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 : You are against confusing who identifies as Québécois as their national identity (mostly francophones) and who is a Québécois by law, a citizen. The majority set the norm. What prevents the adoption of this identity by all Quebecers is the competition, through the English language, of another national identity on the same territory.  
 : It is made very clear as early as 1810, when governor James Henry Craig exposed his plan for the assimilation of ""French"" Canadians by the reunion of Upper Canada and Lower Canada and the disenfranchisement of the majority of the people so as to place the real numerical majority in the position of a minority in the elected House, which happened in 1840. On May 1st 1810, he write to London his feelings on the inhabitants of Lower Canada: 
 :: ""In considering the probability of these people having in view their return to their own Government, it may be urged that they have been hitherto quiet & faithful subjects, during the long lapse of 50 years, in which it would rather be to be supposed that their old attachment should have gradually decreased, so that there should be the less likelihood of their assuming now a disposition, of which they have hitherto shown no indication; to all this however it may be replied, that no circumstance whatever has occurred to awaken their attachment to their Mother Country, nor have any  pains ever been taken to produce such a change, their habits, language and religion, have remained as distinct from ours as they were before the Conquest. Indeed it seems to be a favourite object with them to be considered as [a] separate Nation; La Nation Canadienne is their constant expression, and with regard to their having been hitherto quiet & faithful subjects, it need only be observed that no opportunity has presented them an encouragement to shew themselves otherwise. "" 
 :: Read the rest here: Craig to Liverpool, Quebec, 1st May 1810  
 : In the view of this British employee of the Colonial Office, is made very clear the fact that for some high ranking officials, being a British subject and having ""habits, language and religion"" different from those of the English was incompatible and something to be corrected at the price of the cultural genocide of the existing Nation Canadienne, a distinct American people shaped by French civil law. Luckily the editors of the newspaper Le Canadien were more enlightened and saw no incompatibility with being Canadien and having origins other than Canadien. In the edition of May 21st, 1831 one can read:  

 :: Il n'y a pas, que nous sachions, de peuple français en cette province, mais un peuple canadien, un peuple religieux et moral, un peuple loyal et amoureux de la liberté en même temps, et capable d'en jouir; ce peuple n'est ni Français, ni Anglais, ni Écossais, ni Irlandais, ni Yanké, il est Canadien.  
 :: (There is not, as far as we know, any French people in this province, but a Canadian people, a people religious and moral, a people loyal and loving liberty at the same time, and capable of enjoying it; this people is neither French, nor English, nor Scottish, nor Irish, nor Yankee, it is Canadian.) 
 : La Minerve, the other big liberal newspaper also thought the same in 1827: 
 :: ""What is a Canadien? Genealogically, it is those whose ancestors inhabited the country before 1759 and of which laws, customs and language are conserved for them by treaties and constitutional acts. Politically, the 'Canadiens' are those who make common cause with the inhabitants of the country, those in which the name of this country awakens the sentiment of national homeland (patrie)... As soon as an inhabitant of the country shows that he is truly a citizen, no difference is to be made."" (as cited in Denis Monière's Pour comprendre le nationalisme au Québec et ailleurs, Les Presses de l'Université de Montréal, p.92) 
 : This ""Canadian"" people, the British colonial government worked very hard to divide along ethic lines and thanks to the division of language especially, they succeeded. Whereas many Irish, Scottish and English intermingled with the Canadians as they settled in Canada from 1763 to early 1780s, and subsequently came to think of themselves as Canadians too, the segregated ethnic enclaves created by Loyalists who had no intention of being anything but British anywhere in the British Empire, eventually grew bigger. Having little contact with the Canadians, those communities organized themselves independently from them and even got en entire province all to themselves in Upper Canada, isolating themselves completely from the duality that existed along the St. Lawrence river. Much later, when British North America became the Canadian federation, the second Canadian nationality and consequent nationalism was born, although a