WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.459 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. So I want to start 00:00:03.459 --> 00:00:05.740 today by asking you to put yourself in a very 00:00:05.740 --> 00:00:08.380 specific and honestly somewhat uncomfortable 00:00:08.380 --> 00:00:11.259 scenario. Okay, I'm ready. Imagine it's 1950. 00:00:12.240 --> 00:00:14.900 You are a parent living in Montreal. You're a 00:00:14.900 --> 00:00:17.420 law -abiding citizen. You, you know, pay your 00:00:17.420 --> 00:00:19.620 property taxes on time and you send your kids 00:00:19.620 --> 00:00:21.339 to the local public school right down the street. 00:00:21.519 --> 00:00:23.480 Sounds pretty normal so far. Right. Everything 00:00:23.480 --> 00:00:25.739 looks totally normal on the surface. But every 00:00:25.739 --> 00:00:28.219 single morning when your child actually walks 00:00:28.219 --> 00:00:31.120 through those school doors, the government -like, 00:00:31.120 --> 00:00:35.070 the legal system itself, classifies them as something 00:00:35.070 --> 00:00:37.590 they are fundamentally undeniably not. It sounds 00:00:37.590 --> 00:00:40.390 like a clerical error, doesn't it? Like someone 00:00:40.390 --> 00:00:42.130 in the basement of City Hall just checked the 00:00:42.130 --> 00:00:44.490 wrong box on a form and nobody noticed? Exactly. 00:00:44.549 --> 00:00:47.310 But imagine it's not an error. Imagine it is 00:00:47.310 --> 00:00:50.149 the actual law. Imagine the entire educational 00:00:50.149 --> 00:00:52.729 infrastructure of your city has decided that 00:00:52.729 --> 00:00:56.609 because your child is Jewish, they must, just 00:00:56.609 --> 00:00:58.590 for the purposes of learning math and geography, 00:00:58.829 --> 00:01:01.869 be a Protestant. Wow. Not just like a Protestant. 00:01:02.320 --> 00:01:05.340 But legally classified as one. That is the bizarre 00:01:05.340 --> 00:01:08.640 and frankly fascinating reality we are unpacking 00:01:08.640 --> 00:01:11.379 today. We're looking at a book titled Honorary 00:01:11.379 --> 00:01:14.879 Protestants, the Jewish school question in Montreal, 00:01:15.040 --> 00:01:18.579 1867 to 1997. And that's by David Frazier. Yes. 00:01:18.739 --> 00:01:20.799 Written by David Frazier and published by the 00:01:20.799 --> 00:01:22.599 University of Toronto Press. And just to be completely 00:01:22.599 --> 00:01:25.239 clear. For everyone listening, we aren't just 00:01:25.239 --> 00:01:27.200 looking at the history here. We're looking at 00:01:27.200 --> 00:01:29.159 the fight over that history. Which is always 00:01:29.159 --> 00:01:30.980 where things get interesting. Oh, absolutely. 00:01:31.239 --> 00:01:33.840 We've got the book itself, which is this massive 00:01:33.840 --> 00:01:36.579 deep dive into the legal archives. But we also 00:01:36.579 --> 00:01:40.799 have a stack of academic reviews that are... 00:01:41.239 --> 00:01:44.140 Well, let's just say they really don't all agree 00:01:44.140 --> 00:01:46.599 on whether Fraser actually get a good job. Which 00:01:46.599 --> 00:01:48.760 is often where the best insights come from, honestly. 00:01:48.920 --> 00:01:51.159 When scholars start arguing, you know you've 00:01:51.159 --> 00:01:53.579 hit a nerve. It usually means the topic is just 00:01:53.579 --> 00:01:56.159 complex enough that there isn't one single right 00:01:56.159 --> 00:01:59.000 way to look at it. So our mission today is to 00:01:59.000 --> 00:02:02.700 figure out how a community navigates a system 00:02:02.700 --> 00:02:05.870 that literally wasn't built for them. We're talking 00:02:05.870 --> 00:02:08.449 about legal fictions, these honorary identities, 00:02:08.629 --> 00:02:11.370 and the huge difference between just getting 00:02:11.370 --> 00:02:13.569 into a school building and actually having a 00:02:13.569 --> 00:02:16.270 say in how that school is run. It's a classic 00:02:16.270 --> 00:02:18.889 case of square pegs and round holes, but happening 00:02:18.889 --> 00:02:20.969 on a constitutional level. And it went on for 00:02:20.969 --> 00:02:24.669 over a century. 