It will not be necessary to have a stock of popcorn in anticipation of the immigration referendum evening. The evocation – we dare not say “threat” – by François Legault of a call to the polls to force Justin Trudeau’s hand in the matter had the consistency of Jell-O. I am therefore taking a minimal risk by classifying this referendum in the little-known category of phantom referendums, these non-consultations which have (or have not) marked our history.
Immediately after the surprise election of the Parti Québécois (PQ) in 1976, Minister Marc Lalonde proposed organizing a federal referendum on independence to pull the rug out from under the sovereignists. The vote would have taken place across Canada. Lalonde told me that the question would have been: “Are you in favor of Quebec being an independent country from Canada?” »
But in the weeks following the election of René Lévesque, the popularity of the new government became evident and the chances of a backlash in the face of such an aggressive federal strategy were real. The Lalonde proposal was not supported by Pierre Elliott Trudeau, who feared that the use of a federal referendum on independence would legitimize the referendum tool.
The fact remains that if the federal government had organized this referendum in 1977 or 1978, the embarrassment for the Lévesque government would have been major. Beyond a call for rejection or boycott, a probably negative result would have put a large amount of lead in the wing of the PQ.
Another preventive referendum was considered. The mayor of Montreal at the time, Jean Drapeau, had difficult relations with the new Lévesque government. He confirmed to his biographers that he seriously considered asking Montrealers, on the day of the 1978 municipal elections, to vote for or against independence. Obviously, he would have campaigned for No and, given the demographic composition of the city, would have won his bet.
Why didn’t he do it? Because it would have been very expensive. Furthermore, the PQ government could have prevented it by modifying the Charter of the City of Montreal, which is a regular law, to prohibit this type of referendum. The mayor’s biographers believe that this threat convinced the Lévesque cabinet to be more receptive to certain of his requests, including the construction of the Olympic Stadium mast.
We almost had a referendum in 1981, this time organized by Pierre Elliott Trudeau. He wanted to modify and repatriate to Canada the country’s Constitution, which until then had been British law. It was not certain that the British would accept, because of the immense controversy created by its desire to proceed despite the refusal of the provinces, including Quebec. Trudeau subsequently said that in the event of refusal, he would have asked all Canadians by referendum for a mandate to unilaterally patriate the Constitution. This was not necessary, as London acquiesced.
The big phantom referendum is obviously the one that did not take place to ratify the new Constitution of 1981-1982. Quebec had demanded that it be held, but the prime ministers of English Canada were frightened at the idea that their population would say no to the enshrinement in the text of the linguistic rights of French speakers outside Quebec. Trudeau also used this obsession the day before the famous night of the long knives. By pretending to propose the holding of a referendum to Lévesque, who could not refuse, he deliberately created discord in the common front of the provinces. He had no intention of holding this referendum, and it did not take place.
In 1992 we found a special case: the ghost question. When organizing the consultation on the new Constitution negotiated in Charlottetown, Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney received a call from Jean Chrétien, then leader of the official opposition. He pleaded for the addition of a question on the Quebec ballot: “Are you for independence, yes or no?” »
Members of Mulroney’s cabinet studied the issue and referred it to pollster Alan Gregg. He considered the idea a good one, because it would have indirectly indicated to voters that the risk of independence was real if they rejected the agreement. But he also realized that the Quebec voter, this rabble-rouser, could vote no on both questions and derail the reform. Ultimately, Mulroney opposed it, judging that it would give the impression of federal paternalism.
Bourassa had also received Chrétien’s call. He refused to take what he perceived to be a serious risk. For what ? “It’s obvious that it would have ended 52% against 48%,” he told me afterwards. In what sense, I asked? “One or the other,” he replied. At the time, without even a breakdown of the undecided, sovereignty stood at 50% in the polls, independence at 47%. Details that seemed to have escaped Jean Chrétien.
Who knows, without the refusals of Mulroney and Bourassa, the Quebec Liberal government could have received in October 1992 the cumbersome mandate to achieve sovereignty.
In the end, we almost had a new referendum following the 1995 referendum, if the Yes vote had won. Jean Chrétien, then Prime Minister, had put the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada on alert. Considering the PQ question too vague, he would have asked a month or two later a harsher formulation, perhaps using the word “separation”. He was convinced of winning (like in 1992). But nothing says that having voted yes the first time, Quebecers would not have been more numerous the second time. Polls from the time indicate that the Yes vote had increased from 49% on the evening of the vote to 56% in December, as if voters showed remorse for not having been in the right camp, after the fact.
A positive result would have definitively closed the case. Jean Chrétien would then have become, reluctantly, the founding father of an independent Quebec. This ghost would have haunted him for eternity.