Canadians Vote on Measures to Preserve Unity

Canadian polling stations bustled Monday as this country conducted its third national referendum in its history on a sweeping set of proposed constitutional amendments.

The amendments were written by Canada’s office-holding elite in an effort to keep united this fractious, three-ocean country, the world’s largest political entity after Russia.

But instead of rallying the people, the amendments seem to have increasingly confused, irritated and divided Canadians in the weeks since Prime Minister Brian Mulroney announced that the nation would be invited to vote on them.

At a national level, pollsters have found the referendum’s outcome hard to predict. The nationwide “yes” and “no” votes were virtually even in a number of polls; those who survey public opinion also identified an unusually large group of undecided voters--people who could command the results once they made up their minds.

On Monday, some voters were saying they still did not know how they would vote, even as they walked into their polling stations.

The proposals include amendments that would:

* Set aside the French-speaking province of Quebec as a “distinct society” within Canada.

* Reform Canada’s discredited, do-little Senate.

* Allot Quebec a permanent 25% representation in the House of Commons, even if its population declines.

* Acknowledge the inherent right of Indians and Inuit--as the Eskimos prefer to be called--to govern themselves.

In practice, the overall vote nationwide will not matter as much as the separate regional counts, since Canada is a country acutely divided along regional lines. Most analysts say that a “no” from any one region, or even from a single large province, would scuttle the entire proposition.

Polls conducted in the days just before the referendum showed the “no” side to be cleanly ahead in the key provinces of British Columbia, Alberta and Quebec.

Quebec’s electorate has tended to oppose the amendments in the belief that they will shortchange the Francophone heartland; voters in English-speaking Canada have tended to oppose them, thinking that they cede too much to Quebec.

Even the thrill of Toronto’s World Series triumph didn’t seem enough to persuade many jaded English-speakers to cast “yes” votes.

Although tens of thousands of baseball fans packed the city’s streets on referendum day for a Blue Jay victory parade, waving Canadian flags and some “yes” placards, Ontario sociologist Reginald Bibby, at the same time, was lamenting in the Globe and Mail newspaper that “Canadians are distrustful and not particularly giving--a society badly in need of connection”; opinion surveys said the referendum results were too close to call in Ontario.

Polls closed at 8 p.m. Monday in each of Canada’s five time zones; election workers were counting ballots into the night. Under a special arrangement to keep populous eastern Canada’s vote from influencing voters in the west, the news media were prohibited from announcing eastern polling results outside their own time zones.

If the referendum results translate into a “yes,” Canada’s leaders will go ahead with the cumbersome process of ratifying the amendments.

The effects of a “no” vote are far more difficult to predict. The amendments would die. But from there, seemingly anything could happen in Canada. Some analysts say a “no” would mean business as usual--perhaps even a return to normalcy--for this constitution-weary country; others say it would mean the politicians would go back to the table and resume the tedious, numbing process of constitutional negotiations.

Still others--including both worried federalists and hopeful proponents of sovereignty for Quebec--say a “no” vote would set in motion the eventual dissolution of the country along linguistic lines.

Mulroney, who put his political future on the line in calling the national referendum, voted at a school in his native Quebec, just outside Ottawa. Arriving in a Jeep driven by his wife, Mila, Mulroney said he was confident the result would be “yes.”

“We are going to see a pleasant surprise,” he told reporters. “We will move on to have (the accord) ratified by the provincial legislatures and turn the page and get on with the job of building Canada’s economy.”

But Jacques Parizeau, a proponent of sovereignty and a Parti Quebecois leader, smiled as he cast his “no” ballot in Quebec. “I’m confident” the vote will come out as opponents hope, he said.

Such small, regionally based political parties as his Parti Quebecois and its federal-level cousin, the Bloc Quebecois, along with the populist, anti-Establishment Reform Party based in English-speaking Alberta, would be expected to profit from a “no” vote.

The mood in Canada on referendum day differed remarkably from that of two months ago, when Mulroney and the 10 provincial premiers announced, amid great fanfare, that their months of debate and drafting had finally yielded a constitutional package acceptable to all.

Canada has been struggling for decades to draft a constitution that all 10 provinces would ratify, and Canadians seemed delighted at the thought that their long constitutional wrangle had finally drawn to an end.

As things now stand, nine of the 10 provinces have ratified the constitution. But Quebec refuses, saying the document fails to offer sufficient protection for its minority French language and culture.

Early polls had indicated that most Canadians would vote to ratify the amendments. People here seemed particularly pleased that the amendments offered benefits to the Indians and Inuit, whose economic misfortunes have long been a source of national embarrassment.

But in the weeks since the unveiling in Charlottetown, the capital of Prince Edward Island, support has fallen off. A wide variety of special interest groups began stumping for a “no” vote. And as Monday’s balloting approached, even some prominent Indian leaders began calling for a “no” vote, saying the amendments still didn’t do enough for their people.

A great many other Canadians don’t object to the amendments per se but told pollsters they were voting “no” simply because they are fed up with mainstream politicians and all their works, especially their seemingly endless attempts to amend the constitution.