Muriel Duckworth (1908-2009) and the Outremont School Question : An Overlooked Moment in the History of Human Rights in Quebec

The author outlines the role played by Muriel Duckworth in the 1946 "Outremont School Question." That year, a controversy had arisen within the Montreal suburban municipality of Outremont over the decision of its Protestant Board of School Trustees to cease accepting Jewish students from outside the municipality, or at least to segregate them into a separate school. Contrary to an earlier agreement, the Trustees decided in 1946 that it would no longer accept Jewish children from neighbouring Montreal in any of its three elementary schools or in its high school. Their rationale was that the Board could no longer afford to accommodate these students, whose parents paid no school taxes to the suburb, and that the Jewish students' presence was disrupting the "Christian" character of Protestant education in Outremont. Duckworth organized a Home and School Committee of both Protestant and Jewish parents who produced a report in March 1947 that refuted all the Trustees' positions. The report was supported by at least eighty percent of the Protestant parents in Outremont. In the summer of 1947, the Trustees acquiesced and signed a five-year contract with the Jewish community allowing its children into Outremont schools.

Quebec Heritage News

Vol. 5

no. 5

September-October 2009

23-24

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