130 years. Let's start with the 00:02:24.669 --> 00:02:26.870 architect of this deep dive, the author David 00:02:26.870 --> 00:02:29.610 Frazier. Usually when we cover history books 00:02:29.610 --> 00:02:31.930 on this show, the author is, you know, a historian. 00:02:32.129 --> 00:02:34.759 Right. But that is not the case here, is it? 00:02:34.819 --> 00:02:37.139 No, and that distinction is absolutely vital 00:02:37.139 --> 00:02:39.240 for understanding this whole book. If you miss 00:02:39.240 --> 00:02:41.460 this, you miss the entire point of the academic 00:02:41.460 --> 00:02:43.719 debate we're going to talk about later. David 00:02:43.719 --> 00:02:45.960 Frazier is a professor at the University of Nottingham, 00:02:46.039 --> 00:02:49.460 but his background is in law and social theory. 00:02:49.659 --> 00:02:52.039 Law and social theory. I mean, that sounds impressive, 00:02:52.159 --> 00:02:54.439 but can we break that down a bit? What does that 00:02:54.439 --> 00:02:57.439 lens actually change about how he tells a story 00:02:57.439 --> 00:03:00.669 compared to a standard historian? Well, a traditional 00:03:00.669 --> 00:03:03.610 social historian might focus a lot on the narrative 00:03:03.610 --> 00:03:06.409 arc. They'd look for personal diaries, the emotional 00:03:06.409 --> 00:03:08.810 highs and lows of the families, the texture of 00:03:08.810 --> 00:03:11.110 daily life. You know, they want to put you right 00:03:11.110 --> 00:03:12.889 in the shoes of the people. The ground level 00:03:12.889 --> 00:03:15.830 view. Exactly. But a scholar of law and social 00:03:15.830 --> 00:03:19.370 theory like Frazier, he's looking at the mechanisms. 00:03:19.710 --> 00:03:21.729 The machinery of it all. Yes, the machinery. 00:03:22.430 --> 00:03:26.129 He's interested in how statutes, court rulings, 00:03:26.129 --> 00:03:29.419 and bureaucratic classifications actually construct 00:03:29.419 --> 00:03:32.599 our reality. He's looking at how the law creates 00:03:32.599 --> 00:03:34.560 categories, like the category of Protestant, 00:03:34.860 --> 00:03:37.400 and what happens when the real world doesn't 00:03:37.400 --> 00:03:40.159 neatly fit into those categories. Okay, so it's 00:03:40.159 --> 00:03:41.919 like he's looking at the blueprints of the house, 00:03:42.060 --> 00:03:44.419 not necessarily the family dinner happening inside 00:03:44.419 --> 00:03:46.900 the dining room. That is a perfect analogy. He 00:03:46.900 --> 00:03:49.120 is analyzing the structure that contained these 00:03:49.120 --> 00:03:51.340 people. And speaking of structure, we really 00:03:51.340 --> 00:03:54.419 need to set the stage for Montreal between 1867 00:03:54.419 --> 00:03:57.680 and 1997, because I think most people, when they 00:03:57.680 --> 00:03:59.860 think of Montreal, schools today, they instantly 00:03:59.860 --> 00:04:02.199 think about language. Right. French schools versus 00:04:02.199 --> 00:04:04.240 English schools. That's the big political divide 00:04:04.240 --> 00:04:07.060 everyone knows about. Exactly. That's the modern 00:04:07.060 --> 00:04:10.219 dynamic, especially since the 1970s. But for 00:04:10.219 --> 00:04:12.840 the vast majority of the 130 years Fraser is 00:04:12.840 --> 00:04:15.680 covering, the primary divide in Montreal wasn't 00:04:15.680 --> 00:04:18.779 language at all. It was religion. You had a dual 00:04:18.779 --> 00:04:21.339 confessional system. Confessional meaning? Meaning 00:04:21.339 --> 00:04:25.389 based on religious confession or faith. The school 00:04:25.389 --> 00:04:27.350 districts were literally drawn along religious 00:04:27.350 --> 00:04:29.649 lines. You had a Catholic school board and you 00:04:29.649 --> 00:04:31.430 had a Protestant school board. Those were your 00:04:31.430 --> 00:04:34.389 two options. It was a binary system permanently 00:04:34.389 --> 00:04:37.750 enshrined in the law of Quebec. OK, but life 00:04:37.750 --> 00:04:40.959 isn't binary. especially in a major port city 00:04:40.959 --> 00:04:43.500 like Montreal, which has always been incredibly 00:04:43.500 --> 00:04:46.699 diverse. Precisely. And that right there is the 00:04:46.699 --> 00:04:49.100 honorary dilemma. If you were Catholic, great, 00:04:49.240 --> 00:04:50.720 you go to the Catholic board schools. If you 00:04:50.720 --> 00:04:52.360 were Protestant, you go to the Protestant board 00:04:52.360 --> 00:04:54.660 schools. But if you were Jewish, where do you 00:04:54.660 --> 00:04:57.399 go? The law literally didn't have a box for option 00:04:57.399 --> 00:05:00.259 C. So they just, did they pick one or were they 00:05:00.259 --> 00:05:02.839 forced into one? Essentially, yes. Fraser explains 00:05:02.839 --> 00:05:05.139 that by custom, and that word is really important 00:05:05.139 --> 00:05:08.199 here, custom. Jewish students attended the Protestant 00:05:08.199 --> 00:05:10.360 schools. Even though they obviously weren't Protestant. 