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Constitutional Law

Osgoode Hall Law School of York University

Journal

Separation of powers

Publication Year

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Law

Dialogue: Clarified And Reconsidered, Rainer Knopff, Rhonda Evans, Dennis Baker, Dave Snow Jun 2017

Dialogue: Clarified And Reconsidered, Rainer Knopff, Rhonda Evans, Dennis Baker, Dave Snow

Osgoode Hall Law Journal

Controversies about constitutional “dialogue” often stem from disagreement over the concept itself. The metaphor’s meaning and attendant consequences differ depending on whether it reflects the assumptions of judicial interpretive supremacy or coordinate interpretation. By combining that distinction with the contrast between weak-form and strong-form rights review, this article creates an integrated framework for clarifying dialogic variation across such jurisdictions as the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Australia. We apply this framework most intensely to the Canadian case and bring differences between several dialogic forms—especially the difference between “clarification dialogue” and “reconsideration dialogue”—into sharper relief than is …


Conservatives, The Supreme Court Of Canada, And The Constitution: Judicial-Government Relations, 2006–2015, Christopher Manfredi Jan 2016

Conservatives, The Supreme Court Of Canada, And The Constitution: Judicial-Government Relations, 2006–2015, Christopher Manfredi

Osgoode Hall Law Journal

Three high-profile government losses in the Supreme Court of Canada in late 2013 and early 2014, combined with the government’s response to those losses, generated a narrative of an especially fractious relationship between Stephen Harper’s Conservative government and the Court. This article analyzes this narrative more rigorously by going beyond a mere tallying of government wins and losses in the Court. Specifically, it examines Charter-based invalidations of federal legislation since 2006, three critical reference opinions rendered at the government’s own request, and two key judgments delivered in the spring of 2015 concerning Aboriginal rights and the elimination of the long-gun …