Curious wording on citizenship certificate: What is a "Canadian subject"?

[xf2278389393]

Has anybody noticed that the current wording on the Canadian citizenship certificate is as follows:
"The Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship hereby certifies and declares that XXX is a Canadian citizen and, as such, is entitled to all the rights and privileges and bears all the responsibilities, obligations and duties of a Canadian subject."

(sample citizenship certificate found on the Internet)

The term is not found in the official citizenship guide, Discover Canada, nor any material on the IRCC website. One might at first blush think that this is really archaic language that has never been updated but that's clearly not the case as a review of older certificates shows.

In previous versions, it used to read:
"This certifies that XXX is a Canadian Citizen under the provisions of the Canadian Citizesnhip Act and, as such, is entitled to all the rights and privileges and is subject to all the responsibilities, obligations and duties of a Canadian citizen."

(specimen Canadian citizenship certificate, unknown date but likely before 1977)
The original version from 1947 read:
"I, the undersigned, Secretary of State of Canada, do hereby certify and declare that XXX whose particulars are endorsed hereon, is a Canadian citizen and that he/she is entitled to all rights, powers and privileges and subject to all obligations, duties and liabilities to which a natural-born Canadian citizen is entitled or subject."

(the above is a copy of the very first citizenship certificate ever issued and belongs to former Prime Minister Mackenzie King)

So, a Canadian citizen naturalized in 1947 had not only rights and privileges but also powers. Powers is a specific legal term that is distinct from the concept of rights and privileges. You might have come across the term in corporate legislation that grants to corporations the powers of a natural person, so they can enter into contracts and make powers of attorney, among other things. Likewise, law often confers certain powers on various government officials but also sometimes ordinary people (so-called "statutory powers"). It is curious that they would have removed this term from the certificate.

It is even more perplexing that the Government of Canada which has eliminated all references to Canada's official name, the Dominion of Canada, in every government document since the 1960s, would put alter the wording of the citizenship certificate to insert a reference to a term that sounds like from the 19th century, yet has never been defined anywhere in Canadian law.

A quick search of Canadian legislation for the term "Canadian subject" comes up with nothing:
https://www.canlii.org/en/#search/type=legislation&text=+"Canadian subject"
https://laws.justice.gc.ca/Search/Search.aspx?txtS3archA11="Canadian subject" (this shows two hits in some telecommunications regulations but when you click on it, nothing relevant comes up)

The last major revision of Canadian law was in 1985, when the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1985 Act ("R.S.C.") either confirmed or repealed all statutory law that was then in existence. Any law that was enacted since then appears in the annual statutes of Canada (also known as the Statutes of Canada or S.C. for short). If a law existed defining the term "Canadian subject" or conferring it with rights, privileges, responsibilities, obligations or duties, it would appear either in the R.S.C., the S.C. or the consolidated (updated) versions which are all available through both CanLII and the Justice Laws Website of the Canadian Department of Justice.

A search of the case law turns up nothing useful.
Girard v. The Queen, 2014 TCC 107 (CanLII), <https://canlii.ca/t/gmn3f>
Comments: The term "Canadian subject" was used by a tax protestor but what was not defined. The Court basically said that the taxpayer's argument was nonsensical Organized Pseudolegal Commercial Argument.

X (Re), 2013 FC 1275 (CanLII), [2015] 1 FCR 635, <https://canlii.ca/t/g2rl7>
Comments: Refers to "Canadian subjects" in the context of a warrant where it appears to mean the subjects of a warrant who are Canadian citizens or permanent residents. I doubt this would be the correct meaning because that would mean Canadian citizens have no more rights than permanent residents.

Reference re Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act, 2020 ABCA 74 (CanLII), <https://canlii.ca/t/j5dc0>
Comments: Among some other cases I came across, this one cites the Act of 14 Geo III, which is UK legislation, that provided that 1774 Quebec retained the private law that had been in force under French rule when it came under the British Crown. The act referred to "Canadian subjects" to mean British subjects domiciled in Canada who were assured the right to keep their property. This law is no longer in force, Quebec law having substantially evolved in the centuries since, and the Court simply cited it to show that the scope of the civil law making powers of a province are broad. Permanent residents, of course, enjoy the same property rights.

R v Soulier, 2020 MBPC 39 (CanLII), <https://canlii.ca/t/jb35t>
Comment: Canadian subject was used in the context of an intelligence test, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale, which was developed into the United States. The evidence of an expert witness was that "allowances have to be made for Canadian subjects" because the test asked, inter alia, who the president of the US was during the Civil War. The test subject in the case was a First Nations member, so I doubt that this term was intended to have any legal meaning, given how controversial that would be in the context of indigenous people.