00:05:10.779 --> 00:05:12.759 Exactly. They had different holidays, different 00:05:12.759 --> 00:05:15.259 traditions, totally different beliefs. But the 00:05:15.259 --> 00:05:17.939 state had an obligation to educate them. And 00:05:17.939 --> 00:05:20.879 the Protestant system was sort of the least worst 00:05:20.879 --> 00:05:23.399 fit, or perhaps just the one that was more open 00:05:23.399 --> 00:05:25.899 to taking them in at the time. So for administrative 00:05:25.899 --> 00:05:28.540 purposes, they were treated as Protestants. Hence 00:05:28.540 --> 00:05:30.860 the title of the book, Honorary Protestants. 00:05:30.920 --> 00:05:33.040 Right. Though, and this is a really interesting 00:05:33.040 --> 00:05:35.180 detail that will come up later, Fraser notes 00:05:35.180 --> 00:05:37.399 that the phrase itself actually comes from an 00:05:37.399 --> 00:05:39.899 earlier work. It's from a book called A Meeting 00:05:39.899 --> 00:05:55.439 of Man, it feels incredibly dismissive when you 00:05:55.439 --> 00:05:56.920 say it like that. It's almost like the government 00:05:56.920 --> 00:05:59.459 saying, we don't know what you are, and we honestly 00:05:59.459 --> 00:06:01.519 don't care enough to make a new category for 00:06:01.519 --> 00:06:03.500 you, so we'll just call you this because it makes 00:06:03.500 --> 00:06:06.240 our paperwork easier. It is dismissive. It completely 00:06:06.240 --> 00:06:10.160 erases identity. But what Frazier's deep dive 00:06:10.160 --> 00:06:13.240 shows, and remember, this is 14 chapters of extremely 00:06:13.240 --> 00:06:15.939 detailed analysis, is that the Jewish community 00:06:15.939 --> 00:06:18.939 didn't just sit back and accept this label passively. 00:06:19.079 --> 00:06:21.819 They didn't just say, OK, sure, we're Protestants 00:06:21.819 --> 00:06:26.120 now. Far from it. They actively negotiated the 00:06:26.120 --> 00:06:29.459 K through 12 environment. When you say negotiated, 00:06:29.639 --> 00:06:31.459 what does that actually look like on the ground? 00:06:31.560 --> 00:06:33.740 Are we talking about parents arguing with principals 00:06:33.740 --> 00:06:36.240 about homework or is it something bigger than 00:06:36.240 --> 00:06:38.870 that? Much, much bigger. We are talking about 00:06:38.870 --> 00:06:42.110 a massive structural struggle for rights. And 00:06:42.110 --> 00:06:43.629 this is where we have to make a really clear 00:06:43.629 --> 00:06:46.389 distinction between simply attending a school 00:06:46.389 --> 00:06:48.910 and actually participating in the school system. 00:06:49.110 --> 00:06:50.589 Break that down for me. What's the difference? 00:06:50.790 --> 00:06:52.370 OK, so the Jewish students were allowed in the 00:06:52.370 --> 00:06:54.129 building. They could sit at the desks. They could 00:06:54.129 --> 00:06:56.810 learn the curriculum. That is attendance. But 00:06:56.810 --> 00:06:58.689 think about how a public school system is actually 00:06:58.689 --> 00:07:02.029 run. Who hires the teachers? Who sets the curriculum? 