Premier Danielle Smith is promising to beef up the Alberta Bill of Rights.
Bet you didn’t even know we had one.
A group from her Medicine Hat riding, the Black Hat Gang, wants Smith to revitalize the law and to include America-inspired rights such as the right to own and bear arms, use force to defend private property, and be free from excessive taxation.
The Alberta Bill of Rights has been around since 1972. Still, it has taken a back seat in courts of law and public awareness behind the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which forms a part of the Canadian Constitution
However, Preston Manning, who led the COVID public health emergencies review panel, and his buddies in the so-called Black Hat Gang want a more substantial Bill of Rights.
They want it written into a provincial constitution to guide court decisions and be used to create laws and challenge Ottawa.
And Danielle Smith loves to challenge the feds.
A Rollout of Rights for the… Right?
The idea is getting a lot of traction in Smith’s government.
As reported by the CBC, Smith told a UCP party gathering in Calgary last month that an amended Bill of Rights “will make it illegal for the government to discriminate against any individual for refusing a medical treatment. And it needs to be said, including refusing to take a vaccine you don’t want to take.”
The Black Hat Gang has allies among UCP party insiders, people like pro-Alberta independence lawyer Lieghton Grey—who also likes to wear a black cowboy hat—and key Take Back Alberta organizer Mitch Sylvestre.
In April, Red Deer-South MLA Jason Stephan posed for a grip-and-grin photo with members of the Black Hat Gang, including former Conservative MP LaVar Payne, who represented Medicine Hat between 2008 and 2015.
These extremists are pushing the Premier to create a Bill of Rights that looks like a National Rifle Association manifesto.
For example, the Black Hat Gang wants a right similar to the “stand your ground” law that allows Americans in some mostly southern states to shoot property intruders. Florida’s stand your ground” law was the justification George Zimmerman, a neighbourhood watch volunteer, used to shoot and kill unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in 2012.
The Black Hat Gang also wants to amend the constitution to add the protection of “property” to the “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” provision.
Backlash on Social Media
This small but loud gang of 10-gallon hats has been getting a rough ride from Albertans on social media. Many call their Bill of Rights bluster a big distraction from important issues facing Albertans.
One commentator on Reddit, Super-Net-105, wrote, “I don’t need a gun right now, but I could sure use a family doctor…”
Another called them “a bunch of good-ole boys who forgot that they live north of the [sic] border and feel like aligning with the USA.”
“I think this pandering to these fringe elements within the UCP party is doing nothing to improve the quality of life in Alberta. What I see is the erosion of our healthcare, our education, our housing, and a generalized fear-mongering and finger-pointing at immigrants as being the cause of all their dismay,” South_Daikon_2471 wrote on the social media thread.
It’s not just about guns and the right to bear arms. The Black Hat Gang also uses the Bill of Rights debate to push the pro-independence, Take Back Alberta agenda.
University of Alberta law professor Eric Adams says that’s easier said than done.
While the Federal Charter is a constitutional document, which means it’s like a rule book for the whole country that can be used to strike down laws and regulations, the Alberta Bill of Rights is only a statute (or provincial law).
In an interview with the CBC, Adams said the existing Bill of Rights has no power over federal laws. Still, they added that creating a provincial charter of rights with teeth would make it possible to challenge the feds.
However, Adams warned that making significant changes to Alberta’s laws, even adding a new provincial constitution without telling voters about it during the election, could be risky for the UCP.
“Any sitting government in the middle of its time in office suggests that it has the mandate to alter the fundamental law of Alberta without having campaigned on that question, I think, opens itself to the question that something as important as the Alberta constitution deserves more and better.”
