Documents
in Quebec History
Last
revised: 23 August 2000 | Les
Québécois, le clergé catholique et l'affaire des écoles du Manitoba / Quebecers,
the Catholic Clergy and the Manitoba School Question, 1890-1916
Laurier's
Declaration of Support of Minority Rights [March
1893] [Note from the editor: In
March 1893, a motion of censure of the government policy on the Manitoba school
question was introduced by a liberal supporter, and right hand man of Laurier
in Quebec, Israël Tarte. Tarte's motion blamed the government to have followed
the judicial route instead of taking their responsibilities as governments should.
Laurier supported the motion. It was the occasion for Laurier to discuss the claim,
often repeated by men such as Archbishop Alexandre Taché, that the public schools
of Manitoba were only the former Protestant schools now thinly disguised. It should
be pointed out that there was some disturbing evidence to support such a view.
Laurier used the occasion to express himself on this point and on the issue of
minority rights. The views expressed here by Laurier, led him eventually to demand
that a Commission of inquiry be set up, headed by Sir Oliver Mowat. The investigation
became the cornerstone of the Laurier policy on Manitoba schools. It needs to
be added that, once in power, Laurier did not pursue the idea of investigating
the situation.] If it is true
[
] that under the guise of public schools, Protestant schools are being
continued, and that Roman Catholics are forced, under the law, to attend what
are in reality Protestant schools, I say this, and let my words be heard by friend
and foe, let them be published in the press throughout the length of the land,
that the strongest case has been made for interference by this government. If
that statement be true, though my life as a political man should be ended forever,
what I say now I shall be prepared to repeat, and would repeat on every platform
in Ontario, every platform in Manitoba, nay, every Orange lodge throughout the
land, that the Catholic minority has been subjected to a most infamous tyranny. Source:
Oscar Douglas Skelton, Life and Letters of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Vol. 1,
Toronto, Oxford University Press, 1921, 485p., pp. 455-456. ©
2000 Claude Bélanger, Marianopolis College |