00:07:02.370 --> 00:07:04.810 Who decides which holidays are observed? Who 00:07:04.810 --> 00:07:07.050 decides where the tax money goes? That would 00:07:07.050 --> 00:07:10.689 be the school board, the trustees. Exactly. And 00:07:10.689 --> 00:07:13.209 for a huge chunk of this history, the Jewish 00:07:13.209 --> 00:07:15.649 community, despite paying their property taxes 00:07:15.649 --> 00:07:18.490 directly into the Protestant system, was completely 00:07:18.490 --> 00:07:20.850 excluded from the boards of trustees. Oh, wow. 00:07:21.319 --> 00:07:23.920 That sounds remarkably like taxation without 00:07:23.920 --> 00:07:26.199 representation. That is exactly what it was. 00:07:26.360 --> 00:07:29.360 And that is the core conflict driving Fraser's 00:07:29.360 --> 00:07:33.079 book. He documents these constant grueling battles 00:07:33.079 --> 00:07:35.980 to get representation on those boards. It wasn't 00:07:35.980 --> 00:07:37.579 just about let our kids in the building. It was 00:07:37.579 --> 00:07:40.610 about. Let us decide how the building is run. 00:07:40.790 --> 00:07:43.389 Going back to your house analogy, it's the difference 00:07:43.389 --> 00:07:46.170 between being a guest in a house and being one 00:07:46.170 --> 00:07:47.970 of the owners. That's a great way to put it. 00:07:48.029 --> 00:07:50.430 Being an honorary Protestant meant you were basically 00:07:50.430 --> 00:07:52.829 a permanent guest. You could stay there, you 00:07:52.829 --> 00:07:54.769 could sleep in the guest room, but you absolutely 00:07:54.769 --> 00:07:57.329 couldn't touch the thermostat, you couldn't rearrange 00:07:57.329 --> 00:07:59.649 the furniture, and you certainly couldn't decide 00:07:59.649 --> 00:08:01.709 what was for dinner. And in this case, dinner 00:08:01.709 --> 00:08:04.149 is what your children are being taught about 00:08:04.149 --> 00:08:07.600 their own history or religion. Precisely. Frazier 00:08:07.600 --> 00:08:11.120 tracks this specific struggle over 130 years. 00:08:11.379 --> 00:08:14.879 It is a dense, highly detailed account of legal 00:08:14.879 --> 00:08:18.560 battles, petitions, court cases, and the slow, 00:08:18.560 --> 00:08:21.639 grinding work of trying to change a very rigid 00:08:21.639 --> 00:08:24.899 institution from the inside out. He really shows 00:08:24.899 --> 00:08:27.060 how the community used the law to try to pry 00:08:27.060 --> 00:08:30.079 open those doors of power. So we have a book. 00:08:30.519 --> 00:08:33.399 That is heavy on legal analysis, covering a massive 00:08:33.399 --> 00:08:35.639 time span, dealing with really complex issues 00:08:35.639 --> 00:08:38.080 of identity, governance and minority rights. 00:08:38.500 --> 00:08:40.899 It honestly sounds like a goldmine for researchers. 00:08:40.960 --> 00:08:42.919 It is. But I hear a butt in your voice. I knew 00:08:42.919 --> 00:08:44.679 there was a butt coming. Well, whenever a book 00:08:44.679 --> 00:08:46.879 takes a very specific academic approach like 00:08:46.879 --> 00:08:48.799 this law and social theory lens we talked about. 00:08:49.360 --> 00:08:51.539 It is inevitably going to alienate some people 00:08:51.539 --> 00:08:54.019 while absolutely delighting others. The critical 00:08:54.019 --> 00:08:56.720 reception to honorary Protestants was, let's 00:08:56.720 --> 00:08:58.679 just call it divided. I love a good academic 00:08:58.679 --> 00:09:00.299 brawl. Let's start with the fans. Who thought 00:09:00.299 --> 00:09:02.519 Frasier nailed it? The legal scholars really, 00:09:02.639 --> 00:09:05.320 really appreciated it. They saw it as a masterclass 00:09:05.320 --> 00:09:08.159 in legal history. For instance, there is a review 00:09:08.159 --> 00:09:11.340 by Jory Binder. Binder is a Juris Doctor candidate 00:09:11.340 --> 00:09:15.000 at Osgoode Hall Law School. Now, Osgoode is a 00:09:15.000 --> 00:09:17.899 top tier law school in Canada. So Binder is coming 00:09:17.899 --> 00:09:20.840 at this with a very specific, highly legalistic 00:09:20.840 --> 00:09:23.299 mindset. What specifically did Binder like about 00:09:23.299 --> 00:09:25.799 it? Because let's be honest, legal texts can 00:09:25.799 --> 00:09:29.129 be incredibly dry. Feiner praised Frazier's contextual 00:09:29.129 --> 00:09:31.750 stance on the rule of law. OK, contextual stance 00:09:31.750 --> 00:09:34.389 on the rule of law. That is a bit of a mouthful. 