GUNTER: If it used to be wrong to trust government with decrees, it’s not right now.

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Back in 2009, when the Conservative government of Chancellor Ed Sternach wanted to approve a major new transmission line in the state, the idea met with stiff resistance from many local landowners.

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In response, the Stelmac administration passed three land use laws (Bills 19, 36, and 50). This included what one MLA called the Henry VIII Clause, which gave the Cabinet “power to enact any law or regulation within the powers of the Government.” You don’t need to get approval first.

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In the subsequent state elections (2012), this naked power grab became a major issue. This was especially true in rural constituencies where his Conservative MLA was in a tight race with opposition candidate Wildrose.

At the time, Daniel Smith was the leader of Wildrose. “It’s too much power to hand over to the government,” she said of the decree’s powers.

So what has changed in the intervening decade?

It was Smith who introduced the Alberta Sovereignty Act, which gives the government the power to bypass Congress if it now serves its purpose in skirmishing with Ottawa.

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If it was too risky to hand over decrees to the government in 2012, it would be too risky to do so in 2022.

Besides, what kind of disastrous stunt is Ottawa going to do to Alberta, with our own legislature calling an emergency meeting and not having time to pass laws and amendments to the contrary?

I think Ottawa might call the military on us. Many soldiers refuse to obey orders to invade. And every hunter and rancher in the state picked up their guns and rushed to the state’s defense.

Moreover, last month the Americans asked Canada to send troops to calm the turmoil and unrest in Haiti. We had to tell them, embarrassingly, that they were short of equipment and personnel.

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So if Canadian forces can’t invade third world Caribbean countries, they can’t invade Hannah or Lloydminster.

Smith’s sovereignty law is also almost certainly constitutional, despite the claims of critics.

Since the UCP leadership campaign this summer when Smith first proposed the Ottawa Struggle Bill, the unconstitutional proposal that Alberta, its people, or its businesses could easily choose which federal laws and court decisions to follow. is gone.

Instead, the bill specifically allows provincial governments to challenge federal authority “within a united Canada.”

In fact, the law clearly states that “it shall not be construed as authorizing any order contrary to the Constitution of Canada.”

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This means that almost the only way the Trudeau government can block Alberta’s use of the law is by exercising its constitutional power of “not permitting.”

Disallowance is to state law what emergency laws do to civil rights. This allows Ottawa to declare state law void. But it is such an outdated and outrageous power that no federal government has used it since 1943.

That’s not to say the Prime Minister (Justin Trudeau), who first crushed civil rights using the Emergency Act, doesn’t want to use disallowing for the first time in nearly 80 years.

But I would like him to try.

But why, constitutional or not, does Smith’s Sovereignty Act include the statutory powers of the Cabinet? If it was ‘too much power for “, why is it okay now?

Besides, isn’t Smith an anti-vaccine candidate? Isn’t it one of the dissatisfactions of

Governments should not arbitrarily choose when to democratize.

lgunter@postmedia.com