MONTREAL - Quebec sovereignists are demanding the provincial government invoke the notwithstanding clause to override a recent language ruling by Canada's top court.

Last October, the Supreme Court of Canada struck down a Quebec law which limited immigrants' access to English-language schools in the province, calling Bill 104 unconstitutional.

On Sunday, sovereignist organizations, backed by politicians, artists and union leaders, held a rally in support of Bill 104 and read a declaration demanding stricter enforcement of the provincial language charter.

"I don't see a possible solution without using the notwithstanding clause," Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe told The Canadian Press on Sunday.

"It puts the French language in Quebec in a very weak position if we can't apply such a law."

Societe St-Jean Baptiste president Mario Beaulieu said it was time for Premier Jean Charest's government to take a stand and override the ruling.

"The Supreme Court decision brings us back to the point where people with means can skirt the law and send their children to non-subsidized private schools before moving them into the English system," he said.

"We say no to the Supreme Court's decision and we say no to sluggish politicians who hide their head in the sand. We say yes to a new offensive to strengthen the French-language charter."

Quebec law states that children can only attend English public school if a parent was educated in that language somewhere in Canada.

Prior to Bill 104, many immigrant families escaped the law.

The loophole re-opened by the Supreme Court allows parents to send their children to English-language private schools for a period before transferring them into the public system.

Some two dozen families had taken the Quebec government to court over Bill 104, arguing it was violating immigrants' constitutional rights by denying them access to English-language schools.

The Supreme Court gave the Liberal government one year come up with an acceptable compromise to the law.

Jean-Paul Perreault, president of a French-language advocacy group, said Canada's top court has no business in Quebec's affairs.

"The Supreme Court came out with a decision but we all know the Supreme Court is a political organism mostly directed by the federal government," he said.

"A gathering like this one today is a demonstration that in Quebec, people don't accept that kind of unacceptable imposition to the Quebec society, to the Quebec nation."

After the assembly, some 800 protesters marched through the streets of Old Montreal calling for an independent and French Quebec.