What if Albertans actually vote in October for a serious independence referendum at some future time? Tonight's Hannaford Show guests say there is, after all, a growing possibility that Alberta’s independence referendum will not end the way most of the country still assumes. What if the “Yes” side wins? Tonight we speak about the implications with two serious people who think a vote for independence is a possibility..Randy Royer, Calgary entrepreneur, Western Standard columnist, and author of the book "Alberta Should Lead, Not Leave," has spent years examining how power actually concentrates in this country. Natalie St. Hilaire, entrepreneur, columnist, and host of the Nation of People podcast, has been tracing the same fault line through culture and character.Together they argue that Alberta’s discontent is not a temporary policy dispute over equalization or climate rules. It is the product of two different founding experiences that were never reconciled..And the vote?Ms. St. Hilaire predicts that the “Yes” vote – that is, the vote to leave – will be stronger than many expect, and that there is even a real chance it could succeed. Randy Royer is more measured and points to current polling, at roughly 30 percent. Yet he warns that a complacent “No” side, treating the question as theoretical, could fail to mobilize and thereby hand the "leave" campaign an opening it would not otherwise have.That single prediction changes the temperature of everything that follows. If a majority of Albertans, or even a strong minority that refuses to be dismissed, vote to leave, the consequences will not stop at the provincial border. They will force a national reckoning that Canada has postponed for decades..For, there is a genuine divide among Canadians. Eastern Canada, they say, was settled by people who fled the American Revolution. Not for them the grand themes of liberty and government of the people, by the people. They valued continuity, loyalty, and deference to authority – and when as United Empire Loyalists they settled in Upper Canada and the Maritimes, they were pleased to be colonial subjects clustered near the protection of their government.The history of the West was quite different. Settlers from across Europe and later from the United States to settle the prairies, came seeking distance from government, the freedom to build, and the right to keep what they built. The 1982 Constitution, in their view, locked in the Eastern view of what Canada was and treated the Western one as something to be managed and gradually diluted. The result is a political culture in which power flows steadily upward, the Prime Minister’s Office has swollen into a central command post, and citizens are increasingly encouraged to feel responsible to the state, rather than keeping the state responsible to them..Neither Royer nor St. Hilaire is a pure separatist. Both recognize that history’s repetitive nature being what it is, an independent Alberta will eventually reproduce the same concentration of power. It is the institutional design itself, that must be changed. Their preferred path is a genuine redistribution of sovereignty that would allow different regions to live according to their own instincts.Yet they refuse to treat independence as unthinkable. St. Hilaire’s prediction that the “Yes” side could win is not casual. It is the logical extension of her reading of the moment: a province that feels its values and its resources are permanently subordinated, is capable of surprising the rest of the country.What happens after the ballots are counted may matter more than the numbers themselves. A strong “Yes” would force Canada to confront questions it has long preferred to avoid. A decisive “No” would only settle the issue, if the underlying grievances are addressed.Either way, the conversation Royer and St. Hilaire are forcing into the open – about character, constitutional design, and who ultimately holds power – will not be voted off the national agenda in October.The Hannaford show uploads at seven o’clock tonight. For more from Royer and St. Hilaire, see “Western Standard presents: Nation of People,” part of our regular rotation with other Western Standard shows.
