Malcolm Mercer Hollett

Who was Malcolm Mercer Hollett?

Malcolm Mercer Hollett was a Newfoundland magistrate, politician and Canadian Senator.

Hollett was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship in 1915 after graduating from Mount Allison University in New Brunswick but he delayed going to the University of Oxford in order to enlist in the Royal Newfoundland Regiment. He enrolled at Oxford after World War I and graduated with a diploma in economics in 1921.

He returned to Newfoundland after his studies and was appointed magistrate. Hollett led relief efforts after the 1929 Grand Banks earthquake created a tsunami that devastated the communities of the Burin Peninsula where he lived.

Hollett served in the Newfoundland National Convention and was a member of the colony's 1947 delegation to London. He opposed Newfoundland joining Canadian confederation and supported the reinstitution of responsible government. During the 1948 referendums on Newfoundland's future, Hollett was a leading member of the Responsible Government League that campaigned against joining Canada.

He ran and was elected to the House of Assembly as a Progressive Conservative member for St. John's West in 1952. The next year, he became leader of the Progressive Conservative party and Leader of the Opposition.