Some Canadians thought of it as their country's doomsday scenario. The election of an English-speaking government in Ottawa would be seen by Quebeckers as a hostile rejection. Whereupon Premier Rene Levesque (pronounced Leh-vek) would immediately call a provincial referendum on a separate status for Quebec. After his Parti Quebecois legions stumped the province insisting that Quebeckers now had no choice but to entrust their future to their own government, the voters would give Levesque his mandate to present Ottawa with an ultimatum.
It did not happen that way for a number of good reasons....