Brian Peckford, former premier of Newfoundland and last surviving premier to sign Canada’s Constitution, at the Conference for Dominion of Canada in Calgary on May 16, 2026. Michael Wing/The Epoch Times
CALGARY—Former Newfoundland Premier and the last surviving first minister who helped frame Canada’s 1982 Constitution Brian Peckford says today’s courts are “trying to secularize our nation” and are abandoning the Charter’s original framework anchored in “the supremacy of God and the rule of law.”
“What happened to God?” Peckford asked the crowd at the Conference for Dominion of Canada hosted by the Council of Alberta Lawyers on May 16 in Calgary.
“The most violated is the supremacy of God and the rule of law, which is the opening words to the Charter. We didn’t call it a preamble, it was the opening words, which were to be the framework to interpret the rest of the Constitution.”
The Charter of Rights and Freedoms is itself part of the broader Constitution Act passed in 1982. Peckford said that many modern judicial decisions and interpretations have ignored and “hijacked” the meaning of the Charter as he and others framed it.
“They have … ignored it in many later decisions,” Peckford said, adding that courts have instead embraced a “living tree doctrine” as part of an attempt to “secularize our nation.”
Peckford said the Constitution was intended by framers to evolve via the suggested amendments of elected officials, not via different interpretations of the judiciary. He pointed to assisted suicide as an example of improper interpretation of the Constitution.
“The whole question of the assisted suicide right is a living tree document interpretation, which completely violates the framework of the Constitution being the supremacy of God,” Peckford said.
Big Government, Secular Drift
The Conference for Dominion of Canada focused on Canada’s Christian legal and societal roots and featured pastors, historians, activists, and lawyers alongside Peckford.
Throughout the event, speakers argued that the erosion of the supremacy of God in the Charter’s opening words is leading to a growth in state power and tearing the moral fabric of society.
“Regimes which have denied the existence of God and followed an atheistic or hard secularist philosophy have demonstrated the least regard for human rights,” former Reform MP Eric Lowther said, referencing atrocities by Marxist regimes.
“When no God is acknowledged, the state can all too easily become God with appalling consequences,” he added.
