Shameful Anti-polygamy Raids in Canada
As if the government in the United States hasn’t learned its lesson from continually harassing and persecuting polygamists the government of Canada now got in the act.
Last week provincial BC officials raided polygamous communities in Bountiful, arrested many of the men living there and charged them with polygamy. Now none of these men has civil marriages to plural wives but all lives in plural relationships.
I’m watching this raid with interest. The Supreme Court of Canada has a very expansive view of the right of free association and privacy and I’m betting they’ll overturn anti-polygamy laws as a violation of the freedom of religion. One can only hope.
It’s the same old song but I never get tired of singing it: government persecution of polygamous people always backfires and drives them further away from the embrace of law. If you want to create lawbreakers then treat people like lawbreakers. It’s nothing more than persecution, it’s wrong and this case is no different than any of the other raids of the past and it will, ultimately, fail.
