We should resist the temptation to think that the notwithstanding clause is itself intrinsically unjust or that every use of it is automatically unjust. Our focus should be on the substance of the law and whether it respects fundamental justice.
We find ourselves at a fork in the road. Do we update the remaining vaccine mandates to require boosters and doses of the new bivalent vaccine? Or do we recommend these steps, defer to personal decision-making, and bring an end to vaccine mandates?
Universities have, for centuries, been the principal setting for nourishing the desire for truth. Countless feats for humanity have been achieved by virtue of the university.
Legislatures are not the place to effectively censor certain viewpoints on account of their unpopularity. The costs to democratic health in barring freedom of conscience outweigh the benefits gained.
Judges are human beings with formative experiences and perspectives that predate their judicial careers. They are not robots, and that is for the better.
It’s hard to imagine that many Canadians foresaw the Charter being argued in cases about euthanasia, prohibitions on private health care and same-sex marriage—to name only a few issues.
If the framers of 1982 thought that the constitutional changes of that year would bring about constitutional tranquility, they were sorely mistaken. The past forty years have featured intense activity on the constitutional front as governments have learned how to respect the Charter.
The public discourse in Canada is in bad shape. Key to improving it is adopting a critical posture—even towards our own deeply held beliefs and our own side’s convictions.
It is no overstatement to say that without Trudeau, the 15th Prime Minister of Canada,1982 would not have happened.
As we near the second anniversary of the declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic, we are in a radically different and better place today than we were in March of 2020.
