Can you write “Canadian history news” and say nothing about the latest eruption of the debate over whether Quebec is a nation and whether that needs to influence the text of the Canadian constitution?
Well, I wish…
But I wrote a book about making constitutions in the 1860s (buy it here), one that is very much also about the failed efforts of the 1990s. It’s still the only post-Meech, post-Charlottetown history of confederation-making. So I may have a stake to hold.
I don’t like leadership contests of the kind we do in Canada. They are vote-buying competitions, pure and simple, and they pander to the worst in all concerned. One might guess the Ignatieff camp was burdened with the likelihood that its candidate’s anti-nationalist views and enthusiasm for international interventions (against national excesses, often) would not play well among potential vote-buyers in Quebec. They apparently concluded the best way to build a base in Quebec was to make a play for the soft-nationalist vote. It worked for Mulroney when he brought in Lucien Bouchard. It worked for Paul Martin when he positioned himself as more nationalist than Chrétien. In a vote-buying race, you can see the appeal. There is a lot of “noui” sentiment among potential vote-buyers, so that strategy generally works, short-time. Short term matters a great deal to Ignatieff’s number-crunchers right now.
It’s the long term that matters to the country.
Now that this unsavory race has revived debate about constitutional recognition of Quebec’s national status, I’d say this. A constitution is a machine for running a country. It sets out principles and defines powers. Mostly it’s not a place for love letters and sentimental declarations. One of the things we should admire in the constitution-makers of the 1860s is something constantly held against them: they tried to draft a practical constitution. They put in the principles but left out the poetry. For the constitution then, now, or in 1990, what should matter about Quebec’s status is the grants of powers that might flow from that. It’s the powers that matter, not the sentiment.
The lesson of the last twenty years, I would say, is: we cannot have a discussion about constitutionalizing the sentiment. It is the powers we need to examine and debate. Ignatieff and his “soft nationalist” supporters should be suggesting what constitutional powers they would favour giving Quebec. “Hard federalists” should, if they wish, be putting the case against them. Political leaders and those who seek leadership could all be contributing. Making political commitments about Quebec’s national status complicates that possibly fruitful discussion of powers, I would say. Poisons it, in fact.
I’m a great admirer and supporter of the cultural wonder that is Quebec, something unique in the world and vital to this continent, let alone the northern half of it. I believe I would support any measure necessary to the survival and prospering of Quebec. Show me a power that Quebec needs and does not have, and I’m prepared to consider it.
Including, I suppose, the independence of Quebec if it were necessary, and if it were properly decided. I’ve always been opposed to the independence of Quebec principally because Quebec and all that makes it unique can and will survive and prosper within Confederation. (Actually, there's another reason I'm opposed. For 150 years, every time Quebec has had to choose, whether through its elected representatives or through a referendum, the voters of Quebec have sustained the union. Who am I to disagree?)
All this debate has confirmed my admiration for Stéphane Dion. Sovereigntists and softer nationalists alike declare that to refuse this acknowledgment of nationhood to Quebec is intolerable to all of Quebec. This is nonsense, and it is important to have Stéphane Dion, and not just various Anglos, say it is nonsense. Dion’s own eloquent and rational insistence that we should debate powers and not sentiments obviously influences my own view of all this. But it’s easier for me than for him. His behaviour has been heroic, and for about ten years.
Doesn’t mean I’m convinced Dion must be Liberal leader or prime minister. In fact, I think Ignatieff has substantial claims despite his stumbles, including this one. As does Bob Rae. And Gerard Kennedy at least is a dozen years younger than these soon-to-be senior citizens. They all have their strengths to match their weaknesses.
I have not purchased a vote in their race, so I don’t have to have an opinion. Other than that a vote-buying race itself is contemptible.
Finally, it’s a debate that does credit to weblogging, I’d say. The whole issue is covered fairly summarily in The Globe today, though I guess it’s doing a pretty good job for all who want only a summation. But follow Paul Wells and Michel-C. Auger and the people they link to, and you can follow a pretty extensive and enlightening debate, complete with as many of the actual documents and position papers as you might want.
