Court Rejects Curbs on Jehovah’s Witnesses

MONTREAL — The Quebec Court of Appeal has upheld a lower court’s decision and struck down a municipal bylaw restricting when Jehovah’s Witnesses can go door to door to promote their religion.

The city of Blainville had said many of its residents did not want Witnesses at their doors on weekends and in the evenings. But Justice Pierre Dalphond ruled that, although municipal bylaws regulating door-to-door canvassing must conform to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, “The freedom of religion protected by the charter includes the right to manifest religious belief by teaching and dissemination,” he wrote.