Word: trudeau
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
THROUGH the week Canada's Prime Minister, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, pondered the most difficult decision of his career. On the surface, the threat that confronted Canada, hardly seemed to merit the label "parallel power." Still, the terrorists of the minuscule Quebec Liberation Front (F.L.Q.), with about 100 hard-core members, had openly defied the government by kidnaping two high-ranking officials and threatening to execute them. First, Trudeau called out thousands of armed troops to stand guard in major cities. Then, because he feared that the Quebec separatist movement (see box following page) would be significantly strengthened and federalism...
...those who "are seeking the destruction of the social order through clandestine and violent means," he invoked Canada's drastic 1914 War Measures Act. Only twice before, during the two world wars, had the act been put in force; it had never been applied in peacetime. Backing up Trudeau's dramatic action was a proclamation by his Cabinet that "insurrection, real or apprehended, exists...
...F.L.Q. evidently saw Trudeau's move as a challenge that could not be ignored. In responding to the challenge, the terrorists amply justified the Prime Minister's description of them as "a new and terrifying type of person." Less than two days after the War Measures Act was proclaimed, the terrorists murdered at least one of their hostages and offered little reason to hope for the survival of the other...
...Powerful Instrument. Drawn, almost dazed, Trudeau described the execution as a "cowardly assassination" and called on Canadians to "stick together in this very sorry moment of our history." The Prime Minister's reaction to the murder is likely to be forceful, to put it mildly, and in the War Measures Act he has an immensely powerful instrument for applying pressure. Under the act, a large segment of the Canadian Bill of Rights is suspended for up to six months. Police and troops are empowered to make searches, seizures and arrests without warrants, and to hold suspects up to seven...
...that point, Trudeau's mind was just about made up. After canceling a ten-day trip to Russia scheduled for this week, he conferred with opposition leaders, former Prime Ministers, friends and aides in his spacious corner office in the Centre Block of Ottawa's solid gray federal complex. As a lifelong defender of civil liberties, one who helped to legalize homosexuality and broaden the abortion law, Trudeau could not help being disturbed by the draconian powers of the War Measures Act. But there were other considerations. He is a French Canadian from Quebec, but he has always...