Before the Supreme Court, the hope of the opponents of Bill 21

In Ottawa, before and within the Supreme Court of Canada, the first day of hearings on Bill 21 saw two realities intersect: the concrete one of women and families who say their career paths are hampered or interrupted, and the more abstract one, of a legal debate on the limits of the notwithstanding clause. Between hope for change and uncertainty, the Court is called upon to decide an unprecedented question whose repercussions could redefine the balance between fundamental rights and legislative power in Canada.

In front of the Supreme Court of Canada building, more than a hundred people gathered at dawn on Monday, March 23, 2026. Some are holding signs, others are talking in a low voice. A lot of people are just waiting. In this group, mostly composed of Muslim women wearing the veil, mixed with members of the Sikh community, recognizable by their Dastar, several made the trip from Quebec cities, especially Quebec City and Montreal.

These communities are the most affected by Law 21, adopted in June 2019, which prohibits the wearing of religious symbols by employees of the Quebec government in a position of authority, such as judges, police officers, Crown prosecutors, school directors, and teachers. Quebec made use of the notwithstanding clause (section 33 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms) to protect Bill 21 from legal challenges.

Those who made the trip on Monday did not come to attend the hearings. They came to tell. Leila, 44, is slightly behind. She observes the coming and going in front of the building, while watching her children. Arriving in Canada in 2022, this mother of three hoped to pursue a career in teaching, after having worked for more than a decade in her home country. “I was told that I was great, but that I had to take off my scarf,” she says. I refused. It's a part of me.” Since then, she says she has given up several professional opportunities. “It's not just economic. It's depressing. I like to teach.”

Interrupted paths

Like Leila, several women we met evoke trajectories that were slowed or interrupted because of Bill 21, or even Bill 94, which aims to strengthen secularism in the Quebec school system, in particular by prohibiting staff from wearing religious symbols.

Karima Benzaïd, an educator in Laval for over 25 years, speaks of an abrupt end. “Bill 94 ended my career overnight,” she says. And the consequences go beyond the professional framework. “Today, I am completely dependent on my husband. I have debts. It changed my life,” she confides.

A few meters away, Brahim, who came to accompany his spouse Leila, observed the crowd. For him, the impact of the law goes beyond the current generation. “My daughter wants to be a lawyer. But she is wondering if she will be able to practice in Quebec, he explains. Each decision she makes, she asks herself the question: “Is this going to be possible with this law?” ”

In some families, the idea of leaving the province takes shape. “We are thinking of going to Ontario,” he adds. To provide a better future for our children.”

Crossing the doors

At the top of the stairs in the courtyard, access is filtered by discreet police officers and a security service that manages the flow according to the capacity of the building. It must be said that cases heard by the Supreme Court do not usually attract such a large audience, let alone the parties involved. This time, the Court will have to hear 51 applicants, only from among the dissidents. This first day is reserved for groups that are precisely challenging the law, including the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), the English-Montreal School Board (CSEM), the National Council of Canadian Muslims (CNMC), and the Fédération Autonome de l'Ensegnement du Québec (FAE).

In the lobby, rows of chairs have been set up to welcome the public. Silence is respected. The phones are silent. All eyes are on the two screens that transmit the audience. At 9:30 a.m., pleadings began.

A contained tension

In the large courtroom of the Supreme Court of Canada, the atmosphere is solemn, almost suspended. On the bench, seven judges take their seats. Two are missing: Mahmud Jamal, made the choice to recuse himself and avoid any controversy around his implicit opposition to Bill 21 because he was involved in the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (in fact, a request was filed in 2024 by the Mouvement Laïque Québecois (MLQ) to remove him from the Bill 21 file on the pretext that he would not be impartial); and Mary T. Mole Reau, absent without public explanation. It should also be noted that, out of the nine judges, three come from Quebec.

The tone is calm and calm. But behind this phlegm, the rigor is palpable. The judges, led by Chief Justice Richard Wagner, intervene frequently, interrupting lawyers to ask for details, test a hypothesis, and push reasoning to its limits. Exchanges are dense, technical, sometimes abrupt, without ever breaking with the restraint that characterizes the place.

Lawyers must immediately adjust, rephrase, qualify, defend each word. The debate takes the form of a demanding exchange, where the quiet assurance of the magistrates contrasts with the constant effort of the parties to convince.

