The question underlying contemporary elections is how much a free citizenry is willing to the let the State boss them around. Well, all except Quebec elections.Here, the key query to be decided on September 4 is how much long-established native French-speaking Quebecers are willing to let the State boss other people around.As my Cardus colleague Brian Dijkema pointed out deliciously in his recent blog, we have already witnessed the preposterous proclamation by Parti Quebecois leader Pauline Marois that her government would regulate and inspect the hats, haberdashery, and accessories of public servants to ensure nothing they wear to work has religious significance.Madame Marois, as is her wont, immediately heightened the absurdity by insisting that Quebec’s ancient symbols of religious patrimony such as public-space Christmas trees—a 19th-century import from Prussian Protestants popularized by the British Royal Family—and the Cross in the provincial legislature would be exempt from her proposed “secularization” initiative.Much of the subsequent negative response focused on the hypocrisy of the State preserving overt Christian symbols while using its monopoly on force to strip them away from adherents of other religious faiths.

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Citizen Bossy Boots