Marc-Olivier Fortin: The PQ is already remaking Quebec. Killing oath to the King is only the start

In 1891, Quebec Lieutenant-Governor Auguste-Réal Angers dismissed Premier Honoré Mercier over the Baie des Chaleurs Railway bribery scandal. One-hundred and thirty-five years later, the province’s current Lieutenant-Governor, Manon Jeannotte, silently watched the newly elected government’s cabinet swearing-in on television from her office across the street, her aide-de-camp by her side. For the first time in Quebec’s, the Lieutenant-Governor was not attending the cabinet swearing in. The empty chair said more than any speech could.

From her desk, she signed each order of appointment as the ministers took their oaths. Her signature is still required while her presence is not. Premier St-Pierre Plamondon had asked her a few days ago to stay away. She obliged. Tradition was shattered.

Slowly but surely, St-Pierre Plamondon is hollowing out the Crown without separation or changing a single law. The Crown is fading away not by a referendum, but through lack of use.

The Parti Québécois leader has been testing the limits of the institution since he was first elected in 2022. Section 128 of the Constitution Act 1867 requires members of the National Assembly to swear allegiance to the monarch. St-Pierre Plamondon made a political showdown out of this protocol at his swearing-in back then. He and his two fellow MNAs refused to swear an oath to King Charles III and were barred from taking their seats. But they held their ground. Facing popular and political pressure, the CAQ government passed Bill 4 making the oath to the King optional. Only the oath towards the people of Quebec is mandatory. The three PQ MNAs could took their seats.

Now, not only is PQ swearing allegiance solely to the people of Quebec, so is every other party, including the Liberals. One Liberal MNA put it simply: they are federalists, not monarchists. Eric Duhaime’s Conservatives are set to do the same. Federalist or not, no party will go back to swearing allegiance to the King. That ship has sailed.

What’s remarkable is that this is no longer solely a PQ project. The party moved the line of what is acceptable, and every other party followed, legitimizing a practice that is constitutionally dubious but broadly embraced.

Lawyer Lawrence David argues that Bill 4 is unconstitutional and that MNAs sitting in the National Assembly without swearing the oath are doing so unlawfully. Despite that, it is business as usual in Quebec politics. Lawful or not, MNAs have been sworn in, the cabinet has been sworn in, and the new government can start to get to work. The Assembly is expected to sit at the end of November. The new premier will be hard at work to build the winning conditions for a referendum.

Lieutenant-Governor Jeannotte will also not be welcome at the opening of the legislative session, breaking another tradition. The premier has sought a legal opinion on redirecting her budget to the fight against homelessness, which could leave the Lieutenant-Governor herself officeless.

Some might say it is unfortunate that it happened to the first Indigenous Lieutenant-Governor. St-Pierre Plamondon is not defying her as a person. He is defying her because of what she represents: an institution he calls humiliating. This is not about Manon Jeannotte. It’s about the chair she sits in.

St-Pierre Plamondon says he will even challenge her in her last stronghold: royal assent, constitutionally required for legislation to become. Many say it remains out of his reach. But St-Pierre Plamondon has never given an inch to the institution, and he is unlikely to start now. In the final week of the campaign, he vowed to abolish the office, separation or not.

In 1933, Irish President Éamon de Valera abolished the oath to the King. He then did exactly what St-Pierre Plamondon is doing now: reducing the governor general to a shadow. Sixteen years later, Ireland became a republic. Could it be St-Pierre Plamondon’s inspiration?

The question now becomes how long the institution can survive when everyone around it acts like it does not exist. In 1891, the Lieutenant-Governor put an end to a premier. In 2026, it might be a premier who puts an end to the Lieutenant-Governor.

National Post

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