Pacific Scandal

The Pacific Scandal was a political scandal in Canada involving large sums of money being paid by private interests to the Conservative party to cover election expenses in the 1872 Canadian federal election, to influence the bidding for a national rail contract.^[1] As part of British Columbia's 1871 agreement to join the Canadian Confederation, the federal government had agreed to build a transcontinental railway linking the seaboard of British Columbia to the eastern provinces.^[2]

The scandal led to the resignation of Canada's first prime minister, John A. Macdonald, and a transfer of power from his Conservative government to a Liberal government, led by Alexander Mackenzie.^[3] One of the new government's first measures was to introduce secret ballots in an effort to improve the integrity of future elections. After the scandal broke, the railway plan collapsed, and the proposed line was not built. An entirely different operation later built the Canadian Pacific Railway to the Pacific.