Remembering The FLQ Crisis

Reading the news that portions of the "manifesto" of the Front de Liberation du Quebec (the "FLQ") will be read out during the commemoration of the Battle on The Plains of Abraham brings back vivid memories of living and working in Montreal during the FLQ crisis.

As I noted in my posting of February 16, 2009, the Battle on the Plains of Abraham between the French and British occurred 250 years ago. The British won and gained France's possessions in eastern North America. This year's event which was to commemorate this historic event included a dramatic re-enactment of the Battle. This outraged a group of separatists in Quebec, and the re-enactment was cancelled. The separatists did not want to be reminded of this "profoundly tragic" happening.

So someone came up with a better idea. Why not read some writings, some texts that have "shaped this corner of the world"? Included among these words are apparently excerpts from the "FLQ Manifesto". This document is the cornerstone of the FLQ crisis that gripped Canada, and particularly Quebec, in 1970. The FLQ claimed that although "not an aggressive movement", its goal was to purge Quebec society "for good of its gang of rapacious sharks, the big bosses who dish out patronage and their henchmen, who have turned Quebec into a private preserve of cheap labour and unscrupulous exploitation". It was time for Premier Bourassa to "get what's coming to him: 100,000 revolutionary workers, armed and organized!". The FLQ asserted that it had "had enough of promises of work and of prosperity, when in fact we will always by the diligent servants and bootlickers of the big shots...; we will be slaves until Quebeckers, all of us, have used every means, including dynamite and guns, to drive out these big bosses of the economy and of politics, who will stoop to any action however base, the better to screw us". It promised that "the day is coming when all the Westmounts of Quebec will disappear from the map". They were "prepared to go all the way" to achieve victory.

During the FLQ crisis, a British trade official (James Cross) was kidnapped, and a Quebec Cabinet Minister, Pierre Laporte, was murdered. The War Measures Act went into effect, army tanks were in the streets, hundreds were arrested. The crisis ended in a few months with the release of Cross and the deportation of the FLQ criminals to Cuba.

This was an interesting chapter in Canadian history. Having been born and raised in Montreal, I was a law student in McGill from 1967 - 1970 and was articling in a small law firm during the FLQ crisis. The air of crisis and terror was palpable. Pierre Laporte was a friend and client of the senior partner of the firm and his death was particularly shocking for us. I was a student during the March 1969 "Operation McGill Francais" when thousands of people marched to the gates of the university demanding that McGill become a Francophone university. I recall that the windows of the university buildings were boarded up, and everyone was evacuated from campus, in anticipation of potential destruction and violence. I recall soldiers with guns on roof tops, and searches before we could enter the court house. There was no love loss for Anglos, even from otherwise moderate persons, and the expression "maudit Anglais" (damned English) was an expression heard by me much too frequently.

The Province of Quebec, City of Montreal and Nation of Canada have come a long way since the FLQ Crisis. Montreal is a vibrant, fun, and international city. McGill is a great university which continues as an English university attracting students from all over Canada and the world. Both of our children, born and raised in Alberta, chose to go there for one of their degrees.

I haven't thought too much about the FLQ Crisis since I moved away from Quebec in 1972. The current "FLQ Manifesto reading" controversy has brought back some of the memories. Ironic, isn't it, that re-enacting the Battle of the Plains of Abraham was too painful for the separatists to bear, but reminding us all of the FLQ crisis and what the FLQ stood for and did, is just fine.