October
Crisis
Claude Bélanger,
Department of History,
Marianopolis College Name
given to the events that occurred in Quebec in he fall of 1970. On October, 5
of that year, British Trade Commissioner, James Cross, was kidnapped by
the Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ) and the government of Quebec was presented
with a set of demands in return for his freedom. Originally,
the demands were:
end
of police search; publication
of an FLQ manifesto; rehiring
of the Lapalme employees; liberation
of all political prisoners (23 FLQ members); denunciation
of the informer who had led the police to the capture of a cell of the FLQ in
June of 1970; $500
000 in gold; safe-conducts
out of the country.
Eventually
the FLQ concentrated on demands no. 1, 4 and 7. Important
as they were, the events of early October were not seen originally as tragic;
they did not prevent Robert Bourassa, then Prime Minister of Quebec, from taking
a pre-planned trip to New York to seek out American investments for Quebec. Ever
since the early sixties, there had been trouble with FLQ elements who had espoused
the causes of radical socialism and independence for Quebec through revolutionary
means. They had always been perceived as marginal in Quebec society, as an inevitable
outgrowth to the Quebec movement of social and national self-assertion of the
1960's. However, in the face of the refusal of the Canadian and Quebec governments
to negotiate, another kidnapping (by a second FLQ cell) took place on October
10, that of the then Minister of Labour and Manpower, Pierre Laporte. At that
point, Canada and Quebec entered into a feverish and very tragic phase. On October
15, the Canadian army was sent to Quebec and in the next 24 hours, letters were
sent to the federal government by Robert Bourassa, Jean Drapeau (Mayor of Montreal),
Lucien Saulnier (Chairman of the Executive Committee of the City of Montreal)
and M. St-Pierre (Director of the police in Montreal) all expressing the belief
that the law, as it stood, was inadequate to meet the situation and that emergency
powers should be invoked. The convergence of all of these requests would suggest
that it must have been the result of concerted actions (some have charged, since,
that it was all a put-up job on the part of the federal government). On
the night of October 15 and 16, the federal government issued a proclamation that
a state of war existed and, on the l6th, on the advice of the government, Parliament
adopted the War Measures Act (Public Order Regulation, 1970). As news of the implementation
of the Act and of massive arrests reached the kidnappers, Pierre Laporte was murdered
under circumstances that are still not completely clear to this day. The situation
dragged on for weeks and, eventually, after routine police work, James Cross was
found, unharmed, on December 2, 1970. His kidnappers received safe-conducts for
Cuba and have remained in exile until they returned to Canada in the 1980’s
to face rather insignificant sentences. The
issues raised by the October events are many and complex; they strike fundamentally
at the heart of our political system and of its ability to effect changes in the
face of conflicting values. Many Canadians were torn on the issue of the curtailment
of civil liberties through the War Measures Act. The position of the Canadian
government was that it desired "to ensure that lawful and effective measures
(...) be taken against those who thus seek to destroy the basis of our democratic
governmental system, on which the enjoyment of our human rights and fundamental
freedoms is founded, and to ensure the continued protection of those rights and
freedoms in Canada" (Preamble- Public Order Regulations, 1970). In other
words, contended the government, basic freedoms could only be protected by the
temporary curtailment of society's fundamental rights; and the overwhelming majority
of the Canadian people agreed with the federal government (87% approved according
to a Gallup poll conducted in December of 1970. There was also a substantial majority of the population of Quebec supporting the War Measures Act). That
basic rights were curtailed can be easily demonstrated: the Public Order Regulations
not only outlawed the FLQ but also permitted the detention of persons without
bail and without being charged; arrests without warrant were permitted and no
charges needed to be brought up for up to 7 days after arrest; that period could
be extended to 21 days on the request of the Attorney-General of the province.
