Unholy Trinity

Readers may recall my unhappiness when the Supreme Court decided the companion cases in which the Trinity Western University challenged the denials of accreditation to its proposed law school by the law societies in British Columbia and Ontario, Law Society of British Columbia v Trinity Western University, 2018 SCC 32, [2018] 2 SCR 293 and Trinity Western University v. Law Society of Upper Canada, 2018 SCC 33, [2018] 2 SCR 453. I argued that “[t]he Supreme Court’s decision and reasoning subvert the Rule of Law and nullify the constitutional protection for religious freedom“.

One salient feature of these cases was the Supreme Court’s (re-)embrace of its earlier decisions in Doré v Barreau du Québec, 2012 SCC 12, [2012] 1 SCR 395 and Loyola High School v Quebec (Attorney General), 2015 SCC 12, [2015] 1 SCR 613, which urged judicial deference to administrative decision-makers who applied (or indeed simply ought to have borne in mind) the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Trinity Western cases emphasize this deference, as well as various other aspects of the Canadian judiciary’s surrender of its interpretive authority over the law, which has now been partially walked back in Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65.

At the kind invitation of Matthew Harrington in his capacity as editor of the Journal of Commonwealth Law, I have put my thoughts on this aspect of the Trinity Western cases and generally on the misbegotten idea of judicial deference to administrative applications of constitutional law into article form. The piece, “Unholy Trinity: The Failure of Administrative Constitutionalism in Canada”, is now available from the Journal’s website and my SSRN. Here is the abstract:

The jurisprudence of the Supreme Court of Canada that follows Doré v Barreau du Québec involves administrative decision-makers as key actors in the implementation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Supreme Court emphasizes their expertise in implementing constitutional rights and “Charter values” in the context of the regulatory regimes they are charged with enforcing, and holds that this expertise entitles administrative tribunals to deference when they make decisions that affect the rights the Charter protects or the values that underpin these rights. This article argues that the Supreme Court is wrong to endorse this deferential approach, sometimes described as “administrative constitutionalism”.

It does so by examining the Supreme Court’s decisions in the companion cases that upheld the denial of accreditation by the law societies of British Columbia and Ontario to a proposed fundamentalist Christian law school (the Trinity Western Cases). After reviewing both academic defences of “administrative constitutionalism” and Supreme Court’s previous engagement with it, the article shows that the Trinity Western Cases illustrate the failure of “administrative constitutionalism” to live up to the main arguments made by its supporters. This failure is not accidental, but consistent with significant trends in Canadian administrative law. The article then goes on to consider the implications of the Supreme Court’s decision in Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v Vavilov for the future of “administrative constitutionalism” in Canada, arguing that Vavilov undermines the theoretical foundations of “administrative constitutionalism” or, at a minimum, will change the way it is implemented. The article concludes with an argument that, in addition to not delivering on the promises made on its behalf, “administrative constitutionalism” is also contrary to the Rule of Law. “Administrative constitutionalism” is second-rate constitutionalism in practice, and wrong in principle. The sooner it is recognized for the misguided idea that it is and abandoned, the stronger our actual constitution and the rights it protects will be.

The issue of whether, or at least to what extent and on what conditions, courts should continue to defer to administrative applications of the Charter is very much a live one in the aftermath of Vavilov. Lower courts have ask themselves how to apply Doré in light of Vavilov’s guidance on reasonableness review, and my article makes some suggestions which might be useful in this regard. And the Supreme Court itself, having punted on deference in Charter cases for now, will have to revisit the issue, presumably once Doré‘s author and staunch defender, Justice Abella, retires next year. I would like to think that my paper ― and the somewhat less uncompromising one by co-blogger Mark Mancini, which is set to appear in the Dalhousie Law Journal ― can contribute to the arguments that those challenging Doré will make on that occasion. I’ll be happy to speak to anyone making such arguments. Doré must go, and the delusion of “administrative constitutionalism” and the injustice of the Trinity Western cases must go with it.

Author: Leonid Sirota

Law nerd. I teach public law at the University of Reading, in the United Kingdom. I studied law at McGill, clerked at the Federal Court of Canada, and did graduate work at the NYU School of Law. I then taught in New Zealand before taking up my current position at Reading. View all posts by Leonid Sirota