26 quotes found
"Il est un temps où le courage et l'audace tranquilles deviennent pour un peuple aux moments clés de son existence la seule forme de prudence convenable. S'il n'accepte pas alors le risque calculé des grandes étapes, il peut manquer sa carrière à tout jamais, exactement comme l'homme qui a peur de la vie."
"Est Québécois qui veut l'être."
"Je n'ai jamais pensé que je pourrais être aussi fier d'être Québécois."
"On n'est pas un petit peuple, on est peut-être quelque chose comme un grand peuple."
"Si j'ai bien compris, vous êtes en train de me dire: à la prochaine fois."
"Mais j'ai confiance qu'un jour... y'a un rendez-vous normal avec l'Histoire que le Québec tiendra, et j'ai confiance qu'on sera là, ensemble, pour y assister."
"And I would like to say we've got no lesson on that score to take from the McConnells, from anyone that has been dominating Quebec like a bunch of Rhodesians! The white group. If we have colours here you feel it and that is something we will not stand any more. This paternalistic, WASP ... and it is that, typically, WASP arrogance of the ones that have been leading our government and to the slush funds that they contribute to leaving both of our hacked bodies by the road for too long."
"I want to govern provincially no more. I want national independence. […] I took time for this decision because I know all the perils of this mission. I want to ask you to struggle also in order that our country can be born in a close future."
"Je suis un homme de causes, de collectivité, pas un individualiste."
"Je suis un homme de cause, je ne suis pas un individualiste et je pense en mon âme et conscience que je ne pourrais pas servir la société comme je voudrais le faire avec ce niveau d'appui."
"Tous les partis devraient être féministes!"
"Posterity, until now, has been truly inequitable regarding Godbout. It is true, he was responsible [...] of renunciations, if you will, renunciations that this absolutely infernal pressure of wartime made probably inevitable. But it is quite unjust that people forgot that these few years of the Godbout government were also punctuated by three crucial decisions that almost constitute the act of birth of contemporary Quebec. In a few brief years, in only one government mandate, the creation of Hydro-Quebec, the establishment of obligatory instruction and [...] the women's vote."
"Did not Mister Godbout himself – I will surprise many, such a bad historical reputation was made about him – propose in 1948, in all letters, the holding of a referendum to reach [...], let us get ready, "an equal to equal agreement between Quebec and Canada"? It was 32 years ago..."
"This province of Quebec is catholic and French and shall remain catholic and French. All the while asserting our friendship and our respect for the representatives of the other races and religions, all the while claiming our eagerness for giving them their fair share in every aspect [...] we solemnly declare that we shall never renounce our rights that are garanteed by treatees, by law and by the constitution [...] Let us cease our fratricidal struggles and let us unite!"
"Riel, our brother, is dead, victim of his devotion to the cause of the Métis of which he was leader, victim of fanatism and treason; of the fanatism of Sir John and of some other friends of his; of the treason of three of our own who, in order to keep their wallet, have sold their brother."
"When I say that we owe nothing to England, I speak in regards of politics, for I am convinced, and I shall die with this conviction, that the Union of Upper and Lower Canada as well as Confederation were imposed to us with a purpose hostile to the French element and with the hope of making it disappear in a more or less distant future. I wanted to show you what our homeland could be. I have made my best to open yourselves up to new horizons and, as I let you glimpse at them, push your hearts towards the fulfilment of our national destinies. You have colonial dependence, I offer you independence; you have shame and misery, I offer you fortune and prosperity; you are but a colony ignored by the whole world, I offer you becoming a great people, respected and recognized amongst free nations. Men, women and children, the choice is yours; you can remain slaves in the state of colony, or become independent and free, amongst the other peoples that, with their powerful voices beckon you to the banquet of nations."
"Less than fifteen cents to the province and more than twenty-five cents to Ottawa, this is far from being excessive!"
"This is about an admitted attempt, encouraged from outside, to challenge and break the State's authority. That is intolerable. Whoever deviates from this policy that I have established, privately or publicly, will be expelled from the Union Nationale."
"The period leaves no one indifferent. And that was our goal. We present the facts. It's up to the public to decide."
"The saying goes that after the death of every great man there's a long period of ingratitude. I find Maurice Duplessis's period is lasting pretty long."
"Over the last 40 years, talking about Duplessis has become like talking about the devil himself."
"If I never read a business page, my admiration for him would be complete."
"Before Duplessis died, we’d all go to church and make our sign [of the cross], and a year later we didn’t go to Mass any more. So we looked for another set of values, one that was all-enveloping, like the Church."
"Can you imagine feds saying we don't like your answers."
"Well, in a case like this, what do we do? We spit in our hands and we start over!"
"It is true, it is true that we were beaten, but in the end, by what? By money and certain ethnic votes, essentially."