Joseph Guibord

Joseph Guibord (31 March 1809 – 18 November 1869) was a printer in Montréal, Quebec, Canada, known for the quality of his work. Guibord was acknowledged as one of the best typographers in Canada; he is thought to have introduced stereotype printing to Canada; and he printed a catechism in an Indian language at the request of André-Marie Garin, a missionary in the northwest. However, Guibord's notability is based on events after his death: as a member of the Institut Canadien de Montréal, he was denied ecclessiastical burial by the Roman Catholic Church in the Montréal cemetery of Notre-Dame-des-Neiges. His widow, Henriette Brown, challenged the refusal in the courts, and for five years his body lay in temporary accommodation in a Protestant cemetery as the court action worked its way through the Quebec courts. Finally, five years after his death, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, at that time the court of last resort for the British Empire, allowed his widow's appeal in the Guibord Case and ordered the Church to provide a burial in the portion of the burial ground reserved for Roman Catholics. Religious and political passions were highly aroused by the Judicial Committee's decision and a military escort was needed to carry out the order for burial.

Guibord had been a founding member of the Institut Canadien de Montréal. The Institut was founded in 1844 by a group of approximately 200 young professionals of liberal ideology. They tended to support the Rouge party, and provided a library, a reading room and a forum for debates. Given their political views, they came into conflict with the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic church, at that time a very powerful conservative force in Quebec society, being heavily influenced by ultramontane thought. Eventually, the Annuaire de l’Institut Canadien pour 1868 was placed on the Church's Index of Prohibited Books. The Bishop of Montréal, Ignace Bourget, issued an ordinance which was circulated by the Montréal clergy, condemning the Annuaire and membership in the Institut: “He who persists in the desire to remain in the said Institut or to read or merely possess the above-mentioned yearbook without being so authorized by the Church deprives himself of the sacraments at the hour of his death.”

...
Wikipedia