Grant, Harrison, Shepherd & Suberu: The Supreme Court Decisions of the Summer of 2009 Watch the Webcast On July 17, 2009, the Supreme Court of Canada handed down its long awaited decisions in R. v. Grant, R. v. Harrison, R. v. Shepherd and R. v. Suberu clarifying the law in respect of the exclusion of ... Read More

Albie Sachs: The Strange Alchemy of Life and Law (Oxford University Press, 2009) Friday, January 15, 2010 3:00 – 4:00 (to be followed by a reception) Faculty of Law, Flavelle House, Room FLB   Should a judge be an instrument of pure, detached reason, or a person imbued with human empathy? Albie Sachs, appointed by ... Read More

Nicholas Aroney - TC Beirne School of Law, U. of Queensland This paper utilizes the Australian experience of federation, 1890–1901, as a vehicle for the discussion of the leading conceptions of federalism extant in the late nineteenth-century English-speaking world. In particular, the paper examines the federal theories of James Madison, James Bryce, Edward Freeman, Albert Dicey and ... Read More

The Supreme Court of Canada released its unanimous decision in Prime Minister of Canada et al. v. Omar Khadr on Friday, January 29, 2010. It declared that the Canadian government is violating Omar Khadr's right to life, liberty and security under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The court denounced the use of torture in ... Read More

As rapidly advancing communication technology transforms so many aspects of human interaction it is crucial for public safety that investigative powers remain relevant to the rapidly evolving methods of crime. However, these methods must not too broadly infringe on the rights and liberties of Canadian Citizens. In 2009, two bills, C- 46 and C-47, were ... Read More

Hugo Cyr - Université du Québec à Montréal ABSTRACT: With the increased mobility and interdependence brought on by globalisation, governments can no longer deal effectively with what were traditionally regarded as «domestic issues» unless they cooperate among themselves. International law may once have been a sort of inter-state law concerned mostly with relations between states, ... Read More

Information session on clinical opportunities Please join all the clinics for a joint information session about for-credit clinical opportunities in second and third year. Presenters will include: Asper Centre, DLS, Health Law and Equity Clinic, and the IHRP. Each clinic will review the type of cases/projects pursued, admission requirements and application details. For more information, ... Read More

Marci Hamilton - Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law The Rules Against Scandal and What They Mean For the First Amendment’s Religion Clauses NOTE: Room change to FLA in Flavelle House. MARCI A. HAMILTON is one of the United States’ leading church/state scholars and holds the Paul R. Verkuil Chair in Public Law at the ... Read More

Join us for a panel discussion on the upcoming reference at the British Columbia Supreme Court regarding the constitutionality of s. 293 of the Criminal Code which prohibits polygamy in Canada. This case has attracted wide interest, and will involve various interveners, including the Asper Centre together with the Canadian Coalition for Children and Youth, ... Read More

Monday, June 14, 2010, at 4:00 PM Deadline for upper year students to submit their application for the fall 2010 term of the Asper Centre Clinical Legal Education Course.

The David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights is co-sponsor, with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, of a two day conference at the Faculty of Law on September 24th and 25th, 2010. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association is undertaking a research project on the status of immigrant in Canadian society. Immigration status – whether it be ... Read More

Faculty of Law, University of Toronto Constitutional Roundtable presents James Hathaway, University of Michigan Law School Audrey Macklin, University of Toronto Faculty of Law Lorne Waldman, Lorne Waldman and Associates Is None Still Too Many? Asylum Seekers on Boats, Then and Now, Here and There 12:30 – 2:00 Tuesday, October 5, 2010 Classroom C – ... Read More

Project G20 Inaugural Panel: Protecting Rights in the Aftermath of the G20 Summit in Toronto Project G20, a student-led working group of the David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights, invites the legal community and the public at large to attend its inaugural panel entitled “Protecting Rights in the Aftermath of the G20 Summit in Toronto.” ... Read More

Mary Eberts, S.J.D. Candidate, University of Toronto Faculty of Law October 12, 2010

Speaker: Aharon Barak, President of the Supreme Court of Israel (Emeritus) This essay focuses on proportionality stricto sensu as a consequential test of balancing. The basic balancing rule establishes a general criterion for deciding between the marginal benefit to the public good and the marginal limit to human rights. Based on the Israeli constitutional jurisprudence, ... Read More

In the recent landmark case Bedford v. Canada, Justice Himmel of the Ontario Superior Court held that three provisions of the Criminal Code that criminalize facets of prostitution—living on the avails of prostitution, keeping a common bawdy house and communicating in a public place for the purpose of engaging in prostitution—infringe the core values protected ... Read More

Friday, November 6th, 2010 Sign in and Registration: 8:30 a.m. Public interest litigation can have a significant impact on public policy in Canada. Although Charter and other public interest litigation is most often commenced by individual claimants who are challenging laws that affect them individually, the test case litigant is often supported or opposed by ... Read More

In three cases released on October 8, 2010, the Supreme Court added the third story in what the Court described as the "interrogation trilogy" (R. v. Oickle, R. v. Singh and R. v. Sinclair). Oickle spoke to the types of techniques that officers can legally use to persuade someone to confess, including the use of ... Read More

The Asper Centre with the International Human Rights Program and Canadian Civil Liberties Association present Symposium on the Impact of Targeted Anti-terrorist Sanctions on Charter and International Human Rights Program: 9:00 a.m. Welcome: Renu Mandhane, International Human Rights Program Key Note Speaker: Judge Kimberly Prost, UN Ombudsperson for Al Qaeda and Taliban Sanctions 9:45 – ... Read More