00:09:35.179 --> 00:09:37.340 What does that mean in plain English for our 00:09:37.340 --> 00:09:39.679 listeners? It basically means Binder liked that 00:09:39.679 --> 00:09:41.559 Frazier didn't just list the laws in chronological 00:09:41.559 --> 00:09:44.320 order like a timeline. He explained how the law 00:09:44.320 --> 00:09:46.720 functioned within the actual context of the society 00:09:46.720 --> 00:09:49.379 at the time. He showed how the legal system wasn't 00:09:49.379 --> 00:09:51.379 just a set of dry rules written on paper, but 00:09:51.379 --> 00:09:53.519 a living, breathing machine that was actively 00:09:53.519 --> 00:09:56.220 shaping people's lives, sometimes in very messy, 00:09:56.299 --> 00:09:59.480 contradictory ways. Binder felt Frazier skillfully 00:09:59.480 --> 00:10:01.960 explained these historical developments. So if 00:10:01.960 --> 00:10:03.940 you want to understand the actual machinery of 00:10:03.940 --> 00:10:06.019 how a government and excludes people, Binder 00:10:06.019 --> 00:10:09.460 is saying this book is the manual. Exactly. And 00:10:09.460 --> 00:10:11.960 Anthony Damascio from Bishops University also 00:10:11.960 --> 00:10:14.539 weighed in, calling it a valuable new contribution 00:10:14.539 --> 00:10:17.480 to the field. And David S. Kaufman from York 00:10:17.480 --> 00:10:20.120 University went even further. He described the 00:10:20.120 --> 00:10:24.200 scholarship as meticulous and unassailable. Unassailable. 00:10:24.679 --> 00:10:27.259 That is incredibly high praise in academia. That 00:10:27.259 --> 00:10:30.139 basically translates to I tried to find a mistake 00:10:30.139 --> 00:10:32.120 in your footnotes. I tried to find a hole in 00:10:32.120 --> 00:10:34.120 your logic and I couldn't do it. It really does. 00:10:34.299 --> 00:10:36.539 Now, Kaufman did have a few small critiques. 00:10:36.580 --> 00:10:38.200 He wished the book covered some other related 00:10:38.200 --> 00:10:40.500 aspects, which is pretty standard reviewer feedback. 00:10:40.659 --> 00:10:43.460 You always want more. But on the core research, 00:10:43.720 --> 00:10:46.860 the legal tracking of this history, he felt Frazier 00:10:46.860 --> 00:10:49.279 was rock solid. So the verdict from the legal 00:10:49.279 --> 00:10:51.960 and political science crowd is meticulous, valuable, 00:10:52.220 --> 00:10:55.340 skillful. They love the blueprints. But you mentioned 00:10:55.340 --> 00:10:57.960 a divide. Who is on the other side of the ring? 00:10:58.139 --> 00:11:01.240 The historians, specifically a historian named 00:11:01.240 --> 00:11:03.669 Roderick McLeod. Now, wait a second. That name 00:11:03.669 --> 00:11:05.789 rings a bell. Didn't you say earlier that the 00:11:05.789 --> 00:11:07.850 phrase honorary Protestants came from another 00:11:07.850 --> 00:11:10.370 book? You have a sharp memory. Yes. Roderick 00:11:10.370 --> 00:11:13.029 McLeod co -wrote A Meeting of the People, the 00:11:13.029 --> 00:11:16.649 very book where that term originated. So he isn't 00:11:16.649 --> 00:11:19.289 just a random academic reviewer. He is arguably 00:11:19.289 --> 00:11:22.309 the world expert on this specific historical 00:11:22.309 --> 00:11:26.009 topic. He claimed the term Frazier is using as 00:11:26.009 --> 00:11:28.990 his main title. Oh, that adds a fantastic layer 00:11:28.990 --> 00:11:32.200 of drama. So you have the guy who basically invented 00:11:32.200 --> 00:11:35.100 the term reviewing the book that uses the term. 00:11:35.259 --> 00:11:38.039 What did the expert think of Frazier's take? 00:11:38.320 --> 00:11:41.059 He was not impressed. In fact, he was quite critical. 00:11:41.259 --> 00:11:43.259 Cloud wrote a review in Canadian Jewish Studies 00:11:43.259 --> 00:11:46.000 where he argued the book has a real shortcoming. 00:11:46.019 --> 00:11:48.559 And that shortcoming, in his words, is a lack 00:11:48.559 --> 00:11:51.360 of a sense of human agency. Agency. That is a 00:11:51.360 --> 00:11:53.460 buzzword we hear a lot in sociology and history. 00:11:53.600 --> 00:11:56.000 Let's unpack that. In this context, is he saying 00:11:56.000 --> 00:11:58.120 Frazier just forgot about the actual people? 00:11:58.579 --> 00:12:01.179 Essentially, yes. McLeod is directly criticizing 00:12:01.179 --> 00:12:03.600 that structural approach we talked about. He's 00:12:03.600 --> 00:12:06.240 saying, OK, David Frazier, you have told us all 00:12:06.240 --> 00:12:09.200 about the laws, the school boards, the statutes 00:12:09.200 --> 00:12:12.059 and the legal negotiations. You have mapped the 00:12:12.059 --> 00:12:15.179 maze perfectly. But where are the people inside 00:12:15.179 --> 00:12:17.659 the maze? Right. Where are the parents? Where 00:12:17.659 --> 00:12:20.000 are the students? How did they feel? How did 00:12:20.000 --> 00:12:23.200 they act on a personal day to day level? It goes 00:12:23.200 --> 00:12:25.080 right back to that difference between the machinery 00:12:25.080 --> 00:12:28.350 and the ghost in the machine. McCloud wants the 00:12:28.350 --> 00:12:31.330 ghost. He wants the human heartbeat of the story. 