Curses and rum: What N.S. history can reveal about this summer's provincial election

Former Nova Scotia politician Graham Steele has spent the last year digging into the province's political history, and is offering up a view from the past just in time for the summer election.

In his latest book, Nova Scotia Politics 1945 to 2020: From Macdonald to McNeil, Steele writes about wins, losses, buying votes with rum — and even a few curses.

"So many interesting things to watch for in this election … what we see about them can be so enriched by knowing a bit more about our history," Steele, a lawyer, author and former New Democrat MLA, told CBC's Mainstreet Cape Breton on Monday.

"The more that Nova Scotians know about their politics, the better choices that we can make, and ultimately, hopefully the better government we're going to have."

Since 1945, nobody has stepped in to take over their party from a sitting premier and then gone on to win a majority government, said Steele.

After Angus L. Macdonald died in 1954, Henry Hicks tried and failed. Ike Smith was also unsuccessful after taking over from Robert Stanfield, who went into federal politics in 1967.

Smith was eventually followed by Donald Cameron, then Russell MacLellan and Rodney MacDonald. 

Now, Liberal Leader Iain Rankin is in the same situation after taking over as premier from Stephen McNeil earlier this year.

"I think it'll be very interesting to see if he can break the curse that has defeated all of these previous politicians, some of them very experienced and very capable," said Steele, who works as the information and privacy commissioner for Nunavut and lives in Iqaluit.

He'll also be keeping a close eye on what happens to Independent candidates Elizabeth Smith-McCrossin and Alana Paon.

From a historical perspective, Steele said it's very hard to win as an Independent. Provincially, it hasn't happened since 1988 when Cape Bretoners Paul McEwan and Billy Joe MacLean won seats in the legislature without party affiliation.

"Pretty capable" people have tried and failed, Steele said, like former cabinet minister Ernie Fage who ran as an Independent after being ousted by the Tories in 2007.

"It'll be very interesting to see whether that particular pattern or curse, if you want to call it that, can be broken again," Steele said.

Summer elections are rare in Nova Scotia. There was one in 1999, but MacLellan was forced into it when his minority Liberal government was defeated. In 2003, John Hamm — whose Tories won a majority in the 1999 vote — chose an August election date.

Hamm's government was subsequently reduced to a minority government.

Although it's tough to grab people's attention during the summer and there's a real concern about voter turnout, Steele said "conventional wisdom" is that low turnout favours the incumbent government — which hasn't proven to be true.

So far this election, each party has zeroed in on specific sectors or areas of investment like health care, tourism or affordable housing.

Steele said parties rely on polling to tell them what finely targeted messaging they should hit to win specific blocks of voters. But decades ago, parties used to rely on "the big character" — like Angus L. Macdonald and Stanfield, Steele said.

He added the old stories of buying votes with bottles of rum, nylon stockings and boxes of chocolates were very real, and they resulted in a much higher voter turnout than today.

Steele said that's likely because people were walking away with a real reward. As far as he can tell, the last documented case happened around 1993, which is exactly the point when voter turnout began dropping off. 

"It's part of Nova Scotia's history. And, you know, some people might say that as politicians go around now on the campaign trail, making all kinds of promises, that that is essentially a form of vote buying," he said.

Nova Scotians head to the polls on Aug.17.