CROSS EXAMINED
Litigious transgender lawyer fights for her and others' rights
BY MARK CARDWE LL
began in 1997 when Montreuil, an out- of-the-closet transgender who had prac- tised law for 25 years as Pierre Montreuil, launched the first of three highly publi- cized court challenges against the refusal by Quebec's registrar of civil status to
Q
uebec City lawyer Micheline Montreuil made history in the first case she pleaded as a woman. It
allow her to legally change her name to Micheline. "I had no choice," she recalls in her home office in a suburb of the picturesque provincial capital. "I made the decision to live as a woman [and] my legal identity had to reflect that fact." Five years, several appeals, and much
jurisprudence later, Montreuil got her wish in a landmark ruling that eased
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the lives of "trans" people in Quebec and opened a new frontier in the post- Charter search for sexual equality in Canada. But she didn't stop there — not by a long shot. For the past decade, Montreuil has waged a one-woman war against both private companies and public institutions over claims of employment-related discrimination.
FRANCIS VACHON
