INTRODUCTION
Who is the prime minister of Canada? Politically, he or she is a member of Parliament and leader of the Government of Canada. In the past, the occupant of this position has been described as “first among equals” in relation to the Cabinet he leads, but in practice the PM is, by far, the most powerful figure in Canadian politics. This is despite the fact that the prime minister has no formal constitutional power. As the late political scientist and McGill University professor J.R. Mallory noted in his 1984 book, The Structure of Canadian Government: “The office of prime minister, the most important single office in the government, is, while not unknown to the law, entirely lacking in a legal definition of its powers.”

Unlike the president of the United States, whose powers are specifically spelled out in that country’s Constitution, the prime minister has no clearly defined constitutional authority; and yet the PM has enormous control over the government in Canada. He appoints and directs the Cabinet, which is at the heart of the executive branch; leads the direction of the government in the House of Commons (the legislative branch) and outside of it; and appoints justices to the court system, including the Supreme Court (Stephen Harper appointed eight), part of the judicial branch. He also effectively appoints the governor general, senators, heads of the military, deputy ministers, and ambassadors; the prime minister is also the country’s leader in its foreign relations, notably with the United States, and also represents the country at numerous international summits and organizations such as NATO or the U.N. He or she is the national and global face of the government and country, and as such is the single most important figure in Canadian politics. In addition to all of that, the PM leads a national political party. As Brian Mulroney once noted, “The traditional definition of the prime minister’s role as primus inter pares is, in reality, on a daily basis significantly understated.”

But how well do we know our prime ministers? How well do we understand the nature of the job? “It’s never easy to be prime minister,” Jean Chretien once wrote, years before he took the keys to 24 Sussex Drive. “He has to hurt the feelings of a lot of people on a regular basis; he has to operate in the public eye with MPs who fret and bureaucrats who gossip and colleagues who disagree.” The prime minister may have to do more than hurt people’s feelings. He may send troops to war or make policy decisions that hurt some people economically. His decisions are always bound to upset someone.

As the head of the government and the biggest star on our political stage, the prime minister is always in the spotlight. He has the power to lead the country where he wants. “You can make a difference in what is happening,” Jean Chretien told me.

“When you’re prime minister you can make a decision that does more good in five minutes — something that would take you five months to work on when you’re not in government,” reflected Paul Martin on the abilities a PM has to effect change. When Louis St. Laurent was asked about what pleasures he took from the job, he struck a similar note: “I suppose the principal compensation is the illusion, perhaps, but nevertheless the satisfaction of feeling that he has been useful.”

Clearly, the prime minister is an instrument of power. But what else is there to the country’s highest position of leadership, and what do we know about the people who have served in that role? That is the question that this book attempts to answer. Bruce Hutchison, the venerated Canadian journalist, put it well in his 1965 book, Mr. Prime Minister, a survey of the country’s leaders. In pondering the future of Canada, Hutchison suggests that former and future Canadian prime ministers “must see that the great imponderable is not economic, financial, orlegislative but emotional, psychic, human. It therefore centres in the prime minister not as a constitutional instrument but as a human being.”

Focusing also on that human dimension — and perhaps the exigencies of the job — Lester Pearson remarked, “Prime ministers require the hide of a rhinoceros, the morals of St. Francis, the patience of Job, the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Hercules, the leadership of Napoleon, the magnetism of a Beatle and the subtlety of Machiavelli.”

Being Prime Minister peels back the curtain to allow the reader to see our former leaders in ways that no single book has before. How did they travel? What pets did they have? How did they treat others? What was life like at home? What were their pastimes?

Those who love history often love it because of the small anecdotes that entertain or reveal character. This was something historian Barbara Tuchman called “history by the ounce” — little stories that illuminate. Through anecdotes about the lives of prime ministers while in office, readers will see these twenty-two men and one woman in a new light. They will see them as humorous and hard-working, vain and vulnerable, riled and relaxed. They will see not only what animated Canada’s prime ministers when they were not sunk in briefing books, but also how the office of prime minister has changed by exploring it through lenses such as security, travel, and daily routines. Readers will see how our PMs worked, as well as the toll exacted by the stress of being the leader of Canada.

Canadians have always had an interest in the lives of their country’s prime ministers. Magazines and newspapers have regularly run features and rankings about them. Books — and there have been many — whether they chronicle all PMs, such as Jack Granatstein and Norman Hillmer’s 1999 book, Prime Ministers: Ranking Canada’s Leaders, or focus on a single prime minister, such as John Ibbitson’s 2015 biography of Stephen Harper, are bestsellers. National conversation fixates on the PM. What is more, in an age where increasing attention is paid to celebrities, it is little wonder that the most important political figure in the country receives more scrutiny than ever — something leveraged well by the current prime minister, Justin Trudeau.

The office of prime minister has changed, and the experiences of those who occupy it have also changed since 1867, when Sir John A. Macdonald became Canada’s first PM. He handled his own correspondence, he had no security detail, and did not have to deal much with a prying media or the demands of thirty-six million Canadians. His travel was limited, and he made just one cross-country trip. Justin Trudeau, 150 years later, has a small army of people working for him to allow him to execute the powers of his office; travels on almost a weekly basis, visiting places across Canada and around the world; and has numerous files to track in a Cabinet of more than thirty ministries (Macdonald had fifteen). Indeed, the PM of our time suffers from an “overload” problem because of the amount of work and attention demanded by the job.

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Despite differences in historical contexts, our prime ministers are all linked by the nature of the office. The former prime ministers still living (and I interviewed six of the seven) are well aware of those who came before them. In 1999 Jean Chretien told me he often thought about how Wilfrid Laurier might handle one situation or another. Brian Mulroney wrote in his memoirs that “sometimes in Cabinet, when I’m having a particularly difficult time of it, I glance at the painting of Sir John A. that faces me and wonder what that wise old head would suggest I do. Sir John and all his successors as prime minister have known moments of great sadness and personal defeat.” Mulroney’s comments hint at the emotional, personal side that Hutchison spoke of.

Canadians are quick to criticize a prime minister for his policies and often conflate the political with the personal. That’s politics. But when you go behind the scenes of this most important job, you see that there is a fascinating and human element to being prime minister. You see individuals with an incredible capacity for work, a deep sense of commitment to making Canada a better place, and varying aptitudes for managing people and circumstances. You also realize that when you strip away the trappings of power and get to the people, under the cloak of authority is a familiar humanity. “We’re human, we’re families,” Joe Clark told me. This book chronicles some of the personal and private aspects of the lives of prime ministers as well as the nature of the position. “It’s not a perfect job,” Pierre Trudeau once said of being prime minister, “but it sure beats working.”