This thesis examines anti-Semitism in the Alberta Social Credit Party under the Aberhart and Manning regimes. It is based on various archival sources from the Glenbow Archives-Institute in Calgary, Alberta, the Premiers' Papers at the Provincial Archives of Alberta in Edmonton, contemporary press reports, and the Social Credit Party's national organ, the Canadian Social Crediter. It argues that anti-Semitism in the Alberta Social Credit Party was not the purview of a marginal, extreme wing of the Party, but that it was an integral element of Social Credit ideology. This ideology was espoused by most Social Crediters, including premiers Aberhart and Manning. When Ernest Manning purged the Movement of its anti-Semites in 1947-1948, he was attempting, unsuccessfully, to eradicate the very essence of Social Credit ideology. The consequence of thirty-six years of Social Credit rule is the persistence of an Albertan political culture which breeds provincialism and intolerance.

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The purpose of this thesis is to examine the anti-Semitic propaganda of Social Credit movement in the 1930s and 1940s and its impact on organized Canadian Jewry. During World War Two, the Alberta Social Credit government and its provincial land national parties engaged in the dissemination of anti-Semitic propaganda, which greatly concerned the Canadian Jewish Congress, the national representative organization for Canadian Jewry. The Canadian Jewish Congress responded by attempting to confront and end this propaganda; however, it lacked a public relations philosophy effective and assertive enough to do so. Eventually the Social Credit movement realized the political liabilities of engaging in anti-Semitic propaganda; yet despite Congress's years of efforts, it could take little credit for Social Credit's purge of anti-Semitism. An examination of the relationship between the Canadian Jewish Congress and the Social Credit movement adds a new perspective on the history of both organizations, and reveals much about ethnic organization in Canada and the nation's political culture of intolerance. / The sources for this thesis come from the Canadian Jewish Congress National Archives in Montreal, the National Archives of Canada in Ottawa, the Provincial Archives of Manitoba in Winnipeg, the Glenbow Archives-Institute in Calgary, and the Provincial Archives of Alberta in Edmonton. The Canadian Social Crediter, Vers Demain, and other Canadian newspapers were used extensively. The sources on the Social Credit movement held at the Canadian Jewish Congress National Archives have not been used before, which makes this thesis a significant departure from previous works.

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