Adding my voice to those who responded to the interim leader of the Liberal Party of Quebec that “the great risk of René Lévesque has come true”, it seems useful to me to recall a moment in history and to report the words of the former premier of Quebec regarding the good risk.
Put forward in the weeks following Brian Mulroney’s takeover of power in 1984, the concept was described as follows by Mr. Lévesque during the National Council of the Parti Québécois on September 23, 1984: “If federalism were to function less poorly and even be improve, does this not risk stifling our fundamental option a little and postponing sovereignty indefinitely? There is an element of risk, but it’s a nice risk, and we don’t have the leisure to refuse. »
This concept was a response to Brian Mulroney’s commitment to “convince the National Assembly to give its assent to the new Canadian Constitution with honor and enthusiasm.” On the basis of this commitment, René Lévesque will present in May 1985 a Draft constitutional agreement. This project will include a requirement, namely recognition of the existence of the Quebec people. It will then provide that once such an existence is recognized, Quebec will be willing to conclude an agreement, under three conditions, namely: 1. to recognize Quebec’s primary responsibility in matters of rights and freedoms; 2. to agree to modify the amendment procedure; and, 3. to agree on the terms of Quebec’s participation in the Canadian federation.
If the beautiful risk had come true, these three conditions would have been satisfied. But were they? There is room for doubt.
Regarding the recognition of the existence of the Quebec people in the Canadian Constitution, the insertion by the National Assembly in the Constitutional Act of 1867 of an article 90Q.1 stating that “ [l]”Quebecers form a nation” results from a unilateral modification by Quebec. This is also the subject of a constitutional challenge in the Ravinsky et al case. vs. Attorney General of Quebec where the courts are asked to declare that this modification is “inadmissible, and ultra vires of the National Assembly of Quebec.
Concerning the recognition of Quebec’s primary responsibility in matters of rights and freedoms, not only did it not take place, but the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms was used to deny Quebec’s exclusive right to determine its official language and to legislate on all linguistic matters in the sectors of its competence.
The multiple appeals currently pending before the courts relating to the Charter of the French language, modified by the Act respecting the official and common language, French, eloquently illustrate the refusal of this condition, as well as the rejection of any discussion that the Quebec has the “power to subject its own laws to [sa] only Charter […] of human rights and freedoms. Quebec laws continue today to be subject to the Canadian Charter, including the Law on State Secularism, which is also the subject of numerous unconstitutionality appeals.
As for the modification of the constitutional amendment procedure called for in the Draft Constitutional Agreement, absolutely nothing has been done.
But where the problem lies and where the great risk has never been realized, it is with regard to the demand for satisfaction of Quebec’s legitimate demands. Whether it concerns the supervision of the so-called spending power, the elimination of the power of disavowal and reservation, the adaptation of skills to the needs of Quebec, particularly in terms of the selection and establishment of immigrants to the Quebec, communications, marriage and divorce as well as in its international relations, no progress has been made. The same goes for the reform of judicial institutions which was to result in the attribution to Quebec of the competence to appoint judges of the Court of Appeal and the Superior Court of Quebec.
As history teaches, Brian Mulroney’s government refused to enter into dialogue with René Lévesque’s government on the basis of the Draft Constitutional Accord. And we know the rest. Negotiations would lead to the conclusion on April 30, 1987 of the Meech Lake Accord, which was far from meeting the demands made by the government of René Lévesque two years earlier.
A few months after the conclusion of the Meech Lake agreement and as part of a conference organized as part of the first Entretiens Jacques-Cartier in Lyon, in June 1987, René Lévesque confided to a group of academics taking part in a conference on “Sovereignty at the dawn of the 21ste century” that the beautiful risk had been a “mistake”. I remember this exchange during which the founder of the Parti Québécois affirmed that there would be no honor or enthusiasm in reintegrating the Canadian constitutional fold on the basis of the Meech Lake agreement. This agreement will become obsolete in 1990, and the watered-down version of it, the Charlottetown agreement, will also be discarded in 1992.
René Lévesque did not live long enough to witness the failure of the last attempts to reform the Constitution of Canada. Those who attended it — as well as all Quebecers — should admit today that not only was the great risk not realized, but also that it was a mistake. And this error deserves to be repaired. The best remedy in this matter will not be to take another “great risk”, but rather to make a “responsible gesture”, that of making Quebec achieve independence.
This is the only gesture that should be made so that, as another leader of the Liberal Party of Quebec in the person of Robert Bourassa once said: “ [l]e English Canada [comprenne] very clearly that, whatever we say and whatever we do, Quebec is, today and forever, a distinct society, free and capable of assuming its destiny and its development.