Legalized polygamy is coming to a Canada near you

From David Warren, writing in The Ottawa Citizen:

A test case is already heading towards the Supreme Court, from Bountiful, B.C. Lawyers for the fundamentalist Mormon, Winston Blackmore, who has long been openly practising polygamy, will invoke the Charter. The old goat has actually boasted of his multiple teenaged brides: estimates run to more than 20 wives in total. (And you thought Brad Pitt was a chick magnet.)

That this test case will not only proceed, but succeed, almost goes without saying. Even the attorney general of British Columbia doubted his chances with the Charter, when he brought polygamy charges in January against Blackmore, and Jim Oler. This was after a delay of about half a century: for the polygamous cult has been established openly in Bountiful since the era of Peyton Place (the late 1950s). The very fact that the authorities had not found the guts to enforce Section 293 of the Criminal Code, in all this time, will now be counted against the law itself.

That the legalization of polygamy will have more immediate practical consequences than same-sex marriage can be easily seen. It will make Canada the first country in the western world to be compelled to accept the multiple wives of immigrants from such countries as Saudi Arabia, where polygamy is legal; and others, as refugees from where it is not.

It will have fiscal implications, as polygamous families sue to receive multiples of the benefits now received by common law and other two-adult families. It will create a legal vacuum in which demands will be advanced for everything from public recognition of polygamous marriages, to status claims by additional wives and sundry children.

Read all about it.