Canada’s Supreme Court last week heard arguments in what is possibly one of the most important cases concerning Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms in history and one of the most important cases of the past decade. The case involves religious minorities and their rights, specifically with respect to Quebec’s Bill 21.

Below we will look at this bill, the unique mechanism in Canada’s Charter that lies at the heart of the debate, and what is at stake for religious minorities, for Quebec, and for Canadians generally.

Image: Coat of arms of Québec, and Canada Chamber of Rights and Freedoms picture.  Source: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0, and Canva.com

Bill 21

Bill 21 is a controversial bill that prohibits employees of the provincial government from having visible religious symbols. So, anyone wearing a hijab, a turban, or a yamaka cannot work as a teacher, daycare worker, police officer, or judge. 

Religious minorities oppose this law and have taken it to court as a violation of their rights.

There is no law like this in any jurisdiction in Canada or the United States. That said, some European countries have passed laws along these lines including, most notably France. Quebec is somewhat influenced by France due to the shared culture and this includes a shared and distinctive approach to secularism called laïcité.

Source: Canva.com

Laïcité

Part of what distinguishes Quebec from the rest of Canada is a very unique history with religion. Until about 1960, Quebec was a deeply pious society. American historian Mark Noll has argued that in the 1950s Quebec may have had the highest church attendance in the world. The Church also partly ran the state as the province had no ministry of education nor health, both falling under the Church’s purview. 

The great sociologist David Martin argued that when secularism came in the West, it came hardest and strongest in places where the church was allied closely with the state. This alliance meant – in an age of individualism and growing emphasis on freedom – that the church would be seen by many as a dominating, controlling institution. To be free, even to be modern, would thus be equated with ditching religion. Martin reached this conclusion studying Europe but North America bears his view out. It was Quebec where the Church was most integrated into the state and, sure enough, the province went from the most religious jurisdiction in North America to becoming the least. All that power over society meant that the backlash, when it arrived, was powerful.

Image: David Martin, and an empty church. Sources: Wikimedia Commons, No restrictions, and Canva.com

This, plus some anti-clerical influences from France, has made the Québécois vigilant in their secular outlook. This outlook, or laïcité, differs therefore from Anglo-Canadian secularism. In Anglophone Canada, there is less zeal in ensuring religion is kept away from public spaces. Of course, there are varied views in both Quebec and the rest of Canada but, to generalize, English Canada is more welcoming of religious diversity with no specific religion nor even religion in general being given preferential treatment. In Quebec, the most common view is that religion should simply not be seen in the public square. 

But the Charter!

That said, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is meant to protect minority rights and to do so even if those rights or specific groups are not popular with the general public. The point of the Charter is that some rights are supposed to be protected and not up for debate. Indeed, the Charter does this to some extent but there is a catch in that it has a fairly unusual clause called the notwithstanding clause.

The notwithstanding clause allows legislatures when they invoke the clause to override Charter rights. It has limits. For example, any use of the clause expires after five years unless the legislature renews it (and so on, after every five-year period). And some rights are immune to the clause — you cannot deny people the right to vote for example. But, overall, it gives legislatures a lot of leeway.

Why is it there? Because some Western premiers feared the Charter would give too much power to unelected judges. They did not want Ottawa judges telling them what to do.

Source: Canva.com

The Competing Rights Claims

Hence, the court case pits two rights against one another. On the one hand, is the need to protect minority religious rights. To deny someone an occupation is a serious infringement on their life. And folks really have lost their jobs. Advocates of Bill 21 sometimes respond that no one is forced to wear a specific religious garment so the choice is theirs. But this argument misses that for many, these decisions are part and parcel of their identity. To set it aside, for some, violates their conscience and perhaps would mean becoming a somewhat different person.

The impact of this case is much bigger than this however. The more latitude legislatures have in using this clause will mean that all Canadians’ rights are more subject to what their governments will grant. If one citizen in Quebec can be denied employment by invoking this clause, why not another? Or someone in Manitoba?

On the other hand, Canadian courts have traditionally acknowledged a need for some deference towards Quebec. As a minority culture in a largely Anglophone country (and Anglophone continent), the courts have often agreed that Quebec’s government must have some leeway to take actions to protect its culture. Legal scholar Benjamin Berger, while recently giving an honourary lecture carried on the CBC show Ideas, said that Quebec’s distinctiveness has always been partly about religion. That used to mean a devout Catholicism – today it means laïcité. And polls show the law has majority support in Quebec.

Image: A sticker in Quebec about a ban on religious symbols; enacted by Bill 21.  Source: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0

In addition to the moral argument that maybe a mostly Anglophone court should not tell the Québécois what to do, there is also a practical fear that overturning the law would stoke the fires of separation in the province, threatening the very unity of the country.

There are other arguments too being made to the court: one group claims the law protects women (seeing religion as denigrating women), while another is arguing that the bill protects parents’ rights by ensuring their kids are not exposed or indoctrinated in a religion by the state. So, the arguments to the court are numerous. And, while this is happening, some parents have now been denied the ability to even volunteer at the schools because these moms wear hijabs.

The Stakes and Looking Forward

The court case will have numerous impacts. For many religious minorities in Quebec, the case is not merely about abstract principles. It’s about jobs, careers, and earning a living. It may mean many have to leave the province to work in their field. It’s also about your children believing they belong in the community rather than feeling like they and their family are specifically targeted by the state and are fundamentally unwelcome. 

Moreover, when societies marginalize minorities, it often hardens the division. You get less integration and an increasing us/them dynamic. This can spiral downward such that minorities feel unwanted and second-class which, amongst some, breeds resentment, leading to wider gaps in society, more misunderstanding, and perhaps, down the line, more interventionist laws from the majority. France is notably restrictive towards Muslims and the relationship there between the majority and the Muslim minority is quite fraught. 

In addition, it raises the question of what a dictator-like character in high office could do in Canada by invoking this clause. How many of your rights might disappear?

Source: Canva.com

On the other hand, if the Court overturns the law, there will be an uproar in Quebec. It will almost surely have a massive impact on the provincial election this year. The Parti Quebecois, which has been leading in the polls, would undoubtedly benefit from such a decision and the party desires to hold another referendum on separating from Canada. This case would be fodder for making their case of Quebec’s humiliation and domination by the Rest of Canada. In addition, it would reduce the scope of action for legislatures which many premiers would not like. It may stoke Western alienation in particular as there is little sympathy there to having judges in Ottawa telling them what they can and cannot do.

At the heart of all this is a lack of understanding.

Too often, Canadians outside Quebec fail to grasp the depth of the province’s historical experience with religion and why laïcité resonates so strongly. At the same time, many in Quebec underestimate how profoundly laws like Bill 21 are experienced by religious minorities—not as neutral rules, but as exclusions that reshape lives and identities.

Surce: Canva.com

The Supreme Court cannot resolve that gap in understanding. It can clarify the law, set limits, and define the reach of the Charter. But it cannot decide how we live together in a society that is at once diverse and deeply divided on fundamental questions about religion, identity, and the role of the state.

Whatever the ruling, this case will not be the end of the conversation. It may, in fact, be the beginning of a more difficult one: not just about rights, but about what kind of country Canada wants to be—and whether it can hold together competing visions of belonging.