00:12:31.470 --> 00:12:34.370 Right. He feels that by focusing so heavily on 00:12:34.370 --> 00:12:36.769 the legal structure, Frazier turned the Jewish 00:12:36.769 --> 00:12:39.230 community into abstract figures on a chessboard 00:12:39.230 --> 00:12:41.889 rather than flesh -and -blood human beings struggling 00:12:41.889 --> 00:12:44.690 for dignity. He thinks the book is too cold, 00:12:44.789 --> 00:12:46.990 too far removed from the lived experience. That 00:12:46.990 --> 00:12:49.370 is a really tough critique. It is almost like 00:12:49.370 --> 00:12:51.289 saying, you wrote a book about a school, but 00:12:51.289 --> 00:12:53.169 you didn't include any of the children. And it 00:12:53.169 --> 00:12:55.720 gets more personal than that. McLeod also took 00:12:55.720 --> 00:12:57.980 issue with the title itself. He felt Frazier 00:12:57.980 --> 00:13:01.899 used honorary Protestants, sarcastically. Sarcastically. 00:13:02.080 --> 00:13:04.720 But isn't the situation inherently absurd? It 00:13:04.720 --> 00:13:06.580 is ridiculous that they were legally called that. 00:13:06.700 --> 00:13:09.580 It is absurd. But McLeod felt that Frazier was 00:13:09.580 --> 00:13:12.120 using the term to intentionally mock the past 00:13:12.120 --> 00:13:15.539 or to apply a modern, ironic detachment to it. 00:13:15.759 --> 00:13:18.200 He felt it was a form of tone policing, looking 00:13:18.200 --> 00:13:21.100 back at history and sort of sneering at it, rather 00:13:21.100 --> 00:13:23.299 than trying to understand the genuine custom 00:13:23.299 --> 00:13:25.690 that... the term originally described in its 00:13:25.690 --> 00:13:28.490 historical moment. That is fascinating. So McLeod, 00:13:28.509 --> 00:13:31.350 who used the term descriptively as in this is 00:13:31.350 --> 00:13:33.610 historically what we called it, thinks Frazier 00:13:33.610 --> 00:13:35.629 is using it ironically, like look how dumb this 00:13:35.629 --> 00:13:38.009 whole system was. Exactly. McLeod is saying we 00:13:38.009 --> 00:13:41.049 use this term to neutrally explain a legal reality. 00:13:41.289 --> 00:13:43.370 You are using it to point out how ridiculous 00:13:43.370 --> 00:13:46.169 everyone was. He feels Frazier is judging the 00:13:46.169 --> 00:13:48.350 past rather than just objectively explaining 00:13:48.350 --> 00:13:50.909 it. And did McLeod have any substantial critiques 00:13:50.909 --> 00:13:53.070 beyond just the tone and the focus on structure? 00:13:53.330 --> 00:13:55.470 He did. He actually claimed there were errors 00:13:55.470 --> 00:13:58.710 and confusing passages, which is a direct head 00:13:58.710 --> 00:14:01.450 -on contradiction to Kaufman calling the scholarship 00:14:01.450 --> 00:14:04.570 unassailable. So we literally have one scholar 00:14:04.570 --> 00:14:07.409 saying this is meticulous and unassailable and 00:14:07.409 --> 00:14:09.990 another scholar saying this is confusing and 00:14:09.990 --> 00:14:13.190 has errors. That is a massive gap in interpretation. 00:14:13.629 --> 00:14:16.110 How do we even reconcile that as readers? It 00:14:16.110 --> 00:14:18.190 is a massive gap, but I think it actually helps 00:14:18.190 --> 00:14:20.629 us fundamentally understand what this book is. 00:14:20.669 --> 00:14:23.450 It really comes down to what you value in a history 00:14:23.450 --> 00:14:26.090 book. How so? Well, think about the two different 00:14:26.090 --> 00:14:28.320 lenses we talked about at the start. Binder and 00:14:28.320 --> 00:14:30.639 Kaufman are looking at the system. They want 00:14:30.639 --> 00:14:33.259 to know exactly how the law excludes people on 00:14:33.259 --> 00:14:36.460 paper and in practice. From that specific perspective, 00:14:36.919 --> 00:14:40.179 the book is a masterpiece. It maps the trap perfectly. 