The Referendum

       
   Half of my readers have been complaining about the lack of content. The other two are disappointed in the content. To placate the former I will provide a quick post which consists largely of content provided by others, which should satisfy the latter since my thoughts and writing are kept to a minimum.

   If you are like most Canadians I know, you are consumed by the U.S. election which will take place next week. About it, I can think of nothing which has not been written. So, the focus here is on the 25th anniversary of a vote that took place in Quebec.

   It was a very important event and I was reminded of it by an email I received this morning from Maclean's. It is a very good magazine, by the way, and you should subscribe to it and pay more attention to Canadian affairs which, admittedly are not quite as, shall we say,  baroque as those south of our border. A portion of the email is appended:

ANNIVERSARY OF THE DAY: Twenty-five years ago today, Quebecers nearly voted to leave Canada. A stunning 93 per cent of eligible voters cast a ballot for either "Oui" or "Non," and the nays won the day with a margin of a little over 1 per cent. "So near and so far for sovereigntists, and so uncertain and unsatisfying a result for both sides," wrote Anthony Wilson-Smith in Maclean's.

   The email included a link to the article in Maclean's written at the time: "A House Divided: After A Narrow NO Win, Federalists Fear That the Real War is Only Starting," Anthony-Wilson Smith, November 6, 1995. Snippets from the article are provided below. Let us hope that the headlines from the election next week are not similar to the one noted above and the results more satisfying and certain.

It took 128 years to make Canada into the country that it is today—and 10 hours of voting and a margin of only 53,498 votes to almost break with that past and reshape both the map and the country’s future. No, 50.6 per cent, total votes: 2,361,526. Yes, 49.4 per cent, 2,308,028 votes. In however much time remains to Canada as a united country, those figures are likely to stay burned on the consciousness of federalists and Quebec sovereigntists alike. By that narrowest of margins, the dream of preserving one existing nation almost died on Monday night, and the dream of building a newer, smaller one within Quebec was thwarted—for now. “The people have spoken, and it is time to accept that verdict,” said a clearly relieved Prime Minister Jean Chrétien early Tuesday morning, when it finally became clear that the No side had won. But, said Quebec Premier Jacques Parizeau, in a defiant speech that was in sharp contrast to Chrétien’s attempt to make peace, “the battle for a country is not over. And it will not be until we have one.”

So near and so far for sovereigntists, and so uncertain and unsatisfying a result for both sides. The vote result means that Canada survives—by the barest of margins, and, perhaps, for the briefest of periods in its present form. The final result, which took close to four hours to record, showed the two sides divided by fewer than 54,000 votes out of a total of 4,669,554 cast, and the province riven by cleavages along linguistic, ethnic and regional lines. Montreal, the metropolis and economic motor of the province, voted massively No: the rest of Quebec, with the exception of the Ottawa Valley region, went strongly to the Yes side. Montrealers and ethnic and anglophone voters joined together to defeat Yes voters who were overwhelmingly francophone native-born Quebecers from other regions.

The Bonus:

   Paul Wells writes often and very well for Maclean's and you can read his posts without a subscription, but I won't provide the link since you should subscribe. He went to Western and I will have to ask some of my old friends in the Political Science Department if they have any good stories about him.

   I kept my subscription to Maclean's even after the humour column by Scott Feschuk was dropped. Fortunately you can read some of Feschuk's posts here. For those of you who insist on following the antics of President Trump, read what Feschuk had to say in this post back in 2017: "Scott Feschuk Unpacks Donald Trump's Totally Awesome Just-Trust-Me Tax Plan."

   Feschuk also went to Western and you can read more about him in this article by Brent Holmes, "Faces of the Gazette: Scott Feschuk,". One of his books, by the way, looks like required reading: The Future and Why We Should Avoid It.

  I wrote earlier about another Maclean's columnist, Allan Fotheringham and you can read it here: The Death of Dr. Foth.