To Jacques Monet
Dear Jacques,
This letter is overdue. I have long admired your ongoing efforts to help Canadians understand the role of the representatives of the Crown in Canada. Yours has been a valuable undertaking, for the position of governor general in our country is one shrouded in mystery and misunderstanding. As you know, the governor general is not Canada’s head of state. That designation remains with our Sovereign. Nor is the office one that can have a meaningful, direct influence on government legislation and policy. And yet neither is it wholly ceremonial – “a post,” as one columnist put it, “occupied by a tea-and-crumpets do-gooder, all sugar and smile.”
So what is it? I consider it an institution and an individual.
As an institution, the governor general represents our country’s head of state – in our case, the Queen of Canada. The primary function of the governor general is to uphold Canada’s system of responsible government. Constitutional expert Eugene Forsey defines responsible government as government by a Cabinet answerable to and removable by a majority of the elected assembly, which in our country’s case is the House of Commons. An impartial and apolitical head of state is essential to our system of responsible government. Peter Hogg, another of our leading constitutional scholars, summed up this point nicely: a system of responsible government cannot work without a formal head of state who is possessed of certain reserve powers. With no Crown and no governor general to represent that institution, there would be no responsible government in Canada as we know it. I find the metaphor used by political scientist Frank McKinnon to be particularly vivid and instructive. He likens the office of the governor general to a constitutional fire extinguisher – a potent mixture of powers for use in great urgencies. Like fire extinguishers, Professor McKinnon notes, these emergency powers appear in bright colours and are strategically located. And while everyone hopes they will never be used, the fact that they are not does not render them useless.
These words could not be truer. The occasions on which the governor general must exercise the reserve powers of the Crown are exceedingly rare, but these powers are of supreme importance to ensure that Canada always has a government in place – one with the confidence of the House of Commons and, therefore, safeguarding the rights and freedoms of Canadians – constitutional values that flow unbroken across some eight hundred years from the Magna Carta. As the Department of Canadian Heritage publication A Crown of Maples states, power is entrusted to governments to use only temporarily on behalf of the people, so long as Parliament continues to show confidence in their actions. In our country, the government rules while the Crown reigns. Indeed, the office of the governor general shows us how much institutions matter in preserving peaceful, orderly societies. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II stated that one of the strongest and most valued aspects of this particular institution is the stability and continuity that it can bring from the past into the present – a truth that is particularly valuable in a country as geographically vast and culturally diverse as Canada. Without healthy, vigorous national institutions, we might be forgiven for asking, “What is Canada?”
Individuals matter, too – especially in the office of the governor general. This post is not an abstract model to be contemplated in theory alone. Nor is it a simple mechanism that is turned on at specific times to generate predetermined actions. Like our Sovereign herself – who has served Canada so well and who has for so long expressed the values of service, steadfastness, and tolerance that we all hold as Canadian ideals – the office is occupied by a living, breathing person. My predecessors contributed a great deal to the development of this office and thus to the progress of Canada. I can think of few national institutions from which individuals have exerted such a profound influence, and the story of each vice-regal mandate is fascinating, instructive, and relevant to its times. I resist singling any one of them out, for each made a special contribution in his or her way. Each was reflective of a unique background and set of experiences, and each brought to the job a particular love for Canada and concerns for the well-being of Canadians. Knowing that each governor general is an individual – a human being with a family, previous career, personal story, and special way of seeing this country and the world – enables Canadians to connect with this vital element of their government on a personal level removed from the divisiveness and often rancour of political affiliation and partisanship.
This blend of the individual and the institutional makes the office of the governor general both deeply personal and decidedly practical. I cannot think of any words that better capture this blend and its value to our country than your own: “The Crown shows us that our democratic inheritance descends to us through real people, each with a role to play in preserving our institutions and expressing ourselves. The repeated, measured flow of ritual reminds us that the Canadian Crown and who represent it – the Queen, the Governor General and Lieutenant Governors – are symbols of our freedom and ideals.”
Thank you, Jacques, for shining such a brilliant light on this individual institution.
David
Jacques Monet is one of the foremost experts on the Crown in Canada and the role of our country’s governor general. An ordained priest, Father Monet served as advisor to Governor General Jules Léger from 1974 to 1979 and is author of The Canadian Crown, published in 1979.