00:14:40.700 --> 00:14:43.320 If you want to know how the law works to marginalize 00:14:43.320 --> 00:14:45.320 a group, they are saying, read this. Right, they 00:14:45.320 --> 00:14:47.299 want the structural breakdown. But McLeod is 00:14:47.299 --> 00:14:49.480 a social historian. He wants to know how people 00:14:49.480 --> 00:14:52.220 lived while inside that trap. From that perspective, 00:14:52.559 --> 00:14:55.330 the book feels cold to him. It lacks the agency 00:14:55.330 --> 00:14:58.090 of the actual people who navigated those school 00:14:58.090 --> 00:15:00.649 hallways every day. He is looking for a human 00:15:00.649 --> 00:15:03.370 story. And what he found was essentially a legal 00:15:03.370 --> 00:15:05.970 brief. So if I am a listener trying to decide 00:15:05.970 --> 00:15:07.830 if I should actually go out and read this, it 00:15:07.830 --> 00:15:09.669 really depends entirely on what I am looking 00:15:09.669 --> 00:15:13.029 for. If I want a legal thriller about school 00:15:13.029 --> 00:15:15.850 board governance and constitutional law, this 00:15:15.850 --> 00:15:19.000 is the book. If I want a tearjerker about a student's 00:15:19.000 --> 00:15:21.779 first day at a Protestant school in 1920, I should 00:15:21.779 --> 00:15:24.500 probably look elsewhere. Exactly. It is a work 00:15:24.500 --> 00:15:28.440 of law and social theory, not narrative nonfiction. 00:15:28.759 --> 00:15:31.120 And I think there is a really valuable lesson 00:15:31.120 --> 00:15:33.200 in that clash between the reviewers. What's the 00:15:33.200 --> 00:15:35.919 lesson there? It highlights that there are fundamentally 00:15:35.919 --> 00:15:37.860 different ways to tell the truth about history. 00:15:38.460 --> 00:15:40.539 You can tell the truth about the rules or you 00:15:40.539 --> 00:15:42.840 can tell the truth about the experience. Frazier 00:15:42.840 --> 00:15:45.620 chose the rules. And honestly, I think that is 00:15:45.620 --> 00:15:47.940 deeply valuable because it exposes the sheer 00:15:47.940 --> 00:15:50.820 absurdity of the system in a way that a single 00:15:50.820 --> 00:15:53.080 personal story might not be able to capture. 00:15:53.759 --> 00:15:55.620 Let's circle back to that title for a second. 00:15:56.419 --> 00:15:59.330 Honorary Protestants. Whether it is meant sarcastically 00:15:59.330 --> 00:16:00.970 or descriptively, I think we can all agree it 00:16:00.970 --> 00:16:03.830 really does capture the total craziness of the 00:16:03.830 --> 00:16:06.330 situation. It does. It highlights perfectly how 00:16:06.330 --> 00:16:08.889 binary systems fail. The government said, you 00:16:08.889 --> 00:16:12.230 must be A or B. The community said, we are C. 00:16:12.529 --> 00:16:15.070 And the government responded, OK, well, C equals 00:16:15.070 --> 00:16:17.929 B just for the sake of our paperwork. It is just 00:16:17.929 --> 00:16:20.830 lazy governance. It is lazy, but it is also a 00:16:20.830 --> 00:16:23.629 powerful form of control. It forced a community 00:16:23.629 --> 00:16:26.759 to constantly negotiate their own identity. Am 00:16:26.759 --> 00:16:29.820 I a Protestant today? Only for math class. What 00:16:29.820 --> 00:16:31.220 about when I want to run for the school board? 00:16:31.320 --> 00:16:33.759 Suddenly I am not a Protestant anymore. That 00:16:33.759 --> 00:16:36.009 is the real honorary trap right there. You are 00:16:36.009 --> 00:16:38.490 included when it is convenient for the state, 00:16:38.509 --> 00:16:40.409 like when they need to fill a classroom or collect 00:16:40.409 --> 00:16:42.990 your taxes. But you are totally excluded when 00:16:42.990 --> 00:16:45.250 it involves any actual power or decision making. 00:16:45.429 --> 00:16:47.490 That is the perfect synthesis of this entire 00:16:47.490 --> 00:16:50.450 discussion. The honorary status was a tool of 00:16:50.450 --> 00:16:53.090 management, not a tool of inclusion. It allowed 00:16:53.090 --> 00:16:55.629 the system to continue functioning without actually 00:16:55.629 --> 00:16:57.830 changing to accommodate the growing diversity 00:16:57.830 --> 00:17:00.929 of the city. It preserved the status quo by just 00:17:00.929 --> 00:17:04.490 creating a fake temporary category. And this 00:17:04.490 --> 00:17:08.750 went on. Until 1997. That is startlingly recent. 