From the beginning of the Second World War in 1939, Mackenzie King tried to avoid conscription, lest civil war break out in Canada. Most English Canadians thought young men should be sent to fight. Most French Canadians vehemently disagreed. This same division had nearly torn the country apart during the First World War. Now a similar pressure was building. Should conscription be imposed? In spite of delaying tactics, King had to make a decision in the final year of the war. Mackenzie King and the Conscription Crisis combines archival footage with excerpts from The King Chronicles, a dramatic film series written and directed by Donald Brittain. Some scenes contain graphic language.