Aaron W. Hughes - 10 Days That Shaped Modern Canada

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Copyright 2022 Aaron W. Hughes

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: 10 days that shaped modern Canada / Aaron W. Hughes.

Other titles: Ten days that shaped modern Canada

Names: Hughes, Aaron W., 1968 author.

Description: Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20220259526 | Canadiana (ebook) 20220259550 | ISBN 9781772126327 (softcover) | ISBN 9781772126624 (EPUB) | ISBN 9781772126631 (PDF)

Subjects: LCSH: CanadaHistoryMiscellanea. | LCSH: CanadaMiscellanea.

Classification: LCC FC176 .H84 2022 | DDC 971dc23

First edition, rst printing, 2022.

First electronic edition, 2022.

Digital conversion by Transforma Pvt. Ltd.

Copyediting by Audrey McClellan.

Proofreading by Kay Rollans.

Indexing by Siusan Moffat.

Cover design by Alan Brownoff.

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For Liliana

Who believed when I doubted

Contents

1 | October 13, 1970
Just Watch Me

2 | September 28, 1972
Team Canadas Most Famous Goal

3 | April 17, 1982
The Patriation of the Constitution

4 | July 21, 1988
The Multiculturalism Act

5 | December 6, 1989
The cole Polytechnique Massacre

6 | May 25, 1995
Egan v. Canada

7 | October 30, 1995
The Quebec Referendum

8 | June 2, 2015
The Release of the Executive Summary of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission

9 | August 20, 2016
The Tragically Hips Final Concert

10 | March 8, 2018
A New Ten-Dollar Bill

Introduction

NOT ALL DAYS ARE CREATED EQUAL. While the vast majority of days ebb and flow in a repetitive fashion, some become so singularly momentous to a nations formation and outlook that, although their importance is recognized at the time, the true significance becomes apparent only after the fact. Such days often start out normally enoughindeed, like all othersbut through their course something of such import happens, whether positive or negative, that things are never quite the same thereafter. While the historical record attaches significance to the past as a whole, certain days in that past are often clearly more significant than their peers.

This book compresses the history of Canadas last half century into just ten days. Each chapter focuses on one date, describing what happened on it and what happened as a result of it. When understood both contextually and in terms of their causes and effects, these days help to provide a portrait of how Canada has become the country that it is today. Taken together, these days have played a crucial and formative role in shaping the way Canadians view both themselves and their place in the world.

Which days have I chosen for their significance?

October 13, 1970. The day Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau uttered the phrase Just watch me when a CBC reporter asked how far he intended to go to end the FLQ crisis. Three days later he invoked the War Measures Act, which curtailed the civil liberties of Canadians across the country.

September 28, 1972. The day Paul Henderson scored his famous goal in the dying seconds of the final game with the Russians in Moscow to win the Summit Series for Canada in the middle of the Cold War. The come-from-behind victorywhich united the nation in a way never seen beforerevealed as much about Cold War politics as it did about contrasting hockey styles.

April 17, 1982. The day the Constitution was patriated and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms enshrined within it. The Charter would go on to shape many features of Canadian life, including preventing discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and allowing women safe and legal access to terminate pregnancies.

July 21, 1988. The day the Multiculturalism Act was signed into law, thereby continuing the trend of transforming what had been a largely white and Christian Canada into one of the most diverse countries on earth.

December 6, 1989. The day of the cole Polytechnic Massacre in Montreal, which began a national conversation on violence against women and subsequently led to a debate on gun ownership.

May 25, 1995. The day the Supreme Court of Canada ruled on Egan v. Canada , a case brought to the Supreme Court by two gay men who sued Ottawa for the right to claim a spousal pension under the Old Age Security Act. Though the Court ruled against them, all nine judges agreed that sexual orientation was a protected ground and that protection extends to partnerships of lesbians and gay men, paving the way for same-sex unions and the redefinition of marriage.

October 30, 1995. The day the Quebec Referendum brought Canada to the brink of a constitutional crisis, one it had been moving toward for years.

June 2, 2015. The day the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) released its Executive Summary documenting decades of injustices against Indigenous populations in, for example, the residential school system, and setting a path forward for reconciliation.

August 20, 2016. The day of The Tragically Hips last concert, in the bands hometown of Kingston, Ontario. The Hip, with its Canadian-infused lyrics, had often functioned as a symbolic antidote to the hegemony of American imports.

March 8, 2018. The day federal finance minister Bill Morneau and Bank of Canada governor Stephen Poloz unveiled the new ten-dollar bill with its portrait of Viola Desmond.

These days, I argue, have been crucial not only because of what happened on them but, just as importantly, by virtue of what happened because of them. Even the quickest of glances at the list should show the far-reaching consequences of these days. I would like to think that if you were to pick up any Canadian newspaper today, you would be able to connect contemporary stories or news items thereinwhether through a chain of cause and effect or associationto one of these ten days. For example, the national outpouring of grief on May 27, 2021, when the remains of 215 nameless and faceless Indigenous children were discovered on the grounds of the Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia, only makes sense when situated against the history of these schools in the country, something the TRC commission sought to call attention to and to redress. Though the full repercussions of the later dates, especially those in chapters 8 and 10, remain to be seen, they represent the culmination of historical wrongs, and it will be up to Canadians to ask ourselves how to move forward in their light. In other words, these days inform what we have become and, equally important, how we became it.