic during the 1972 federal election. Though she found campaigning arduous, saying: "I felt uneasy for the first time in my life when I was campaigning ... I must say I had qualms about it myself", Sauvé won, becoming one of five female MPs. She was subsequently both sworn into the Queen's Privy Council and appointed as Minister of State for Science and Technology in the Cabinet chaired by Pierre Trudeau, thus becoming the first woman from Quebec to become a minister of the Crown and the sole female in that Cabinet. Sauvé ran again in the election two years later, re-winning Ahuntsic, and was given the environment portfolio until 1975, when she was appointed Minister of Communications.
In the 1979 election, Sauvé won the riding of Laval-des-Rapides, but the Liberals lost their majority in the commons to the Progressive Conservative Party; she thus lost her Cabinet position. She remained MP for her riding after the federal election of 1980, which saw both the Liberals returned to majority position.
Speaker of the House of Commons Trudeau returned to position of prime minister in the 32nd Canadian Parliament, and selected Sauvé as his choice for the speaker of the House of Commons. Because she strongly desired to campaign for the "No" forces in the weeks leading up to Quebec's 1980 referendum on separation from Canada, Sauvé initially refused the offer to run for the non-partisan position. But she eventually acquiesced after Trudeau convinced her that she was the right person for the job and she received permission from the leaders of all the parties in the House of Commons to engage in the federalist campaign in Quebec. She became the first female Speaker of the House.
In her early days as speaker, Sauvé often made mistakes with the names of MPs or the ridings they represented—once calling on the Prime Minister as the "leader of the opposition"—and occasionally miscarried procedural rulings, which led to MPs addressing her with increasing curtness. Further, all 32 of the New Democratic Party MPs in the house walked out in protest of what they viewed as a bias on Sauvé's part; they felt she allowed Liberal MPs to ask more questions than those from any other party. In a CBC interview, Sauvé conceded that the NDP members may have been right that the Liberals may have been allowed more questions over two or three days, but, on the whole, each party received an equal number of opportunities. It was also speculated that MPs had taken to showboating for the television cameras that had recently been installed in the chamber.
Sauvé did, however, find success in implementing reforms that professionalised the speaker's tasks of managing expenses and staff for the House of Commons, cutting back on the excess bureaucracy, personnel, overtime waste, and costs she discovered upon her installation. Once the changes were made, Sauvé had reduced the commons' support personnel by 300 and saved $18 million out of the annual expenses, all of which, to some, actually improved overall service. Sauvé was lauded, by MPs and the media alike, for her courage in challenging the establishment. Other MPs, though, stated that she had gone too far and balked at the resulting inconveniences, such as having to clear their own plates in the commons cafeteria. At the same time, Sauvé also established the first daycare for Parliament Hill staff, MPs, and senators.
She also presided over debates on the constitution, dealing with filibusters and numerous points of order, as well as discussions over the proposed Energy Security Act, against which the loyal opposition mounted a counter-campaign that culminated in a two-week bell-ringing episode when the Conservatives' Whip refused to appear in the Commons to indicate that the opposition was ready for a vote. Despite pressure from the government that she intervene to break the deadlock, Sauvé maintained that it was up to the parties to resolve it themselves through negotiation.
Governor General of Canada Sauvé was the first female governor general in Canada's history, and only the second woman amongst all the Commonwealth realms—both previous and contemporary to the time—to assume the equivalent office, after Elmira Minita Gordon, who was in 1981 appointed Governor-General of Belize.
As governor general-designate It was in December 1983 announced from the Office of the Prime Minister of Canada that Trudeau had put forward Sauvé's name to Queen Elizabeth II as his recommendation on who should succeed Edward Schreyer as governor general of Canada. In the national media, the reception was generally positive, with Sauvé's elegance, refined nature, and bilingualism viewed as an asset to such a posting, despite speculation regarding her ability to remain non-partisan, as would be expected of the vicereine. However, by January 15, of the following year Sauvé resigned as an MP, and thus as speaker, and two days later she was hospitalised; rumours circulated that it was due to cancer, but the official story was that she had contracted a respiratory virus, which was further complicated by an allergy to antibiotics.
Still, Queen Elizabeth II, by commission under the royal sign-manual and Great Seal of Canada, appointed on January 28, 1984, Trudeau's recommendation that she appoint Sauvé as her representative. However, the latter remained in hospital, and her illness only worsened, leading colleagues to believe that she would die, and the Canadian Press and CBC to draft preliminary obituaries. Sauvé did recover, and was released from care on March 3, though the illness had delayed her installation ceremony, which had been scheduled to take place that month. Sauvé remained secretive about the exact nature of the illness, and did not pay attention to rumours that she had developed Hodgkin's lymphoma, stating in interviews that it was a private matter, and that she was well enough to uphold her responsibilities.
In office
Sauvé was sworn in as governor general on May 14, 1984, in a ceremony in the Senate chamber, during which Trudeau said: "It is right and proper that Her Majesty should finally have a woman representative here", though stressing that the Queen had not appointed Sauvé simply because she was a woman. Almost immediately, Sauvé made it clear that she would use her time as governor general to promote issues surrounding youth and world peace, as well as that of national unity.
As governor general, Sauvé kept up to date with Cabinet papers and met every two weeks with her successive prime ministers. She would not speak openly about her relationship with these individuals, but there was reported friction between Sauvé and Brian Mulroney, whom she had appointed as prime minister in 1984. It was speculated Sauvé disapproved of the way Mulroney elevated the stature of his office with more presidential trappings and aura, as exemplified by his insistence that he alone greet U.S. President Ronald Reagan upon his arrival at Quebec City for the colloquially dubbed "Shamrock Summit". This was taken by the media as a snub against Sauvé who, as the head of state's direct representative, would otherwise have welcomed another head of state to Canada.