Philippe Couillard tells Stephen Harper he wants Quebec to sign Constitution

This'll give the separashits fits.

It'll be a good day.

It'll be a good day.


It'll be a great day, as long as no one wants to renegotiate.

It's a good idea. You saw the anti-constitutional crap that Pauline Marois tried to pull, simply as a wedge issue to pit the Quebec and Canadian governments against each other to further her own nasty purposes.

It will be a happy day when Quebec fully becomes part of Canada.

That's the problem, though-Couillard believes that Quebec's distinct status ought to be recognized in the Constitution, and that he will try and convince his fellow premiers of that fact:



For those who don't read French, what Couillard is saying in the above post is that, while he has nothing against federalism in its curent form, he believes that it is time to take steps to recognize the specific character of the Quebec nation in the Canadian Constitution. He also mentioned his intent to visit his fellow premiers and the federal party leaders to convince them of this.

However, he also said that Constitutional talks should only take place when the time is right, and that hte main focus right now should be the economy:




In this quote, Couillard mentions that his main focus is the economy, but that he would also present Quebec's desires if the Constitution was in fact opened up and the other provinces or Ottawa began discussing the matter.

As to what Quebec's desires would be, Couillard said the following:



However, Couillard backtracked on the implications of this, saying that his main priority right now was the economy:



While Couillard might get some support from his fellow Premiers, I doubt that Stephen Harper would be interested in discussing something that goes against his own view of how Canada should be organized. That goes double for Justin Trudeau, who would never go against one of his father's most important beliefs when it comes to provincial equality. Tom Mulcair might want to, but somehow I doubt he would risk any government he might form if things go pear-shaped the way they did with Meech Lake.

The thing is, though, is that Couillard's support for reforms along the lines of the Meech Lake Accord are what many Quebec federalists not named Trudeau have been talking about for years. St�phane Dion, even while he was leader of the federal Liberals, talked about how Canada now has the practical advantages of Meech Lake but not the symbolic benefits that would have come from Quebec's distinctiveness recognized in the Constitution, and Dion also expressed his pride at being part of "la nation qu�b�coise". Claude Ryan expressed his support for reforms along those lines as well. Even Elijah Harper, the Aboriginal MLA from Manitoba who helped derail Meech Lake, specifically said later that his intent was to say no to Quebec, but simply to stand up and make a point that Aboriginal people's own goals and aspirations could not be ignored.

The threat of Quebec separatism was what led Pierre Trudeau to enter politics in the first place. Many of the changes he made, for all the very real good they did, ended up becoming far more supported by Canadians outside Quebec than among the Franco-Quebecois Pierre Trudeau originally strived to convince.

The end result is that we're stuck in a seeming merry-go-round where many Franco-Quebecois are alienated from the rest of the country, feeling as though the unique challenges they face are not being addressed. Most of the rest of us, on the other hand, don't understand what the hell is up with Quebec and think that they should just make a decision on the separation thing already, convinced that Quebecers are spoiled kids who aren't happy despite all the years Quebec PMs have been dominating the scene. The mutual insults and acrimony just create more ill will, and keep the merry-go-round spinning.

Most people don't realize that those thirty-odd years of Quebec PMs are not a single attempt by Quebec to impose its view of federalism on the rest of us, nor just a struggle between federalists and separatists, but also part of a tug-of-war between Pierre Trudeau and his supporters to snuff out Quebec nationalism and impose a view of Canada that actually took much more root in the rest of the country, and those Quebecers who hoped for some recognition of their province's distinctiveness in the Constitution.

Long story short?

Couillard is taking a smart and sensible approach to this, reminding the rest of us that this issue is not resolved, but also repeating that the still-fragile economy and jobs are what is most important for Quebecers as much as for the rest of us.

However, until we build a greater understanding of the Quebec issue in the rest of the country, and also make Francophone Quebecers more comfortable with the larger pan-Canadian identity, I wouldn't hold my breath on getting Quebec's signature on the Constitution.

The constitution recognizes the special status of aboriginals, why not Quebecers as well? This might be the time to strike, while there's an amenable govt in Quebec. Just because the seperatists were defeated again, doesn't mean they can't rise again too.

Fuck, I knew it was too good to be true.

Never mind, if anything the ROC is even more anti-Quebec than 15-20 years ago.

If there's a silver lining, it's that the separatist movement isn't in much better shape...



Note that Lucien Bouchard was saying the same thing even before Pauline Marois was elected:



Before anyone thinks that this means the whole issue is finally dead and buried, we should wonder whether Bouchard seriously had some sort of miracle conversion to federalism overnight. I'd weigh the probability as being somewhere between "no chance" and "not bloody likely." More likely he thinks that Quebecers have more important things to be working out.

