Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- Table of cases
- Table of international instruments
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction
- PART I The Foundations of International Law and Their Impact on Secession
- PART II International and Domestic Practice
- 9 The question of secession in Africa
- 10 International law and secession in the Asia and Pacific regions
- 11 Secession and international law: the European dimension
- 12 Secession and international law: Latin American practice
- 13 Lessons learned from the Quebec Secession Reference before the Supreme Court of Canada
- 14 The Secession of the Canton of Jura in Switzerland
- 15 Conclusions
- Select bibliography
- Index
13 - Lessons learned from the Quebec Secession Reference before the Supreme Court of Canada
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 July 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- Table of cases
- Table of international instruments
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction
- PART I The Foundations of International Law and Their Impact on Secession
- PART II International and Domestic Practice
- 9 The question of secession in Africa
- 10 International law and secession in the Asia and Pacific regions
- 11 Secession and international law: the European dimension
- 12 Secession and international law: Latin American practice
- 13 Lessons learned from the Quebec Secession Reference before the Supreme Court of Canada
- 14 The Secession of the Canton of Jura in Switzerland
- 15 Conclusions
- Select bibliography
- Index
Summary
Introduction
The present chapter deals with the practice of secession in North America. It is both a bloody story as well as one of virtue. The contrast between the approach adopted by courts in the United States following the attempt by the southern states to secede in 1861, and that adopted by the Supreme Court of Canada in 1998, could not be more striking. Both attempts at secession (one real and the other hypothetical) were firmly opposed by the federal government of the United States. However, one secessionist bid was crushed by war, while the other was discussed in a court of law and became the object of legislative acts. Even when the U.S. Supreme Court discussed the issue of the legality of secession in the famous Texas v. White Case, it took the view that:
[t]he [US] Constitution, in all its provisions, looks to an indestructible Union, composed of indestructible States. When, therefore, Texas became one of the United States, she entered into an indissoluble relation. All the obligations of perpetual union, and all the guaranties of republican government in the Union, attached at once to the State. The act which consummated her admission into the Union was something more than a compact; it was the incorporation of a new member into the political body. And it was final. The union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration, or revocation, except through revolution, or through consent of the States.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- SecessionInternational Law Perspectives, pp. 416 - 452Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006
- 7
- Cited by