The debate centers on how traditionally white, Catholic and French-speaking Quebec can absorb and respect the religions and cultures of immigrants arriving to the province, while protecting its own identity.

Rejecting multiculturalism, the Quebecois speak instead of “interculturalism” — a concept of protecting both French culture and minority rights. But until now, that concept has never been codified.

The first try came in 2008 by a government commission, which was created to respond to a so-called “accommodation crisis,” when conflicts between members of religious groups and local institutions made regular headline news. One involved the Y.M.C.A. in Montreal, which replaced windows in its exercise room with frosted glass at the request of the synagogue next door so that Orthodox students would not see women exercising.

Run by two well-respected academics, the commission issued 37 recommendations focused on increasing integration, reducing intolerance and secularizing the state. Controversially, it suggested that all state officials in positions of “coercive power” — like police officers and judges — be barred from wearing any religious symbols, and that the large crucifix hanging prominently in the provincial legislative chambers be removed.

The government voted unanimously to keep the crucifix, and the report was shelved.

The debate resurfaced in 2013, when a new provincial government suggested expanding the ban on religious symbols to all state employees.

Though cast as a bill on secularism, much of the debate stuck on voiles — the word used in Quebec for both hijabs and niqabs, because Muslims are the largest non-Christian religious group in the province, though only around 3 percent of the population according to the most recent census. (As for those who cover their faces, local estimates peg the number of women in the entire province of Quebec — population 8.39 million — who wear the niqab or burqa at 50 to 100.)