The King v. Martin, 1904 CanLII 174 (NB KB), <https://canlii.ca/t/jl0hj>
Comment: This case dealt with the Seaman's Act which is no longer in force. The case held that in the case of an offence on a foreign vessel, the consent of a consul of the ship's flag nation only had to be obtained if the accused belonged to or otherwise was connected to the ship, so it didn't apply to a Canadian subject unconnected to the ship. The accused was said to be a citizen of Saint John and a Canadian subject. It is possible that Canadian subject here simply meant a person subject to Canada's jurisdiction or it could mean a British subject domiciled in Canada, as at that time there was no Canadian citizenship and all Canadians were British subjects.

It appears the change was made when IRCC switched from citizenship cards to letter-size certificates in 2012.

(Citizenship certificate card issued before February 2012)

So what is a Canadian subject? What rights and privileges and responsibilities, obligations and duties does a Canadian subject have? Does the term mean anything at all? Who decided to put that term on the citizenship certificate?

How do you feel about this terminology?

 

[xf2278389393]

Any thoughts?

 

[MelVan]

It is an interesting choice of expression. I read it as a Canadian subject of the King of Canada, HM King Charles III, to whom we swore our oath of allegiance. That said, because under section 28 of the Citizenship Act "the Minister [of Immigration, etc] may prescribe the forms of applications, certificates and other documents required for the purposes of this Act", it's possible that wording used on the certificate is a creation of the Minister's office and there's no means of knowing why that expression was used.

 

[johnjkjk]

Good question I noticed this also. You could submit an information act request to ircc asking why it was changed From citizen to subject in 2012 and the legal basis for this given that the relationship with the monarchy hasn't changed since 1982 (subject meaning of a monarch as per British law).

The other interesting thing is that the Canadian passport doesn't mention subjects but it does say that help can be sought from a British office if Canadian isn't available. I wasn't aware that there was any residual link to the UK after 1982.

 

[armoured]

Has anybody noticed that the current wording on the Canadian citizenship certificate is as follows:
"The Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship hereby certifies and declares that XXX is a Canadian citizen and, as such, is entitled to all the rights and privileges and bears all the responsibilities, obligations and duties of a Canadian subject."
...
The original version from 1947 read:
"I, the undersigned, Secretary of State of Canada, do hereby certify and declare that XXX whose particulars are endorsed hereon, is a Canadian citizen and that he/she is entitled to all rights, powers and privileges and subject to all obligations, duties and liabilities to which a natural-born Canadian citizen is entitled or subject."
...
So what is a Canadian subject? What rights and privileges and responsibilities, obligations and duties does a Canadian subject have? Does the term mean anything at all? Who decided to put that term on the citizenship certificate?

I believe the clue is that they wanted to wordsmith to remove and rephrase a few things that now seems somewhat outdated (the use of he/she, reference to natural-born, the repetition of Canadian citizen, possibly deprecating passive constructions where possible) and then got themselves stuck with Canadian subject.

Important thing is that a citizen is 'entitled to' some things (rights and privileges basically), but 'bears' or is subject to other things (duties responsibilities and obligations.) In a different format you could link these visually, but the key bit is that these are different concepts - you are entitled to 'good things', subject to 'things you must do.'

The original is arguably weak in that the 'respectively' required to link entitled to entitlements vs subject to obligations is omitted, although clear enough since the words themselves imply this relationship already - in my view. On the other hand, there MAY be an important legal point here, IF there is any legal argument to be made that 'entitlements' are optional, whereas obligations are mandatory. And my guess is that both stylistically and legally (to foreclose the optionality argument), the decision was made that the entitlement relationship should be separated from the obligations.

Plus since way back then - Canadian law (somewhere) defines the term 'Canadian' to include permanent residents, so citizenship certs can't use that shorthand.

Arguably the newer version puts somewhat more emphasis on obligations. And I actually support the rephrasing to active voice, i.e. "the citizen bears [these obligations]."

But at that point, they've snookered themselves into either repeating Canadian citizen, or ... the hoary old "Canadian subject."

Personally? I don't have a big attachment to nor take offence at use of 'subject.' But I do recognize many do not like that word, or more importantly the historical connotations.

They also seem to have moved away from (deprecated) any use of something like 'bears the [obligations] thereof or similar. (Mind, if that's the case - i.e. it's a stylistic choice - I believe they should also remove the 'as such' - and if they're out to remove superfluous, archaic sounding words, consider whether 'hereby' is necessary, too).

If it were me, I would collapse the two to put Canadian citizen at the end and use citizen of Canada for force and avoidance of repetition with some other minor changes:
"... [hereby] certifies and declares that XXX is a citizen of Canada and is entitled to all the rights and privileges, and bears all the responsibilities, obligations, and duties[,] of a Canadian citizen."

This hits all the notes, avoids repetition (although technically Canadian citizen and citizen of Canada are equivalent, the second usage is actually needed for content), avoids 'subject', archaic parasitical structures ('such as') minimized, reduces use of passive voice, maintains the split between entitlements and obligations, etc. Also Oxford comma. (The placement/order of Canadian citizen/citizen of is arbitrary except that my version sounds better, see my Rule 1 (which reads 'I am correct')). The [square bracketed] comma I would argue is useful, but I wouldn't insist upon it; I suspect it would make it harder for some to grasp so perhaps leave it out.

