OTTAWA, Feb 19, 2001 (LSN.ca) – Bills seeking to protect the traditional definition of marriage as the union between one man and one woman were recently introduced in both federal Houses. Liberal Senator Anne Cools introduced legislation Jan 31 seeking to specify in law the meaning of the term “marriage” to indicate “a voluntary union of one man and one woman as husband and wife to the exclusion of all others.” Cools’s bill S-9 notes that the traditional definition of marriage was “declared in the 1866 decision of Hyde v. Hyde in the Courts of Probate and Divorce in the United Kingdom” and was “understood in sections 91 and 92 of the Constitution Act, 1867.”
Meanwhile in the House of Commons, Canadian Alliance MP Jim Pankiw introduced bill C-266 on Feb 14, which would amend the marriage act so that by the use of the notwithstanding clause the traditional definition of marriage would be protected against court tampering.