Quebec 1958
First Published: in Laurentie no. 104, September 1958;
Source: Andrée Ferretti & Gaston Miron, Les grands textes independantistes. Editions de l'Hexagone, Montreal 1992;
Translated: for marxists.org by Mitch Abidor;
CopyLeft: Creative Commons (Attribute & ShareAlike) marxists.org 2005.
The Alliance Laurentienne and its journal Laurentie, which appeared from 1957-1962, were the beginning of the rebirth of the nationalist movement, which had lain dormant since the thirties. Still expressing a fundamentally conservative vision of a free Quebec, it failed to take hold.
L'Alliance Laurentienne is a patriotic movement that groups together French-Canadians of all milieus, of all ages and all conditions. Founded in 1957, it proposes as its principal goal the spreading of the idea of independence for the Province of Quebec and the creation of the Republic of Laurentia.
Laurentian nationalism, based on the love of the French-Canadian nation, on the Québecois state and people, is legitimate since it is in conformity with the divine order. This love, which doesn’t exclude the love of other peoples, even the English and the Canadians, is intimately tied to our origins, our milieu, to our heredity, to a kind of historical and geographic determinism, and rests upon the Catholic and French mission that we inherited and that we must, at whatever price, perpetuate in time and space.
The Canadian Confederation threatens the political unity of our five million people, contests our most elementary rights, usurps the sacred rights inscribed in the constitution, unjustly halts our economic expansion, offends our nationals in contempt of the rights of peoples, and seeks to create inter-provincial combinations in order to insult our dignity and legitimate influence. In order to save our prestige and our honor we have no other choice than to demand the sovereignty of the state of Quebec. Within our Laurentian nationalism there is a natural aspiration for our people to constitute itself as a fully independent nation, autonomous internally, sovereign externally.
Whenever a nation is threatened men rise up to call for justice. Let’s look at what is currently occurring in the Arab world: Pan-Arabism is shaking up a part of the world. In another part it’s Pan -Slavism that has become particularly threatening; elsewhere it’s the rise of black people, the awakening of the yellow peril that looms. On our continent the sentiment of America First is solidly implanted, and even closer to us Pan-Canadianism very much preoccupies Canadians confronting the American colossus. French-Canadian nationalists are following the march of history. The secession of Quebec from the Confederation is thus the only solution to the accumulated threats of Anglo-Saxon centralization and assimilation. If our people grow normally, preserves itself from foreign penetration and annexation, and, in keeping with the principle of self-determination, conquers its independence, then Laurentian nationalism will have attained its objective.
The ideal and life of our people don’t demand that we close ourselves off within our borders, that we ignore other peoples and see to it that they ignore us, and even less that we hate them. Beyond their specific characteristics, in every people there is humanity, and it is not rendering them a disservice to want to become adult and free. It is claimed that the class struggle is a necessary and universal fact. On the contrary, it is the struggle between clans, tribes, nations and empires that engender hatred, misery, wars and despotism. Harmony and peace will return to the world when each nation shall be free: “Freedom for individuals, freedom for peoples!”
When the Laurentian nation places itself proudly before other nations, it will then have found within itself a strong personality that knows what it wants, that strongly wants it, and that gathers to itself the intellectual, moral and economic energies upon which depend its prosperity and influence. Our people have a body and a soul. But they lack the brain that is a free state, in which are reflected all national aspirations, and from which flow the directives that will promote the vitality of the nation in all senses of the term.
In order to realize our ambitions and pursue our destiny, when the hour will arrive to live normally the Laurentian government of the province of Quebec must:
Proclaim the national, constitutional and political sovereignty of the state of Quebec with the goal of obtaining international recognition of he Republic of Laurentia.
Abolish foreign allegiances, dominations and subjections in the internal and external affairs of the national state of Laurentia.
Look upon the British North America Act and the Statute of Westminster as nonexistent treaties, since the federal government of Canada violated with impunity all the fundamental articles of these colonial and imperialist constitutions.
Proceed by legal and parliamentary means to the progressive establishment of the Republic of Laurentia, which responds to the historic hopes, the inalienable rights, and the legitimate ambitions of our people.
Carry out a complete reorganization of the structures of the Senate, of the ministries and the Provincial Parliament with the goal of promoting a governmental administration in service to the common good of all citizens.
Protect the citizens and the current territory of the Province of Quebec through the establishment of a defensive army.
Completely respect and recognize, in principle and fact, the rights of minorities in the free state of Laurentia.
Install corporative forms of organization as an economic regime and as the basis of social justice.
Insist upon the neutrality of the Republic of Laurentia in case of war.
Effectively develop and, if need be, nationalize, the natural resources of the country.
Realize a Laurentian government, of Christian inspiration, which will perpetuate the healthy traditions of, and will permit the full blossoming of the French-Canadian people according to the formula: “A government of the fatherland, by the nation, for the people.”
— Manifesto, Laurentie, no 104 September 1958