To be honest, I’m still trying to figure out how anybodys marriage diminishes what mrAru and I have 
Bill and Fred getting married has about the same impact as Jenny and Lina, or Mark and Sandi … unless we are invited to the wedding and have to lay out some cash to get there and buy a present of course 
As I actually sort of like going to peoples weddings as long as I dont have to buy a silly dress and stand there in front of people, the more people I know that marry the better
And when people in that newspaper are equating your province to Oklahoma, it doesn’t do much for your province’s reputation as a hip, progressive place to live. (Sorry, Oklahomans 
)
The government invoked the notwithstanding clause, a mechanism IN the constitution, put there specifically so that local legislatures could retain autonomy over certain issues. It’s been invoked by Quebec, Saskatchewan, the Yukon Territories, and Alberta.
So this is by no means a violation of the charter.
I happen to disagree with the existence of the notwithstanding clause, and opposed it at the time. But there it is, and it’s disingenuous to claim that invoking it is somehow a violation of the charter of rights and freedoms.
And yet, Alberta started granted marriage licenses to same-sex couples in 2005, immediately after the federal Civic Marriage Act received royal assent. Which is the subject at hand.
I am no fan of that bill, or even much of a fan of the current Alberta government. But in any event, I wasn’t talking about the government’s policies - I was talking about the opinion of the Alberta population. Alberta actually has the 4th largest number of same sex marriages in Canada. Although polls still show a majority of Albertans oppose same sex marriage, it appears that Alberta is more liberal than Saskatchewan and Manitoba, and only slightly less liberal about it than is Ontario.
In any event, the percentages aren’t that different. One poll shows Alberta at 56% opposed, compared to 48% opposed in Ontario. Other polls show it a little closer. We’re not talking huge margins here, like 80% opposed in Alberta vs 20% opposed elsewhere, or anything like that. Across most of Canada, the percentages only differ by a few points. Support of Canadians as a whole for SSM is around 55%. It’s by no means universally supported - it has a thin majority of support.
Didn’t say it was - s. 33 is commonly referred to as the Charter override - but my point is that it sure isn’t just “a little grumbling”, which is how you characterized the government’s reaction to same-sex marriage. Invoking the notwithstanding clause, overriding fundamental constitutional rights, is one of the most serious things that a government can do in our system. Any time a government does it, it’s a major political statement.
Oh, sorry - I thought that when you began your post by talking about “the Klein government”, you meant to refer to the government of Alberta. I guess in your wording, the phrase “the Klein government” means the people of Alberta. Sorry for the misunderstanding.
And I gather from your comments, that in assessing the opinion of the Alberta population, it’s not appropriate to consider the positions taken by their government, over the past 11 years, on this particular issue. Because there’s no connexion between the views of the government and the views of the people who elect them, right?
Valteron, since I read that your PM is not accessible, please excuse my being OT long enough to tell you how hilarious I found the thread "**A question for the opponents of women voting **. It held the shabby arguments used elsewhere in other socio-political arguments up to the light of ridicule better than anything within memory. And there were some stingly clever one-liners thrown in to boot! Too bad that it was closed instead of moved.
And while I’m at it, congratulations on your marriage! It’s about time you made him an honest man…
(Oh, the irony!)
In Spain there has been a process more or less like this, leaving aside the II Republic:
Civil Registries were created in the XIX century, as in much of the rest of Europe (Switzerland for example) they were a way to put in the hands of Caesar something which had, until then, been the province of God; namely, registries of births, deaths and marriages. For the next 100+ years someone could get a Civil Marriage or get a Catholic Marriage (which doubled up as a Civil one). If you got married by a different religion, you needed to do the paperwork yourself to get the marriage recognized by the State; after all, the majority of people used to want a church wedding, so making them do the paperwork twice was rightly perceived as a bad publicity move on the part of those who didn’t want the church wedding.
Fast forward to the mid-1970s. Divorce is reintroduced (it had existed during the II Republic).
1980s, the Socialist government says that priests aren’t allowed to do the paperwork for “their” weddings any more: if you get a Catholic wedding, you need to go to the Civil Registry in person as well. This backfires, leading to the birth of a new form of marriage when some people realize that they can get “the marriage that matters” (to them) without losing the bride’s widow’s pension; others go this same “Catholic wedding only” route because their taxes will be lower if they file as two single people than as a married couple. In turn, this leads to a tax reform by which married couples can choose to file jointly or separatedly.
In the 1990s, some towns start “de facto couples registries.” While the couples registered there don’t get the same benefits as those registered in State registries, this is viewed as a way to allow those who can’t legally marry (same gender; one of them is in a bad divorce; etc) to register their relationship. It’s also a way to pressure the State into preparing laws which can end those bad situations.
2003, one of the Socialist Party’s promises in their campaign is same-sex marriage; they win and fulfill that promise as soon as legally able to do so.
PP (the other largest party, social-democrat) has, as they in turn promised, sued that reform; this is not so much an attempt at getting rid of it (which makes their most backward bases happy) as… to reinforce it through challenging it. You see, once they (who after all are pretty moderate) have sued and the judges have said that this law is within the Constitution’s boundaries, other people can’t sue again. Double jeopardy, if you want.
I once saw an interview with Mayor Oreja where a reporter asked “the next time PP is in Govenrment, will you repeal this law?” Mayor Oreja’s answer was “of course not!” and his eyes said “are you NUTS?”
PP has no interest in having a situation similar to what California has now, of having people who have been married until the 2004 law but which aren’t allowed to do so under a theoretical future law.
The largest ruckus re this was caused by a children’s program (Los Lunis) when they represented a same-sex marriage; while I’m all for SSM, I agree with the people who protested that it’s absurd to have a program where the ONLY previous relationship between characters was friends and neighbors (no siblings, parents, nothing) and then go and pull, of all possible relationships that two people can have with each other, the one that still smelled of the printer’s ink.
“De facto” registries still exist and are now viewed as “marriage lite.” Funny thing is, those who use them by choice are pushing for full marriage rights… :smack: so go and do the full paperwork, genius!
Sorry, lunch was calling:
Mayor Oreja is PP’s current head. An PP isn’t interested in “having people married under the 2004 law but which wouldn’t be able to marry under a theoretical later law.”