30th Anniversary of the
Defeat of the Meech Lake Accord
Political and Constitutional Renewal Has Never Been More Urgent
- Christine Dandenault -
June 23, 2020
marked the 30th anniversary of the defeat of the Meech Lake Accord.
Thirty years after its defeat, the issue of vesting sovereignty in the
people through political and constitutional renewal remains the main
issue to be resolved. The struggles of workers, youth, women, and the
First Nations for their rights and the rights of all, including the
fight against COVID-19, are coming up against the denial of their
political power, which poses the block to their implementation of a
nation-building project that defends the rights of all, provides a new
direction for the economy and makes Canada a zone for peace.
Today, political power is concentrated in the
hands of supranational private interests which collude and compete for
narrow private gain and domination. Notably, to the detriment of the
well-being of all and the right of the people to determine their own
affairs, they manoeuvre through states at their disposal, including
Canada. Today, the Canadian constitutional system is the instrument of
the factions of the imperialist ruling elite, who have no real ties
with Canadians other than the economic and political power they have
usurped and continue to wield against them. They operate through
various governments, so-called democratic institutions, the cartel
political parties of the Canadian parliament, the provincial
legislatures and the Quebec National Assembly. Canada urgently needs a
modern constitution that vests sovereignty in the people and guarantees
the rights of all, including the Aboriginal and treaty rights of the
First Nations and the right of the Quebec nation to self-determination.
The Failure of the Meech Lake Accord
On June 23, 1990, the Meech Lake Accord was
defeated. It was a set of amendments to the Constitution of Canada
negotiated behind closed doors in 1987 by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney
and the provincial premiers. The failure of the Meech Lake Accord
marked a deepening of the constitutional crisis which has now become an
existential crisis due to Canada's all-sided integration into the U.S.
war economy and state arrangements.
The Meech Lake Accord was signed as a result of
the crisis which accompanied the 1980 Quebec Referendum on the place of
Quebec within Canada and the refusal of Quebec to sign onto the Pierre
Trudeau government's patriated Constitution of 1982. Trudeau had
promised that he would draft a new constitutional agreement after the
Quebec referendum was defeated. His promise was realized in the form of
the addition of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms
and an amending formula to the British North America Act of
1867 (BNA Act 1867). Called the Canada
Act, it was passed by the British Parliament on March 29,
1982 and, on this basis, it was claimed that the Constitution was
"patriated." While the claim is made that this ended Canada's formal
dependence on Britain, the fact is that the Queen of England remains
Canada's Head of State.
Canada's Constitution Act
(1982) was the "Canadian equivalent" of Britain's Canada Act
and its text was included in the Canada Act along
with an amending formula and the Charter of Rights and
Freedoms. However, it did not recognize Quebec's right to
self-determination and Quebec refused to sign it. This created a
constitutional crisis which the Mulroney government attempted to
resolve by commencing constitutional negotiations in 1985. These
negotiations culminated with the Meech Lake Accord two years later on
June 23, 1987.
Quebec Premier Robert Bourassa said the
Constitution needed five modifications for Quebec to sign. On this
basis, the following changes were laid out in the Accord:
- constitutional recognition of Quebec as a
distinct society;
- a constitutional veto for Quebec over constitutional change;
- a role for Quebec in the appointment of judges to the Supreme Court
of Canada;
- a constitutional guarantee of increased powers in the field of
immigration; and
- a limitation of the federal spending power.
These amendments and the agreement did not address
the causes of the constitutional crisis. These include: the need to
guarantee nation-to-nation relations with the Indigenous peoples so as
to end colonial injustice and provide redress for all the wrongs
committed against them; the need to end all notions of rights based on
privilege and so-called reasonable limits; the need to vest sovereignty
in the people and not a fictional person of state, let alone one who is
a foreign monarch; and the need to enshrine equal rights for all
citizens and residents. Finally, it requires recognizing the right of
the people of Quebec to self-determination, including secession if they
so decide -- something the Meech Lake Accord refused to do.
Two years after the failure of the Meech Lake Accord another
constitutional deal was reached behind closed doors in the form of the
Charlottetown Accord on which a referendum was called. The first of
three books written by Hardial Bains during the campaign (above)
provided the only real information on the contents and significance of
the Accord which was rejected by the Canadian people in the
referendum.
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Instead, the Meech Lake Accord seeking to maintain
the status quo, declared Quebec a "distinct society" within Canada; it
gave Quebec a constitutional veto; increased provincial powers with
respect to immigration; extended and regulated the right to reasonable
financial compensation for any province that opted out of any future
federal programs in areas of exclusive provincial jurisdiction; and
provided for provincial input in appointing senators and Supreme Court
judges.
Because the Meech Lake Accord would have changed
the Constitution's amending formula and modified the Supreme Court, all
provincial and federal legislatures had to consent to it within three
years. The 10 provincial premiers soon agreed but, as the three-year
deadline for consent of all legislatures drew near, the consensus began
to unravel. To try to save Meech, a First Ministers' Conference was
held 20 days before the signing deadline, resulting in an agreement for
further rounds of constitutional negotiations. During that conference,
Newfoundland Premier Clyde Wells attacked the secrecy of the whole
process of decision-making. On June 23, 1990, the deadline date, Elijah
Harper, a First Nations Member of the Manitoba Legislature, signaled
his refusal to give approval by holding up an eagle feather. This
blocked the motion required for the Manitoba Legislature to vote on the
Accord. Wells then cancelled a proposed vote in the Newfoundland
Legislature and the Meech Lake Accord was officially dead. That is what
was called the failure of the Meech Lake Accord.