“Reformulate the use of the derogation clause”

Among the organizations heard is the Autonomous Federation of Education (FAE). Met at the end of the hearing, his lawyer, Frédéric Bérard, believes that the issue goes well beyond Law 21.

“We are asking the Court to redraft the text relating to the use of the derogation clause, because it is now too easy to suspend fundamental rights”, he explains. Concretely, the FAE invites the Court to create a precedent, he continues, and to “add a substantive condition to limit the ease with which legislators can overturn fundamental rights”.

According to M^E Bérard, the loss of employment linked to the wearing of religious symbols is a serious attack on protected freedoms. “Losing a job for the simple fact of exercising a freedom protected by the charters is appalling,” he said.

What the Court must decide

To understand what is playing out in this room, you have to go back to the particular role of the Supreme Court. “It is the highest court in the country. She does not hear the facts again. It checks whether the rule of law has been applied correctly,” explains Dallal Boukhari, a doctor of law and author of a thesis entitled Study of the compatibility of French secularism in Quebec based on the “Charter of Quebec values”.

Unlike lower courts, the Court chooses the cases it hears. It focuses on legal issues of national importance. In the case of Law 21, adopted in 2019, the judicial process is already long. Challenged as soon as it came into force, the law was examined by Quebec courts following appeals brought in particular by hijab-wearing teachers and groups such as the Ligue des Droits et Libertés. In April 2021, the Superior Court of Quebec recognized that the law infringed fundamental rights, but validated its application due to the invocation of the notwithstanding clause, a decision confirmed on appeal by the Quebec Court of Appeal in October 2022, despite reservations about the scope of the clause.

This clause allows a provincial government to temporarily exempt a law from some of the protections of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, for a renewable period of five years.

It is precisely this use that is being contested today. “The Court is not going to decide directly on the validity of Law 21, says Dallal Boukhari. It will examine the use of the derogation clause itself, in particular its preventive use.”

In other words: can a government invoke this clause as soon as a law is passed to prevent any substantive challenge? “This is a first, underlines the lawyer. The Supreme Court has never ruled on this issue.”

A legal debate with concrete repercussions

In the room, arguments follow one another. Lawyers for protest groups insist on the concrete effects of the law, especially on linguistic or religious groups. Lawyers representing the Jewish community are also pleading on this first day before Mr.^E Wagner and colleagues.

Even before the opening of arguments at the Supreme Court of Canada, the tone was already set. Outside as well as in public spaces, voices in favor of Bill 21 reacted, placing the debate in a political balance of power from the outset. On its digital platforms, the Parti Québécois described the hearings as “Quebec trials”, believing that the challenges were aimed at “undermining Quebec's right to legislate on [its] model of living together.” The party defends the notwithstanding clause as “the only legislative tool” to protect Quebec's specificity.

Within the Court, this position is translated into legal arguments. Speaking on the second day, the representative of the Attorney General of Quebec, Mr.^E Isabelle Brunet, maintained that the notwithstanding clause is a democratic choice and that “it is not the role of the Court to decide a political question.”

Outside, waiting

At the end of the day, at the end of the day, the group reformed. Some followed the hearings from inside, others waited outside. Discussions resume, sometimes lively, sometimes silent. Leila is always there. “I hope that there will be someone who understands that you cannot build a country by limiting freedoms,” she says simply.

Expectations around her are both high and cautious. Everyone knows that the decision will not come right away.

After the four days of hearing, the judges will withdraw to deliberate. The judgment could take several months. That said, the Supreme Court of Canada generally delivers its opinion before the end of the summer. But for those present that day, the main thing has already happened elsewhere: in being there, in testifying, in seeing, for once, their reality brought to the highest judges in the country.

Between law and daily life

What is being played in Ottawa goes beyond the walls of the Court. The institution could in fact validate Bill 21 as it is, if not invalidate it totally or in part, or even formulate a nuanced decision, by limiting its application in certain specific cases or by redefining the way in which the derogation clause can be used in the future. Judges should then determine whether the ban on the wearing of religious symbols by teachers and the functions concerned constitutes discrimination.

Such a decision would set a national precedent. But for Leila, Karima or Brahim, these scenarios are still abstract. What they are experiencing is very real: a job refused, a career interrupted, a future choice called into question.

On the forecourt of the Supreme Court of Canada, all eyes turned to the building one last time before everyone headed home. Behind these walls, judges and lawyers continue their exchanges, in the calm and rigor of the law.

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