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 The
Ruling 17 crisis, 1912-1927
In 1912, the Ontario government put
forward Ruling 17, forbidding the use of French as a language of instruction in Ontario schools. Franco-Ontarians regarded the ruling as the culmination of an assimilation policy extending as far back as the 1860s. The Association canadienne-française
d'éducation d'Ontario (ACFÉO, later named the
Association canadienne-française de l'Ontario in 1969),
on behalf of francophones across Canada, initiated a 15-year battle, pitting two distinct visions of the country against one another.
This first document (original in
English) captured the spirit of the claim of Ontario French-Canadians, calling for "British Fair Play." At this time Ontario's francophone community was not demanding unilingual French schools.
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