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Le PQ et le Tea Party
Le mois dernier, Martin Patriquin avait fait grand bruit avec une chronique publiée dans le New York Times, où il affirmait qu’avec son projet de Charte de la honte, « en courtisant cet électorat blanc, populiste, rural, le Parti québécois, un parti de gauche, semble s’être aventuré sur en territoire du Tea Party » (ma…
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The Best
I’m a bit late, but still on time. ‘Tis the season ― for Clawbies nominations. So here are mine: Paul Daly’s Administrative Law Matters:Don’t let the title put you off, like I did for too long. Administrative law might not sound like a very exciting thing, but that just highlights the measure of prof. Daly’s…
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Off Course
In my post on Canada (Attorney General) v. Bedford, 2013 SCC 72, the Supreme Court’s recent decision striking down the prostitution-related provisions of the Criminal Code, I said I would have some thoughts on what this decision means for the future of Charter-based judicial review in Canada. As Churchill said, it is a dangerous thing to make predictions, especially…
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Down with Hypocrisy
As everybody already knows, on Friday the Supreme Court struck down the provisions of the Criminal Code regulating prostitution in Canada (Attorney General) v. Bedford, 2013 SCC 72. In this post, I will summarize its (rather brief) reasons for doing so, and comment on the substance of the decision. In a separate one, I will have some thoughts about…
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Damn Your Party?
In my post last week assessing the merits of Bill C-559 (a.k.a. the “Reform Act“), I pointed out that it risked creating or embittering conflicts between the caucuses and members of political parties. In particular, I wrote that [i]t is at least conceivable that a leader would lose the support of the caucus while retaining…
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The Discomforts of Religion
Religion gives law a lot of trouble. Most often, the difficult question is what to do about it ― what to do about prayer at municipa council meetings, what to do about religious believers asking for exemptions from general laws. But sometimes, the law must confront a more basic, and perhaps an even more difficult…
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The Ways of Change
I wrote last week about Bill C-559, the “Reform Act,” which if enacted would transfer some power from party leaders to MPs and caucuses in the House of Commons. Yesterday, I addressed the question whether the changes it would operate would be good for our democracy, and concluded that this is very doubtful. In this…
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Where to Stand
I wrote last week about Bill C-559, the proposed “Reform Act” that would, if enacted by Parliament, shift some power from party leaders to parliamentary caucuses and maybe individual MPs. It would do so by making it impossible for a leader to deny a candidate chosen by a local party association the ability to run…
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To Be Something
Speaking of our lawmakers, Pierre Trudeau (in)famously remarked that “when they are 50 yards from Parliament Hill, they are no longer honourable members, they are just nobodies.” Not that the honourable members fared any better on Parliament Hill ― over there they were, as he apparently also said, just “trained seals,” performing whatever tricks their party…
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Cross-Purposes
I wrote some time ago about the challenges, legal and political, to the appointment of Justice Marc Nadon to the Supreme Court. I argued that although the appointment was unwise because Justice Nadon did not bring enough to the Court, the legal challenge to it, on the basis that he did not fulfill the requirements…
Double Aspect 