For Canadian Dopers Only

Great Debates
1

Do the names Major, Bastarache , Binnie, LeBel, Deschamps, Fish, Abella, Charron, McLachlin mean any thing to you?

Do you know which one is the chief justice ?
Do you know how many women?
Do you know if they are conservative, liberal or swing?
Do you know anything relevant or personal about these people?

Well until a short while ago I couldn’t answer yes. If you asked me the same style question about the US equivalent, I could answer yes.

Now I’m predicting that there are a hell of a lot of Canadians that are in the same boat I was. If not, don’t I look the fool.
Why? I can’t recall any information on these guys being on the news. But I confess that I’m not all that attentive to Canadian news. I like CNN and my local newspaper.

If you agree that Canadians don’t come close to Americans, for knowledge and interest in these nine positions, Why is that?

My position is that these people mentioned in the beginning are not that relevant to Canadians and that our supreme legal document is not that consequential or relevant. I’m not so sure that is bad either.

2

Oh, and non-Canadian replies are certainly welcome.

3

I recognized the list immediately, and I do know that McLachlin is the Chief Justice.

The conservative-liberal split has never been quite as relevant in Canadian politics, for four reasons;

  1. Canada doesn’t presently have the adversarial, bipolar argument over social issues the U.S. does right now, so there’s not as much reason to be freaked out over which side has 5 votes and which has 4.

  2. All the justices were named by either a Liberal government or by the Mulroney government, which was socially as liberal as any liberal government we’ve ever had. Practically speaking they’re all liberal.

  3. Since there’s no Canadian equivalent to the Senate hearing process in the USA, there’s never really a forum for a big argument, and

  4. Our Supreme Court has taken “reading in” and “substantive due process” to a level that makes it hard to judge their decisions by any sort of objective reading of the law, which makes discussion difficult.

4

I recognized the list immediately, but then, it’s part of my job to know those things, having appeared in front of them from time to time. It’s bad form not to be able to respond with their name when questioned… :wink:

RickJay, to hijack a bit - what examples do you have in mind when you comment about reading in and substantive due process?