When did Canada become fully independent?

Vanadium 50

Legally, 1982. That's when the British Parliament said "Canada is no longer our concern." De facto, as you said, long before that.

SW VandeCarr

You must be Canadian to know that. That was the repatriation of the British North America Act (BNA). I was living there at the time. PM Pierre Elliot Trudeau (PET) tried to make a big deal of it, but the public reaction was basically "So what?" People were tired of PET and he was soon out office. It was largely regarded as a publicity stunt although legally it did dissolve the last connection between the British Parliament and Canada. However, this connection only existed because western Canadian politicians wanted to keep it in place after the 1931 Statute of Westminster eliminated nearly all other government level connections. They wanted to be able to appeal laws that were passed with the votes of the eastern provinces which held the majority of seats in both houses of parliament. The occasion never arose afaik.

However, as I said in my first post, so called "reserve powers" still exist. These powers were the basis for the 1975 Australian "coup" against the Whitlam government which had two years before it had to call elections.

Although the Queen was not personally involved in this "coup", the reserve powers of the Crown were invoked. The Queen is the ideal constitutional monarch. She rarely states her opinion on anything and is certainly not an activist. On the other hand the heir apparent has opinions on everything and has made them known over the years. It's really quite unclear how an opinionated activist king might be able to use reserve powers in concert with the politicians of a commonwealth member. That's why I'm interested in whether the Harper government may take action to make Canada totally independent; that is, a republic with an ambassador, not a "High Commissioner" in London.

Vanadium 50

Canadian, eh?

Actually, I believe technically the Monarch of Canada can dissolve Parliament. At present, the person who happens to hold that office is also the Queen of England. Canada could, at least in theory, replace HM Elizabeth II with a monarch of its own choosing. There is Commonwealth precedent for that - Brunei, Malaysia, Swaziland, Tonga and maybe one or two others.

Because Canada does not need British permission to change the Monarch, I would argue that it is truly independent today, de jure as well as de facto.

Since the French title is "Chef du Canada", I was going to suggest former hockey player and restauranteer Tim Horton as the new monarch. Pity he's no longer around.

SW VandeCarr

I didn't think that Canada would be able to change its monarch. However, I suppose if it could vote to become a republic, it could just as well vote to remain a monarchy, with a different monarch. In that case, I say Avril Levigne for Queen (it even rhymes), not that I have any say in the matter.

Clearly a good choice if he were still alive. He was already a symbol of Canada. I've had more than a few of those donuts. Then there's the King of Norway. I think he might be a safer bet than Charles III. But Elizabeth will probably live to be 100 like her mother.

Alfi

what's a two dollar bill? lol


This Canadian chuckles at how much people understand about Canada.

SteamKing

I'm confused. So is Canada now an autonomous collective or an anarcho-syndicalist commune? And who are the Britons?

Jimmy Snyder

Everybody talks about Canada, but nobody does anything about it.

Edit: Never mind. Nobody talks about it either.

SW VandeCarr

So that's gone too! You guys have no sense of tradition.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CAD_2_dollar.jpg

Proton Soup

it's been found. huge amounts of oil in the tar sands.