00:17:08.849 --> 00:17:11.349 I mean, we were literally listening to the Spice 00:17:11.349 --> 00:17:14.170 Girls on the radio while this confessional system 00:17:14.170 --> 00:17:16.509 was still technically in place. It is wild to 00:17:16.509 --> 00:17:18.900 think about. There are people. walking around 00:17:18.900 --> 00:17:20.900 Montreal today, probably people listening to 00:17:20.900 --> 00:17:23.039 this deep dive right now, who actually went to 00:17:23.039 --> 00:17:26.000 school under this exact system. This isn't some 00:17:26.000 --> 00:17:29.299 ancient history from the 1800s. It is living 00:17:29.299 --> 00:17:32.400 memory for a lot of people. It directly shaped 00:17:32.400 --> 00:17:35.400 the city we see today. So to wrap this all up, 00:17:35.759 --> 00:17:38.700 David Fraser's book, Honorary Protestants, gives 00:17:38.700 --> 00:17:40.940 us the highly detailed blueprints of a legal 00:17:40.940 --> 00:17:42.839 house that was completely divided against itself. 00:17:43.640 --> 00:17:46.339 It shows us exactly how Jewish Montrealers fought 00:17:46.339 --> 00:17:48.539 for a seat at the table in a room where they 00:17:48.539 --> 00:17:50.980 were only technically considered guests. And 00:17:50.980 --> 00:17:53.279 the academic reviews remind us that while blueprints 00:17:53.279 --> 00:17:55.180 are incredibly important for understanding the 00:17:55.180 --> 00:17:57.799 structure, they don't tell you what it actually 00:17:57.799 --> 00:18:00.259 felt like to live in the house. You really need 00:18:00.259 --> 00:18:02.259 both perspectives to get the full historical 00:18:02.259 --> 00:18:04.380 picture. It makes you think about our current 00:18:04.380 --> 00:18:07.000 systems, too. We really like to think we are 00:18:07.000 --> 00:18:08.599 much more enlightened now that we don't have 00:18:08.599 --> 00:18:11.930 these rigid binary boxes anymore. But are we 00:18:11.930 --> 00:18:13.430 just doing the exact same thing under different 00:18:13.430 --> 00:18:15.730 names? That is the million -dollar question. 00:18:16.230 --> 00:18:19.390 Are there groups today that we are labeling honorary 00:18:19.390 --> 00:18:22.250 something or other just to awkwardly fit them 00:18:22.250 --> 00:18:24.809 into our existing bureaucracy? Like honorary 00:18:24.809 --> 00:18:28.630 employees in the gig economy. Or honorary citizens 00:18:28.630 --> 00:18:31.430 with complicated visa issues. The list could 00:18:31.430 --> 00:18:34.599 go on and on. We often try to force new complex 00:18:34.599 --> 00:18:38.420 realities into old, rigid legal boxes, and it 00:18:38.420 --> 00:18:40.599 usually results in the exact same kind of structural 00:18:40.599 --> 00:18:43.259 friction Frazier describes in this book. I want 00:18:43.259 --> 00:18:44.599 to leave the listener with one final thought, 00:18:44.740 --> 00:18:47.680 pivoting off McLeod's criticism about human agency. 00:18:47.940 --> 00:18:51.539 Go for it. If the law tells one story, a story 00:18:51.539 --> 00:18:54.400 of rigid legal categories like Catholic and Protestant, 00:18:54.700 --> 00:18:57.500 but the people living under that law felt something 00:18:57.500 --> 00:18:59.460 completely different in their day -to -day lives, 00:18:59.680 --> 00:19:02.319 which history is the true one. Is history what 00:19:02.319 --> 00:19:04.400 is officially written in the statute books, or 00:19:04.400 --> 00:19:06.440 is it what actually happens in the hallways? 00:19:06.599 --> 00:19:09.079 That is the ultimate tension between law and 00:19:09.079 --> 00:19:12.019 life. The statute book says you are an honorary 00:19:12.019 --> 00:19:14.680 Protestant. Your heart and your community say 00:19:14.680 --> 00:19:17.500 something entirely else. History is the friction 00:19:17.500 --> 00:19:20.200 between the two. A great place to leave it. The 00:19:20.200 --> 00:19:22.980 friction between who the law says we are and 00:19:22.980 --> 00:19:25.700 who we actually are. Thanks for joining us on 00:19:25.700 --> 00:19:28.079 this deep dive into Montreal's complex history. 00:19:28.319 --> 00:19:30.019 It was a pleasure. We will see you next time.