As the holidays are upon us, co-blogger Mark Mancini and I would like to invite you to join our very special celebration. In our capacity as the self-proclaimed lords of misrule of the Canadian legal blogosphere, we will be reviving the old tradition of festive subversion by marking the twelve days of Christmas with a blogging symposium highlighting Canadian legal scholars’ least favourite Supreme Court decisions.
Borrowing a model recently suggested by Damon Root for Reason, we have asked Canadian legal thinkers for lists of five particularly bad public law decisions from the period 1967-2017 (we decided to exclude this year’s cases to avoid too much bias in (dis)favour of the ones fresh on everyone’s mind), accompanied by brief reminders of what they were about and explanations about why they deserved to make the list. We will be taking a “large and liberal” approach to what counts as public law, and have invited contributors to use their own criteria for what makes decisions bad and worse. The only limit, other than the time range, that we have asked them to respect is that the decisions they list should not have been overturned.
Speaking of contributors, we are very grateful to all those who have agreed to take part. This was a bit of a last-minute idea, and it was very kind of people to take time, on short notice, out their busy pre-holiday schedules to join the fun here. In no particular order, the guests who will partying with us are:
- Geoff Sigalet
- Bruce Pardy
- Gerard Kennedy
- Kerri Froc
- Asher Honickman
- Joanna Baron
- Maxime St-Hilaire
- Michael Plaxton
- Dwight Newman
For most (all, in fact, except for Professor St-Hilaire) this will be a first appearance on Double Aspect, and we are delighted to welcome them here in such festive circumstances. And of course Mark and I will be taking part in the celebrations too.
Now, perhaps you’ve noticed that this only adds up to 11 participants. One person, sadly, had to pull out at the last moment. We thus have a spot to fill. If you feel up to the task of penning a contribution quickly, please get in touch! If not Mark and I will round-up the proceedings with some concluding observations on Day 12.
Double Aspect 
I wish there was a little more optimism in the media/blogosphere nowadays. Rather than focusing on the negatives the entire time, might I suggest an honorary mention day where you highlight the best decisions as well?
I’m actually curious about where you’re getting the negativity about the Supreme Court. Sounds like I’m missing out! There is too much fawning over the Supreme Court as it is. No need for us to add to it.