In 1977, as a print journalist, Scully was accused of harbouring anti-Quebec sentiment in the wake of a caustic article he wrote in the Washington Post that railed against what he viewed as a backward, empty Quebec society. He apologized five days later on the French program "Ce Soir" for having offended some people with his article, claiming that the article had been written for an American readership, primarily to stir up discussion over the Quebec issue in America. Shortly thereafter, Scully strangely confided to a journalist from "La Presse" that he was a separatist (or at least, had independentist leanings) as he had actually voted for the Parti Québécois around that time and insisted that his sentiments had been misconstrued. In 1978, he co-wrote a book with the leader of the Quebec Liberal Party, Claude Ryan, about the history of the Quebec independence movement, two years before the first Quebec referendum on sovereignty. In that referendum, Ryan successfully campaigned for the "No" (federalist) forces and won against the independentist forces in Quebec.