The battle of the Plains of Abraham

A WAR ON OUR HISTORY –Maclean’s Editorial Mar.2nd issue.


It is not often I disagree with Maclean’s editorial stances, but this time I do, for the following reasons:

Quebeckers, French-Canadian in particular, tend to be hyper-sensitive to anything they perceive as slights against their French-Canadian heritage. The members of the National Battlefield Commission should have been more sensitive to these “tribal” feelings. Instead, they proceeded to “wave a red flag before the bull”, with predictable results.

Until the Québécoise “revolution” in the sixties, English-speaking Canadians did, to a degree, “lord” it over the French-Canadians; controlling to a large extent the Quebec economy. As an example, Quebecois assembly workers at the GMC automobile plant at St.Therese, Que, were supervised by unilingual English-speaking managers. Thus, some lingering resentment is still present, though the situation, of course, is now quite different.

Furthermore, your analogy with Gettysburg is not totally accurate. Gettysburg was a battle in a civil war, between two sides of the same coin – Americans. They had all ready had their revolution and beaten the British. Had the British won, there would be no Gettysburg.

Quebeckers, however, until the Plains of Abraham, were French. They lost to the English, and had no say about becoming British subjects. Furthermore, the British, in their wisdom, magnanimously allowed the conquered to keep their language and (Catholic) religion, as well as control over education; thus perpetuating and protecting the separateness inherent in a different language and culture. The alternative might have been our own Gettysburg, but we might now be more “unified” or “uni-cultural.”

However, as they say, that’s history, and we are what we are, and it’s not so bad. As long as we remember to respect our differences and not throw sand in each others eyes.