First a caveat: for close followers of our corporate activities and online destinations, you will note that some of what follows has been posted and re-purposed elsewhere on one of our other websites. Sometimes, that’s the challenge of being a contributor for two separate websites, the luxury of a day off, and ultimately, the ease with which you can “copy/paste.” 

Every July 1, Canadians celebrate their country’s birthday. But what exactly are we celebrating? The beginning of some school-free summer months, or a day off work, or time spent with family at an annual barbeque capped off with a night-in-the-park fireworks display?

Alternatively, others would suggest that July 1st signifies the celebration of Canada’s ‘birth certificate’, our original Constitution (aka, The British North America Act). Yet, our own country’s founding document doesn’t seem to have the same cache as what the American Declaration of Independence has to Americans or the Magna Carta has to Britains. Why? Could it be because we don’t have our own original Constitution here in Canada and on public display?

Regular readers of this blog know of our ongoing, year-long Canadian history/civic literacy series, The Canadian Experience, written by some of Canada’s foremost historians, under Jack Granatstein’s editorship, and published in over 70 print/online publications in 24 languages. From this special series, the realization that the BNA Act was, indeed, housed on foreign soil prompted Lori Abittan, our President and CEO, to launch the campaign to bring the document to Canada. To bring the BNA Act home. To BringBackTheAct.ca.

“We are proud Canadians and while many of our citizens were born somewhere else, we have all chosen Canada as our home. It is why we decided to undertake The Canadian Experience and why we have dedicated ourselves to bring the BNA Act home for all Canadians. We all need to understand our country’s history with it peaceful evolution to nationhood to truly appreciate how wonderful and unique Canada really is.” – Lori Abittan

The last few months have been hectic for many of us here, but we remain passionate and committed to the cause.  BringBackTheAct.ca is a national campaign intended to gather names to petition Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and the British government to allow the original BNA Act to be given to Canada where it will be properly displayed for all Canadians to see. This will be the final action to really “repatriate” our Constitution.

The official press release can be found by clicking here. Over the coming months, I will post progress updates on this blog, and provide more information on some of the other people and organizations – Canadians from all walks of life – who are also lending their time and effort to support and participate in this initiative.

If you believe that such an important historical document – Canada’s original birth certificate – should be brought back to enable as many Canadians to see it, to experience and learn from it, perhaps this great  national holiday could begin with one small, but significant act of participation … we hope you sign the online petition.

From all of us at Multimedia Nova, Diversity Media Services/Lingua Ads, we wish you a safe and happy Canada Day.

This afternoon at 1:45 pm, we will be hosting the Hon. Eric Hoskins, Ontario’s Citizenship & Immigration Minister for an Editorial Roundtable discussion in our main boardroom.

Minister Hoskins has been a member of the Ontario legislature since 2009 after winning the Toronto riding of St. Paul’s. A practicing family doctor and well known for his humanitarian efforts — Minister Hoskins and his wife, Dr. Samantha Nutt co-founded War Child Canada — and has received numerous awards for his public service, including the Order of Canada and the United Nations Lester B. Pearson Peace Medal.

Similar to a previous Editorial Board with the Hon. John Wilkinson, I have tweeted these kinds of Editorial Roundtable discussions via my Twitter account; but, with the World Cup wreaking havoc on Twitter the last few days, we will be covering today’s discussion via Cover it Live, a live web-blogging application. If you would like to participate, you can return here to this post. We expect to begin our discussion at approximately 1:45 pm. today.