That point was brought home with eloquent force by John Whyte, constitutional law professor and counsel for the government of Saskatchewan in these hearings. Confederation, he reminded the court, was not only "the amalgamation of colonies [or] the creation of a national government." It was also a conscious and deliberate choice to form a nation, "a new, transcendent, organic reality" beyond the mere trappings of statehood.

It was a nation built not on assimilation, but on respect for historic political identities, notably that of the French-speaking minority, and on the compromises that these often require: "The threads of a thousand acts of accommodation are the fabric of a nation." Yet it was a nation for all that: not a contract among states, but a union of citizens. As such, as a blend of respect for minorities with "a belief in transcendent nationhood," it has acquired a "powerful moral identity." It has, in short, a right to exist, this nation: not just a legal right, but a moral right. We don't have to beg for that right. We've earned it. Or as Whyte put it, Canada has, by virtue of its moral identity, "an overwhelming interest ...

in national integrity." If so, if Confederation was the creation, not just of a state, but a nation, and not just of a nation, but of a nation founded in a moral vision, then two points follow. The secession of Quebec, under any circumstances, would not only mean the division of the country, but the annihilation of the nation. And this would be, not merely a transfer of sovereignty, but a profound moral wrong.

In which case, why are we so quick, as we have been all through this affair, to declare that, should a majority of Quebecers express a desire to secede, the rest of Canada would be obliged to cooperate in their own demise? It's fine to say, with the federal government, that secession could not be effected without the rest of Canada's consent. But the government is equally insistent that the rest of Canada would have no choice but to give that consent.

This is nonsensical. If consent means anything, it means the right not only to say Yes to secession, but also to say No. And if we have the right to say No, then Quebec does not have the right to secede, but only the right to ask.

There may be many things that the rest of Canada would be willing, even obliged to concede to Quebec. But this list stops at the point where the very survival of the nation is at stake. We are entitled, that is, to resist any secession bid, not merely an unlawful one. We are not obliged to sign our own death warrant, even if it has been properly drafted. Indeed I would even say we have no right to.

At the least, however, one point should be clear: secession does not involve the severing of two bodies, but the disintegration of one. It does not so much resemble a divorce as a suicide. For any nation to contemplate such an act of self-destruction, there must be an extraordinary level of national consensus to that effect.

Which brings us to Anne McLellan. The Justice minister made headlines this week with her comment that the Constitution could not be changed in such a way as to permit a lawful secession. "One would be dealing," she told an interviewer, "with an extraordinary set of circumstances not comprehended, in our opinion, within the existing constitutional framework." In the event, "one would probably acknowledge the extraordinary nature of the situation and determine what process would be pursued at that point." This is a dangerously ambiguous statement, which the minister has a duty to clarify. Either the federal government is contemplating some manoeuvre in place of the existing amending formulae to give effect to secession -- in which case, it is as guilty as the Parti Quebecois of subverting the rule of law. Or, as one hopes, the minister is suggesting that some additional measure of consent, beyond even unanimity, would be required to make secession legal.

I have argued this point before. Secession would, by necessity, alter a number of constitutional provisions -- on the composition of the House of Commons, on the role of the lieutenant governors, and much else -- which require the unanimous consent of the country's legislatures. But secession itself -- the obliteration, remember, of the nation created at Confederation -- is an altogether different thing. So far as the constitution envisages any such rupture, it would require another, higher measure of national consent, probably a referendum.

Each is necessary. Neither is sufficient.

Not unanimity or, but unanimity plus.