"Fissiparous Tendencies"

In Toronto, the Workers' Educational Association of Canada (which sponsors night classes for workers) planned to build a house on a lot it owned on O'Connor Drive, then to raffle it off for profit. Then in the deed to the lot it discovered an ominous clause: ". . . not to be sold to Jews or persons of objectionable nationality." The Association went to court to have the clause annulled.

Last week in Ontario's Supreme Court, a canny Scot Justice named Keiller MacKay gave a decision that all members of the clan Mackay could cheer. He had found his legal assignment harder than it looked: nowhere in British or Canadian law had he been able to find any precedent for knocking out the deed's clause. But he had been able to marshal a shattering array of recent world opinion. As evidence of what most of the world thinks about such things, Justice MacKay cited:

P: The United Nations Charter, which reaffirms "faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men & women of the nations large & small . . . without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion. . . ."

P: The Atlantic Charter, which assures "all men" that they "may live out their lives in freedom."

P: Charles de Gaulle's message to the World Jewish Congress in 1941 : "Free France . . .is resolved to establish [equality] of all citizens. . . ."

P: A resolution passed at the Conference of Chapultepec (1945), which states that nations shall "prevent with all the means in their power all that may provoke discrimination among individuals."

P: A 1945 resolution adopted by the World Trade Union Congress : "Every form of . . . discrimination based on race, creed or sex shall be eliminated."

P: Soviet Russia's Constitution (Article 123): "The equality of the rights of citizens . . . irrespective of their nationality or race ... is an indefeasible [i.e., non-voidable] law. Any direct or indirect restriction [of those rights] is punishable by law."

That seemed to be precedent enough. The discriminatory clause in the Association's deed, said Justice MacKay, was "offensive to the public policy. It appears to me to be a moral duty to ... repel [such provisions] as fissiparous tendencies which would imperil national unity." His ruling: the discriminatory clause and all others like it (involving millions of dollars' worth of property in Ontario) were henceforth void.

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