William Lyon Mackenzie King
William Lyon Mackenzie King was the leading Canadian politician beginning in the early 1920’s till 1940’s – he was elected as the 10th Prime Minister of Canada in the year 1921 for a five year term that ended in the year 1926 and again for the following term from 1926 to 1930. After absence from office for the subsequent political term, he again held the office of the chief executive from the year 1935 till 1948. Best described politically as a Liberal, he has had twenty-two years’ worth of experience in public office and is recognized as the premier having served the longest term in the history of the country. Taught and trained in social work and as a lawyer, he displayed a strong curiosity towards the condition of humans, ultimately playing a key part in establishing the groundwork for turning Canada into a welfare state (Welfare State, The Canadian Encyclopedia).
As stated by historians and his personal biographers, Mackenzie was short of the emblematic personal qualities of prodigious frontrunners, particularly when compared with the likes of Charles de Gaulle of France, Winston Churchill and Margret Thatcher of England, Franklin D. Roosevelt of the United States of America or even lesser known personalities like Joey Smallwood of Newfoundland – the masses were not enthralled by him. He did not possess a forceful presence or a charismatic personality. He lacked the necessary rhetorical talent and failed to stand out on the media of his time. Moreover, his greatest piece of work was strictly academic in nature (English and Stubss, 1977). He was totally stony and insensitive towards normal human interaction, he possessed many associates but a limited number of those he could label as close friends. He stayed a bachelor all his life and did not have a hostess by his side whose allure could act as a ancillary for his shortcomings. His supporters were irritated by his continuous schemes as well the clandestine beliefs he kept regarding spiritualism and the usage of certain means to establish communication with the departed, in particular, with his deceased mother. He famously permitted his devout spirituality to garble his comprehension of Adolf Hitler (Granatstein and Lamb, 1977).
Historians have settled on the fact that the premier continued to retain political power for such a long time due to the fact that he had established an all-encompassing skill-set that was suitable to the country’s requirements of the time (English and Stubss, 1977). He was intensely sensitive to the changes in policies and regulations - he was labeled as a workhorse with an astute and piercing intellect as well as a thoughtful comprehension of how the social order and the economic system operated. He also comprehended the nexus between capital and labor. He was a master of timing and also possessed a good ear for the mentality and temperament of the average Canadian citizen. He can also be described as a developing technocrat who viewed executive arbitration as indispensable to a manufacturing society; he desired his political party (Liberal) to characterize copious corporatism to produce societal accord. King labored to convey negotiation and coherence to a number of opposing and disputing components, employing government activities and policymaking as his apparatuses. He spearheaded the political party (Liberal) for over three decades and recognized the country’s global standing as a force somewhere in the middle that is entirely dedicated to the global political stage (Canadian Biography Online). A study of academics in the year 1997 by the magazine named Maclean's categorized King number one amid all of the country’s chief executives up till now even ahead of personalities like Wilfrid Laurier and Macdonald. Stewart has initiated that even Liberal protesters have but an indistinct remembrance of him.
King’s particular intention to transfer the personal heritage of hostility for the everyday person combined with his conviction that God would lead his route in life, further permitting him as a scholar; clasp the new theoretical idealism as an authorization of his own Christianity. He viewed idealism as a means to fill in the fissure amid the wealthy and the downtrodden. In late circles of Victorian intellectuals, idealism discovered its genesis at institutions of higher studies like University of Oxford where the ethical enticement of logical idealism and pragmatic research of culture were intricately interconnected. An idealist philosopher at Oxford by the name of Green communicated to his pupils a responsibility to understand their higher selves through provision of facilities to others. The collective theories of Green and his contemporaries like Toynbee were persuasive in the expansion of social efforts in Britain. In the city of Toronto, an influential communal moral belief included ethical and methodical intensions and reinforced by the British understanding established inside the academic community at the University of Toronto. Sarah Burke labels this societal morality as the Toronto Ideal. She records a robust connection amongst the ethical values of British idealism and social facilities available to the community at University of Toronto was established based on the debate that empirical evidence can also be employed in the solving of societal issues.
Even during his lifetime, King’s spiritual values were common knowledge to a mere handful of his close associates; because he wished for the topic to stay under wraps, he usually avoided a large number of related groups and further ensured that the mediums he referred to were inconspicuous, completely trustworthy and appreciated his concerns for privacy. Following his death, his supernatural interests became publically known – this was followed by a series of queries regarding what part of his political office had relied upon and followed advice gained from the departed.
One trusted source, Geraldine Cummins stated that Mackenzie’s realistic and precarious appraisal of the proof provided by other supernatural investigations captivated her. She considered him to be far too bright to be naïve and gullible and that his opinions on the theme were very informative. The actual inquiry of if he depended on the supernatural to decide on political judgments was responded after it was exposed by one individual that when counseled regarding possible issues in the Asian region, he stated that King had created a principle of negating the advice provided by the supernatural and he relied only on his personal and his advice-giver’s decisions.
In the year 1977, King's biographer possessed numerous diaries of his in which the answers of the mediums to his inquiries were burnt out. The outstanding collections were sealed until the year 2001. They displayed still, that whilst holding office, King may not have heeded the political counsel of the supernatural; however, he did get enormous relief from the conviction that his treasured ones continued to live on in the hereafter.

References
Canadian Biography Online. (n.d.). Welcome to the DCB Online | Bienvenue au DBC en ligne. Retrieved January 14, 2013, from http://www.biographi.ca/009004-119.01-e.php?BioId=42131

English, J., & Stubbs, J. O. (1977). Mackenzie King: widening the debate. Toronto: Macmillan of Canada.

Granatstein, J. L., & Lamb, W. K. (1977). Mackenzie King: his life and world. Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson.

Welfare State - The Canadian Encyclopedia. (n.d.). The Canadian Encyclopedia. Retrieved January 14, 2013, from http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/articles/welfare-state