Demonstration against Meech Lake Accord outside the Manitoba
Legislature, June 21, 1990.
The Problems Inherent in the Accord
A main feature of the Meech Lake Accord was its
failure to clarify what was meant by "distinct society" when referring
to Quebec. It stated that Quebec was a "distinct society" and declared
that the role of the Legislature and Government of Quebec was to
"preserve and promote the distinct identity of Quebec." The term
"distinct society" remained undefined in the documents and the
"distinct" features of Quebec were not enumerated, nor were any
guidelines given by which these features could be preserved and
promoted. "Distinct society" was subject to many interpretations, but
the predominant one that emerged was the old fiction that Quebec was
distinct simply because the people spoke French. By making language the
only issue, the Meech Lake Accord formulation of a "distinct society"
denied that the Quebec people comprise a nation that has historically
evolved with a common economy and territory, language, culture and
psychology that have the imprint of this development. Further, it
denied the Quebec people the right of self-determination. Telling the
Quebec Legislature what it was to do also did not go over well.
Another significant feature of the Meech Lake
Accord was its overall promotion of national disunity and inequality.
Defining a nation by language alone leads to the theory that Canada is
populated by a large number of different "language-nations," all of
which should or could supposedly have independent status, but only two
of them -- the "English" and "French" -- are given pride of place.
The Meech Lake Accord also created disunity by
devolving federal powers to the provinces, suggesting the existence of
10 small nations (the provinces) and one big one, the federal
government. The two territories (Nunavut did not yet exist) were not
invited to Meech Lake (they participated by video conference) because
Mulroney considered they had insufficient power to affect any
decisions. This was seen to imply that the regions of Canada each had
different status. The Accord also gave each province a veto to block
legislation and it was clear that each province would use its veto to
promote the narrow interests of its own regional economic and political
power-brokers rather than to advance an overall national interest or
aim.
A third main
feature of the Meech Lake Accord was its failure to affirm or even
address the hereditary rights of the Indigenous peoples, which amounted
to a suppression of those rights. The rights of the Indigenous peoples
are not a peripheral issue but should be enshrined in the Constitution
of Canada. They have a rightful claim to the territories of their
ancestors and to the determination of what must be done with them. As
sovereign peoples they have the right to determine not only their own
affairs but to participate in determining the affairs of Canada as a
whole. In the proposed modifications to the Constitution, the Meech
Lake Accord did not deal with any of this. Indigenous leaders also
raised two other issues. One was their exclusion from the entire Meech
Lake proceedings. The other was the potential transfer of federal
services to the provinces implied by the clause calling for
compensation to provinces for opting out of federal programs. This
could have led to the dismantling of programs very important to the
well-being of the Indigenous peoples.
A fourth main feature of the Meech Lake Accord was
the anti-democratic nature of the proceedings. All consultations were
held behind the backs of the people. In fact, people referred to the
process as 11 white men in suits dealing with the future of the country
behind closed doors. Once the Meech Lake agreement was reached in
secret, the 11 First Ministers then tried to impose it on the people
without any discussion or deliberation. There was no broad consultation
of the people at any time, the agenda was not set according to what the
people wanted, and the items discussed and included in the Accord were
only those that the First Ministers wanted.
Meech Processes and the Spicer Commission
The people's extreme displeasure with the Meech
Lake proceedings was captured by the 1990 Citizens' Forum on Canada's
Future, commonly referred to as the Spicer Commission. Mulroney, who
was forced to convene it just after the Meech Lake Accord was defeated,
claimed that his government wanted to hear the opinions of Canadians.
The Spicer Commission published its findings in 1991 with many
Canadians expressing their acute awareness that something was lacking
in the Canadian political process, that politicians were not to be
trusted, and that mechanisms were required to empower the people. Many
called for the formation of a constituent assembly which would enable
the people to deliberate and decide on their own constitution. All of
the proposals and recommendations of the Spicer Commission were
subsequently ignored by the Government of Canada.
Problem Posed and to Be Solved
People today want
to be the arbiters and decision-makers. This is the battle that is
being waged everywhere on the question of who decides. Canadians,
Quebeckers and Indigenous peoples rejected the Meech Lake Accord
because today history demands that power be transferred to the people
who act on their own initiative and in their own interest.
The Meech Lake Accord confirmed that in the form
of political power inherited by Canada, absolute power today resides in
the financial oligarchs and their political representatives. This
absolute power is not the defender of the rights of the people and is
not at the service of the people's well-being and the resolution of the
problems they face. The reality is that public authority has long since
been destroyed and narrow private interests have directly usurped
public institutions, which are now their preserve.
Today, no government has the consent of the
governed and the need for democratic renewal is more urgent than ever.
This article was published in
Volume 50 Number 23 - June 27, 2020
Article Link:
30th Anniversary of the
Defeat of the Meech Lake Accord: Political and Constitutional Renewal Has Never Been More Urgent - Christine Dandenault
Website: www.cpcml.ca
Email: editor@cpcml.ca
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