Searches without warrant were permitted and property could be seized and held
for up to 90 days. The infractions to the Canadian Bill of Rights were permitted
by the government, and approved by Parliament and the Canadian people, in the
context of a mass hysteria well entertained by the press and the politicians (Jean
Marchand, an important Cabinet minister in the Trudeau government, claimed that
there were 3000 terrorists in Quebec, hundreds of pounds of dynamite were supposed
to be in the hands of the FLQ, and the establishment of a provisional government
was supposedly being plotted in Quebec. The mayor of Montreal, Jean Drapeau, claimed
that his political opponents in the municipal elections -FRAP- were nothing less
than a "front for the FLQ:"). More than 450 citizens were arrested and
nearly all of them (435) were released later without ever being charged. A disturbing
pattern emerged: for the most part, those arrested were separatists and radical
social spokesmen. In the eyes of many, the purpose of the operation was to crush
separatism - the legitimate legal movement- and to uphold the status quo in the
socio-economic sphere. In an article written in Le Devoir on December 30, 1970,
Claude Ryan, editor of the influential daily, and future leader of the Liberal party, summarised
very well the impact of the crisis on Quebec and Canada:
"A tort ou à raison,
un grand nombre d'intellectuels, de jeunes d'éléments nationalistes et syndiqués
ont eu l'impression que le gouvernement Bourassa, sacrifiant les gains de la dernière
décennie, s'était placé sous la tutelle du gouvernement Trudeau et avait raté
par le fait même une occasion unique de s'affirmer. En même temps, il nous a semblé
qu'il affaiblissait la position politique du Québec vis-à-vis du reste du Canada.
Fait non moins grave: les gouvernements se sont, à leur insu, solidarisés par
leur attitude avec des éléments qui s'opposent dans ce pays à tout chargement
de fond et qui sacrifieraient volontiers les libertés fondamentales pour le maintien
d'un ordre qui, de toute façon, craque de l'intérieur. [Translation: Whether right or wrong, a large number of intellectuals, as well asof young nationalists and of trade unionists, have had the impression that the Bourassa government, sacrificing the gains made throughout the last decade, placed itself under the tutelage of the Trudeau government and, thus, lost a unique opportunity to affirm itself. At the same time, it appears to have weakened the political position of Quebec vis-à-vis the rest of Canada. Another point to consider - one that is no less serious - is that the governments have, without realizing it, allied themselves with elements that oppose all fundamental changes in this country and who would willingly sacrifice basic freedoms to maintain an order that, in any case, is crumbling internally.]
(...) Nous refusons
de croire que les immenses efforts accomplis depuis 1960 ne furent qu'agitation éphémère. Ils furent l'expression d'un peuple qui cherche obstinément son destin
dans la voie d'une plus grande liberté, d'une plus nette affirmation de son identité.
Nous relions a ce phénomène la plupart des crises que nous avons vécues. Nous
avons la conviction que nous ne réussirons pas à sortir du climat malsain d'aujourd'hui
avant que le corps politique, au lieu de les rejeter, consente enfin à assimiler
les valeurs nouvelles issues de la révolution tranquille." [Translation: We refuse to believe that the huge efforts made since 1960 were mere ephemeral agitation. They were the expression of a people searching obstinately for its destiny in the path of greater freedom and a clear affirmation of its identity. Most of the crises we have witnessed were linked to that. We are convinced that we will not succeed to get out of the currentunhealthy climate before the body politics accepts to assimilate the new values that emerged during the Quiet Revolution rather than reject them.]
The
best documentary account on the October events is John
SAYWELL's Agenda 70, University of Toronto Press, 197l. For
a justification of the government's position see Gérard
PELLETIER, La Crise d'Octobre, Montréal, Ed. du Jour, 1971, and
Robert
BOURASSA, Les Années Bourassa, Editions Télémedia, 1977, chap. l. For
critical assessments, Claude
RYAN, Le Devoir et la Crise d'Octobre 70, Leméac l97l, and
Ron
HAGGART and Aubrey E. GOLDEN, Rumours of War, New Press, 197l. For
a radical interpretation and background see ‘Québec
70. La Réaction tranquille’ Socialisme québécois, Nos 21-22, April,
1971. See
Also: Chronology
of the October Crisis, 1970, and its Aftermath
Documents on the October Crisis ©
1998 Claude Bélanger, Marianopolis College
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