Three former Toronto mayors urge city not to rename Dundas Street

Three former Toronto mayors say that the city should revisit its plan to rename Dundas Street after raising questions about the interpretation of the research that led to this decision and the “practicality of carrying it out.”

Dundas Street as well as a number of parks, TTC stations, and Yonge-Dundas Square, are named after Henry Dundas, the 1st Viscount Melville. Dundas, who was alive from 1742 to 1811, was a Scottish lawyer, politician, and one of British Prime Minister William Pitt’s “most trusted and powerful ministers,” the City of Toronto said on its website.

Dundas is also believed to have left behind a controversial legacy as numerous studies of academic research found that he played a role in delaying the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade.

After receiving a 2020 petition with more than 14,000 signatures, city council began examining if using the name Dundas on one of its major thoroughfares and for several local landmarks aligned with its values of inclusion and equity.

On July 14, 2021, councillors voted overwhelmingly in favour of renaming Dundas Street and other civic properties.

A Community Advisory Committee has since been established and city staff are expected to report back to the executive committee by the end of this year with new name recommendations.

In their Aug. 14 letter, Art Eggleton, David Crombie, and John Sewell however, say there’s reason to believe that Dundas was not the person many think he was and was, in fact, a “committed abolitionist.”

They point to a case that Dundas took on in Scotland in 1778 where he defended an enslaved man named Joseph Knight. Their letter read that in court, Dundas said that he “hoped for the honour of Scotland, that the Supreme Court of this country would not be the only court that would give its sanction to so barbarous a claim. Human nature, my Lords, spurns at the thought of slavery among any part of our species.”

“The judges not only agreed but ended slavery completely in Scotland,” they wrote in the three-page letter.

The three former mayors then referenced an amendment to a motion that Dundas made as a British MP in 1792. This motion, which passed, moved to make the abolition of the Transatlantic slave trade “gradual.” Previously, a motion to abolish it by fellow British politician William Wilberforce had overwhelmingly failed.

“With Dundas’s amendment, it at least passed in the House of Commons, the first anti-slavery motion to do so in Great Britain. Unfortunately, the plan was subsequently defeated in the House of Lords,” wrote Crombie, Swell and Eggleton, who went on to note that Dundas’s appointment of abolitionist John Graves Simcoe as the first lieutenant-governor of Canada is another demonstration of his promotion of the “anti-slavery cause.”

They then pointed to Dundas’s role in “Britain taking steps to reverse two decades of oppression of Black Loyalists in the Atlantic provinces.”

“In summary, it appears that Henry Dundas for whom the street is named, was a committed abolitionist who, when facing strong opposition and certain defeat, rather than give up his quest, advocated for interim measures that would ultimately lead to that result,” they wrote.

“It seems he was doing the best he could under challenging circumstances at that time in history. Therefore, we don’t see a valid reason to remove his name from the street.”

Crombie, Sewell, and Eggleton also noted that with the City of Toronto dealing with a $1.5B budget shortfall, there are “more appropriate” ways to spend the $8.6 million it would cost to rename the street and landmarks bearing the Dundas name.

Graffiti that reads "Son of slaver and Colonialist Profiteer" has appeared on the statue of Robert Dundas 2nd Viscount Melville, son of Henry Dundas 1st Viscount Melville, in Melville Street, Edinburgh, Scotland, Tuesday June 9, 2020. (Jane Barlow/PA via AP)

Speaking with NewsTalk 1010’s John Moore early Monday, Sewell said that he and his former mayoral contemporaries are “going to bat for Dundas,” adding it’s important to “take history seriously” and to not “misrepresent the past.”

Sewell said people need to understand who Henry Dundas was and what he was all about.

“I think that's an important thing to try and come to grips with. I mean, I think many of us are very much opposed to what has happened to the Black community, in Canada and elsewhere, and we want to do everything we can to try and right that wrong, but trying to falsify history isn't going to help us in that regard,” he said, adding there “lots of other different ways” to spend the city’s money.

Sewell went on to say that although Dundas’s effort were slow to fruition, at least he was a “guy who got it done.”

Andrew Lochhead who created the initial petition to rename Dundas Street told CP24.com that he’s both disappointed and baffled that three powerful individuals would choose to invest their time, energy, and political capital to pen a letter calling for the repeal of a decision made by City Council two years ago.

“Why this, why now, when they could use their status and privilege to really, really support the Black and Indigenous community who have been calling for the removal of monuments and street names,” he said.

Lochhead also said that decades of research and studies were analyzed in order to come to these conclusions about Dundas and understand the harm caused by his gradual abolition motion. Coming to this determination was not made lightly, he noted.

“It’s in no way accurate to call Dundas an abolitionist. … And calling him one denigrates the significant work of historians, especially those from the Afro-Caribbean community. Nearly a century of scholarship supports the view that Dundas was no abolitionist,” he said.

“And to peddle this type of historical fiction during Emancipation Month is particularly galling. … I would encourage Crombie, Sewell, and Eggleton to read Dundas’s own words to understand what gradual abolition really meant.”

Gradual abolition, which Lochhead said may "sound like a pro-abolition position of compromise," was a plan advocated by Dundas to replace the transatlantic slave trade with a essentially self-sustaining enslaved population.

"The first part of this plan involved ramping up the slave trade with a focus on young girls and boys in prime child-producing years who would eventually make the importation of human beings unnecessary thanks to reproduction," he said.

"This is not an abolitionist position. In fact, this is an expressly pro slavery position and was supported by plantation owners."In terms of the roughly $9M required to rename the street and change the name of some local landmarks, Lochhead said that amounts to about a tenth of one per cent of the city’s budget, which he deems a worthy investment.

“Doing the work of reconciliation, doing the work of dismantling structural and systemic white supremacy should not be convenient, cheap, or an easy solution,” he said, urging everyone to familiarize themselves with this important period of history, especially by reading Afro-Caribbean scholarship.

“It sends the message that the experiences of the Black and Indigenous community is worthless. Nine million dollars is a penny in a bucket.”

In an email to CP24.com, the City of Toronto would only say state that in July 2021, city council directed the city manager to convene a Community Advisory Committee made up of Black and Indigenous leaders, along with other diverse residents and business owners living and working along Dundas Street, to develop a shortlist of new names for Dundas Street and Yonge-Dundas Square.

“With ongoing collaboration and support from the Community Advisory Committee, the City plans to release the shortlist of names for public feedback in fall 2023,” a spokesperson wrote in an email.

“Based on feedback from the public surveys, as well as research on the history and use of each name, committee members will then select a new name (or names) for the street and/or square, which will be presented to city council for consideration in early 2024.”

Shirven Rezvany, Chow’s spokesperson, said that the mayor has “publicly supported the 2021 council decision, which was a response to community wishes.”

“We expect updated information, including name options and updated cost estimates, to come back for city council consideration," he told CP24.com.