By Donald Wright
Donald Trump is a troll trying to own the libs and get under our skin. Let’s ignore him and get on with the task of peace, order and good government.
Canadians owe Donald Trump a debt of thanks. His musings about Canada becoming the 51st state have reminded us why we are Canadians in the first place and why we want to remain Canadians.
Still, it’s worth thinking about some of the legal steps to, and political implications of, a possible Canadian statehood.
First, Canada is a constitutional monarchy. To join the United States, it would have to become a republic. While that’s not impossible, it wouldn’t be easy. Amending the Canadian Constitution in relation to the King or Queen requires unanimous provincial consent. When was the last time all 10 provinces agreed on anything?
And what about Indigenous Peoples
Meanwhile, there are 634 First Nations governments – each with their own relationship with Canada or the Crown. Indeed, one of the mandates of the Department of Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs is to recognize and implement “treaties concluded between the Crown and Indigenous Peoples.”
If it’s difficult to imagine Indigenous Peoples agreeing to give up their treaty rights, it’s equally difficult to imagine the US negotiating new treaties and nation-to-nation relationships with 634 First Nations.
For its part, Quebec will never agree to give up the substantial power and real sovereignty it has as a province, even if every other province agreed to – which they won’t. In defence of their borders and the French language, Quebecers would likely secede from Canada long before any serious move towards Canadian statehood – and who could blame them?
Of course, this assumes that American lawmakers want a 51st state – and they don’t. Certainly, Republican lawmakers don’t, for the same reason they don’t want Puerto Rico and Washington, DC to become states.
Each state has two senators and it’s a safe bet that both Canadian senators would be Democrats or be from a separate party that would caucus with the Democrats. The GOP cannot risk becoming a minority in a closely divided Senate.
When Hawaii joined as the 50th state in 1959, there was a lot of handwringing, especially in the Jim Crow South. For example, a Mississippi senator insisted that Hawaii’s admission would mean “two votes for socialized medicine, two votes for government ownership of industry, two votes against all racial segregation and two votes against the South on all social matters.”
Canada: A potential Republican wasteland
Republican senators have similar arguments against admitting Canada – two votes for universal, single-payer health care, two votes for abortion rights, two votes for LGBTQ+ rights, two votes for multiculturalism, two votes for science, two votes for vaccines, two votes for climate policies and two votes against tax cuts for the wealthy.
Each US state also has members in the House of Representatives, according to its population. If Quebec doesn’t secede, Canada would be the most populous state in the US, giving it as many as 55 seats in the House which, with Canada’s admission, would have about 490 seats. If Quebec does secede, Canada would be the second most populous state, giving it as many as 45 seats.
Not all Canadian representatives would be Democrats or from a party that would caucus with them, but the majority would be, providing the Democratic Party with control over the House of Representatives into the foreseeable future.
Finally, the White House: Does anyone really think that Canadians would vote for the Republican Party in its current incarnation? Some would, but the majority wouldn’t.
In the last federal election, about 60 percent of Canadians voted for the Liberals, the NDP, the Bloc Québécois or the Green Party – all centre and centre-left parties. Even if Quebec secedes, most Canadian voters still lean centre or centre-left.
In America’s winner-takes-all presidential election, Canada’s roughly 50 electoral college votes would go to the Democratic candidate, not enough to guarantee a Democratic victory when approximately 590 electoral votes would be up for grabs, but enough to permanently narrow the GOP’s path to victory.
If Canada does become part of the United States, it won’t be as a state. It will be as an occupied territory and occupations never end well for the occupier – something Americans understand after 20 years in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Bottom line: Canadians don’t want to become the 51st state and the Americans don’t want us anyways, which leaves us with Donald Trump, a troll with a large following on social media trying to own the libs and get under our skin.
My advice? Ignore him and get on with the related tasks of peace, order and good government and managing the economic fallout of his tariffs.
- Donald Wrightis a professor of political science at the University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, and president of the Canadian Historical Association.
[This article was originally published by Policy Options magazine and is reproduced here under a Creative Commons/No Derivatives licence. Opinions expressed do not reflect the position of the Round Table editorial board.]
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