A separate argument/discussion that's mostly stylistic is I think both of the 'alls' are not required and redundant, as I don't believe there's any argument that removing the 'all' would imply that either the entitlements or obligations would or could be limited by this text (but only by law). (Any entitlement or obligation applies to all citizens, by definition, really). [In fact I think the inclusion of all here paradoxically WEAKENS any right or obligation, because it implies that some citizens could be deprived of or do not benefit from / do not bear some of them.]

So my final preferred:
"... certifies and declares that XXX is a citizen of Canada and is entitled to the rights and privileges, and bears the responsibilities, obligations, and duties of a Canadian citizen."

That said, one could write this differently by relaxing some other constraints: allowing the name of the individual to be repeated, allowing this to be split into two sentences, etc.

 

[xf2278389393]

Plus since way back then - Canadian law (somewhere) defines the term 'Canadian' to include permanent residents, so citizenship certs can't use that shorthand.

Before 1947 when the first Canadian Citizenship Act came into force, there was a law called the Canadian Nationals Act, R.S.C. 1927 c. 21, under which British subjects with domicile in Canada (a.k.a. "citizens"), their wives and their descendants in the male line were Canadian nationals. https://www66.statcan.gc.ca/eng/1946/194601600118_p. 118.pdf
It is no longer in force and has been repealed. Today, the terms Canadian citizen and Canadian national are synonymous and one could be used in place of the other.

While permanent residents have a right to enter and remain in Canada under the IRPA, there is no law that includes them in the definition of Canadian. In particular, where a criminal law requires a person to be Canadian for the person to be prosecuted for an offence committed outside Canada (notably under s. 6 of the Criminal Code), a permanent resident is not taken to be Canadian - see for example, R. v. Patel, 2016 ONCJ 172 (CanLII), Her Majesty the Queen v. Jean-Marie Aloise Hoch, 2020 CanLII 46157 (SCC). Even if Canadian could also mean a permanent resident of Canada, the use of "all" in reference to rights, etc. would seem to provide sufficient clarity since permanent residents don't have all the rights of a Canadian citizen.

So either Canadian citizen, Canadian national or just Canadian would seem to be far better options.

 

[armoured]

While permanent residents have a right to enter and remain in Canada under the IRPA, there is no law that includes them in the definition of Canadian.

If you can provide an authoritative source for this, I'd accept of course. But I cannot find one. The IRP act only provides three categories: Canadian citizen, Canadian permanent resident, and foreign national. Foreign nationals are clearly not Canadian.

I'm not trying to be pedantic, I believe I've seen the reference (in law) that Canadian must include PRs - but I admit I don't have it to hand and cannot find.

I could make some textual claims about eg the sole place where the IRPA uses "Canadians" (n) and not as an adjective, it is this: "to protect the health and safety of Canadians and to maintain the security of Canadian society." No hint that, or reason to believe, that only the health and safety of Canadian citizens is what is meant.

But I'm not making that claim, just saying this has been my understanding and I can't find specific text that states otherwise.

And even if that claim is not correct (i.e. the noun "Canadian" by law does not actually include permanent residents), they shouldn't just use Canadian (n) unless it's clear. "Canadian subject" as you've noted - and I agree - appears to be a stylistic choice here that doesn't have any defined meaning either, except that here they seem to be using it as simply a term whose meaning is 'citizen.'

In particular, where a criminal law requires a person to be Canadian for the person to be prosecuted for an offence committed outside Canada (notably under s. 6 of the Criminal Code), a permanent resident is not taken to be Canadian - see for example, R. v. Patel, 2016 ONCJ 172 (CanLII), Her Majesty the Queen v. Jean-Marie Aloise Hoch, 2020 CanLII 46157 (SCC).

The wording of the relevant part of the Criminal Code (s7(7)) referenced in R v Patel reads "(7) If the accused is not a Canadian citizen...". That does not seem in any way to settle whether the term "Canadian" (n) includes a PR or not, since the text specifies citizen / Canadian is used as an adjective. Appears to be the same for the second case you cite as well. If the law itself states Canadian citizen (only), that's unambiguous.

Even if Canadian could also mean a permanent resident of Canada, the use of "all" in reference to rights, etc. would seem to provide sufficient clarity since permanent residents don't have all the rights of a Canadian citizen.

I don't follow you here. I was only saying they don't seem to use Canadian (n) because ambiguous / undefined - I didn't say that PRs have 'all' the rights of citizens. Clearly not, as stated in the Charter of Rights (amongst others) - where there are some rights that are also held by 'everyone' eg including foreign nationals in Canada.

Anyway, this would lead me further along the path to agreeing with you in saying that the certificate should not use 'subjects' as simply not clear, and that the stylistic choice to use it is dubious. That said, I don't know if the wording in the certificate has any meaning beyond the existence of the certificate as a document stating citizenship is held, i.e. the text itself has no legal force. And it presumably wouldn't make for a very ceremonial document to write "see the Charter and Constitution, ibid., for more information.