BY KATY LEROUGETEL
TORONTO - About 1000 people demonstrated in Ottawa February 16 in favor of Quebec's right to self-determination on the opening day of a week-long federal Supreme Court hearing.

At the request of the Liberal Party federal government, the court will be examining three questions: Does Quebec have the unilateral right to secede under the Canadian constitution? Does international law accord that right? If the two are different, which takes precedence?

The Quebec government has refused to participate in the proceedings, saying that it is the sole right of the Quebecois to decide their fate, not those who live in the predominantly English-speaking provinces. So the Court has appointed a sovereignist lawyer to plead Quebec's case. In addition to the Ottawa's legal representative, a series of lawyers, representatives of Native organizations, proponents of "Canadian unity," and a few supporters of Quebecois sovereignty will appear before the court.

In an October 1995 referendum on sovereignty in Quebec, the Yes (to sovereignty) vote lost by such a narrow margin that the results were widely seen as a defeat for the federal government. The June 1997 federal election results further registered the regional fracturing of bourgeois political forces. No party emerged as a national formation with strong representation in both Quebec and elsewhere in Canada. From this position of weakness, the Ottawa government has pursued a sustained course of anti-Quebec propaganda and initiatives, one of which is the Supreme Court case.

The federal government's initiative has provoked widespread dissension among federalist figures in Quebec. Both Daniel Johnson, who heads the Quebec Liberal Party, and Claude Ryan, leader of the No (to sovereignty) campaign in the 1980 Quebec referendum, have publicly declared that it is Quebec's right to decide its own future. Ryan warns of "dangerous consequences at the political level" if this is contravened.

The Toronto Globe and Mail editorialized, "There is too much wrong and too much risky in this reference.. The Supreme Court should find a way to put it off."

Quebec premier Lucien Bouchard of the Parti Quebecois was given a standing ovation by some 80 students at the Université de Montréal Faculty of Law when he addressed them February 12 to explain his support to Quebec's exclusive right to decide.

Federal justice minister Anne McLellan asserted in a front page Toronto Star interview published the day the Supreme Court case opened, "This is not about limiting the political will of Quebecers to express their views on their future in Canada. This is about helping [people] understand that you need respect for the rule of law to exercise free democratic will." A unilateral Quebecois declaration, she said, "leads us into an abyss where nobody knows anything about the rules that apply. You have chaos."

Only the New Democratic Party and Progressive Conservative Party forces sided with the pro-sovereignty Bloc Quebecois in a February 10 vote on a motion proposed by the Bloc in the federal Parliament. The Liberal and Reform parties united against the motion, which stated, "It is for Quebecers to freely decide their own future."

Court-appointed lawyer André Joli-Coeur, who is supposed to argue on behalf of the right of Quebec to independence, stated in his written submission to the court that this right is not because of national oppression. He pointed to the number of politicians who are Quebecois who have been prime minister of Canada and held other high offices over the past half century.

Recent events indicate differently. The January unemployment rate in Quebec, the country's second most industrialized province, rose to 11.3 percent. The Canadian average excluding Quebec was 8.1 percent.

There has been a decades-long struggle for French-language rights in Quebec, which continues today. The official send-off party organized for the Canadian Olympic team February 5 made headlines nationally. According to the Toronto Star "no more than five percent of the evening was spoken in French.. Many Quebecois journalists left during the [video] show in disgust."

Katy LeRougetel is a member of the United Steelworkers of America Local 5338.  
 
 
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