Constitutional law
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Cooperative, or competitive?
The critics of the Supreme Court’s decision in the long-gun registry case, Quebec (Attorney General) v. Canada (Attorney General), 2015 SCC 14, have lamented the majority’s failure to make good on what seemed like the promise of cooperative federalism in the Court’s recent jurisprudence. In La Presse + today, Jean Leclair argues that the judges in… Continue reading
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How to Be Good Neighbours
Sometimes, the soundness of a position only becomes apparent by comparison with the alternative. So it has been, for me, in the gun registry litigation, which has finally concluded this morning with the Supreme Court’s decision in Quebec (Attorney General) v. Canada (Attorney General), 2015 SCC 14. The majority finds that contrary to Québec’s claims, the federal… Continue reading
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Beavertail Western
Suppose you are the sheriff of a remote town in the Wild West. John, the man who used to run the town’s saloon ― the only saloon within a hundred-mile radius as it happens ― passed away, and left the saloon to a son of his, name of Steve. However, unlike John, who was never fewer… Continue reading
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Splitting a Baby
There came a Catholic school and a minister of education unto the Supreme Court, and stood before it. And the school said, “Oh my Lords and my Ladies, I am a private Catholic school, and am delivered of a programme for teaching a class on Ethics and Religious Culture through the prism of my Catholic faith.… Continue reading
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Rule and Exemption
Here’s something that has been bothering me since I’ve recently re-read the Supreme Court’s decisions in R. v. Morgentaler, [1988] 1 S.C.R. 30 and in the Insite case, Canada (Attorney General) v. PHS Community Services Society, 2011 SCC 44, [2011] 3 S.C.R. 134. The two cases dealt with different topics: the former is about abortion; the latter,… Continue reading
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Des fois, Boisvert a tort
J’avais beaucoup de respect, de l’admiration même, pour Yves Boisvert. Il est sans doute l’un des observateurs les plus perspicaces et les plus justes du système judiciaire et des enjeux reliés au droit dans les médias traditionnels. Il a fait preuve de sagesse et de respect pour la différence lors du débat sur la Charte de la… Continue reading
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Section 0
I wrote yesterday about the possibility that the relationship between sections 7 and 1 of the Charter might change in the wake of the Supreme Court’s assisted-suicide decision, Carter v. Canada (Attorney General), 2015 SCC 5. If I am right, however, the changes will only be relevant in a limited number of cases (albeit potentially significant ones).… Continue reading
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Seven and One
I want to come back to Carter v. Canada (Attorney General), 2015 SCC 5, the Supreme Court’s decision striking down an absolute prohibition on assisting a person to commit suicide, to comment on an aspect of the Court’s reasoning that seems, as best I can tell, to have attracted little attention. The Court found that,… Continue reading
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A Bad Fit
I blogged about Michael Chong’s proposed “Reform Act” back when it was first tabled as Bill C-559, criticizing both the substance of the changes it sought to introduce into the Canadian democracy, and the choice of legislation as the vehicle for effecting these changes. The bill (now C-586) has been much amended, and passed by… Continue reading
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No Blurred Lines
Last week, I published a lament for the Charter challenge to the Canadian citizenship oath, which the Supreme Court refused to hear, over at the Policy Options blog. Philippe Lagassé has published a thoughtful response, arguing that contrary what I have been saying all along, the case really was about “the legitimacy of the Crown” as… Continue reading
Double Aspect 