This is not unlike the situation of 1984, when Pierre Trudeau was riding off into the sunset and seemed to have slain the separatists. The problem was that even in the 1980 referendum, and for all the claims that Trudeau "destroyed" the separatists, the fact remains that among Francophone voters, support for separatism and federalism was split squarely down the middle, with the province's Anglophone and other minorities ensuring the win.

The fact is that, based on a lot of the stuff I've seen in my own readings, there was a large sense of political malaise in Quebec by the early 1980s, a malaise brought about by a combination of the economic pains Quebec and Canada as a whole were enduring, Ren� L�vesque pissing off his political base by cutting government spending to balance the books (something he did a good 10-15 years before Ralph Klein and Mike Harris made it trendy in other parts of Canada) and L�vesque's admission that Brian Mulroney's overtures with Meech Lake were a "beau risque".

None of this suggests that the Franco-Quebecois enthusiastically threw their nationalism over the side and bought into Pierre Trudeau's way of looking at things. Even many Quebec federalists were infuriated at the way Trudeau patriated the Constitution, and many of them, including many of Trudeau's former colleagues from Ottawa, all came out in support of Meech Lake. Federalists like Claude Ryan were quite happy with the actual content of the Charter of Rights, but that all-important recognition of Quebec's distinctiveness, the same distinctiveness that federalist Quebecers from Georges-Etienne Cartier to Henri Bourassa to Andr� Laurendeau to Claude Ryan to L�on and St�phane Dion to Phillippe Couillard have all supported in their own ways, is missing from the Constitution, and this remains the sticking point which has left so many Quebecers still alienated from Canada.

I'll provide references to the written works I've read on the subject if anyone's interested...

If there's a silver lining, it's that the separatist movement isn't in much better shape...

... and why would it be? Quebec got defacto sovereignty about almost everything, anyway.

Yeah, but that doesn't mean it might not come back again, and if Quebec really has de facto sovereignty, why does separatism even still have a pulse? And we're still no better off, considering that many Quebecers remain alienated from Canada and there's a lot of ill will on both sides, which could eventually rebound into something bad.

At least one Franco-Quebecois thinks so, too...



They're not alone in this, of course-many Anglophones are still wondering how exactly multiculturalism ought to work, Aboriginal peoples are also trying to figure out exactly who they are, and new immigrant groups are trying to figure out exactly how they fit into Canadian society too.

However, de facto sovereignty doesn't exactly help things.

Well, unlike Scotland, Quebec is right at the heartland center of this continent and it is by no means certain how our southern neighbour will react to having their northern coastline on the Great Lakes come under the control of a possibly hostile country. There are many other complications, like a French Quebec that is surrounded by native nations who have bigger, better and older claims to the same land that the Quebecois want to take out of Canada. The U.N. may end up adjudicating on whether Quebec is any more than 100 miles wide. This will be a very complicated process regardless of how TROC reacts and the Quebecois have been lying to each other about sovereignty. The Scots may be about to pull it off but their situation is entirely different. They are surrounded by countries just like theirs ... Denmark, Norway, Iceland and Quebec is surrounded by 330,000,000 Anglos and counting and that is about to get a lot worse as Quebec's birth rate falls right over a cliff. Many, many factors and factions will not allow Quebec to get any more sovereign than they are now.

Maybe, but with the sentiment in other parts of Canada that Quebec ought to leave Confederation, with Martin pointing out how much higher it apparently is than it was even just after 1995, that might, God forbid, be enough to tip the balance. People were declaring the issue dead in 1984, and Trudeau himself was declaring it dead back in 1975.

The Quebecois are not the only ones lying to themselves about sovereignty, of course-anybody who thinks that the rest of the country would benefit by Quebec's departure is fooling themselves just as much, as I've shown elsewhere.

However, Quebecers are hardly the only ones who have contemplated separatism despite it being apparently unthinkable. Remember Roy Romanow's admission about Saskatchewan also contemplating secession if Quebec left in 1995? Or how, according to his Wikipedia page, Ezra Levant not only supported Quebec separatism in 1995 but also said in 1996 that Alberta should contemplate separating if the federal Liberals were re-elected?

Reason shows that Quebec, and Canada as a whole, is far better off if the country stays united. However, especially fervent emotion can lead to things happening that reason alone suggests would never occur.

Canada might easily fracture into three or four pieces. Even Saskatchewan considered separation during the last referendum. I guess that it was because of the UNFOGIVEABLE OUTRAGES committed against Saskatchewan by Canada, I guess.

I really don't like living in a nation of whiny victims. Just how far up your asshole can you bury your head, anyway?