scholarly journals Expressive Harms and the Strands of Charter Equality: Drawing out Parallel Coherent Approaches to Discrimination

1969 ◽  
pp. 393
Author(s):  
Ron Levy
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Economic Benefits ◽  
Supreme Court Of Canada ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
State Recognition ◽  
State Action ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Equality Test

"Expressive harms " are rights violations that may arise from governmental expression through laws or state action, even absent material or otherwise tangible harms. Same-sex marriage provides an example: having won rights to most marriage- related economic benefits in M. v. H., gays and lesbians nevertheless fought for state recognition of their marriages in Halpern v. Canada The author delineates three conceptions of expressive harms. Among these are what may be termed "direct dignity harms"; on this conception, some forms of state expression exert effects upon human dignity without intermediate steps (for example, stereotyping) or ultimate material consequences (for example, exclusion from benefits). The author provides, in particular, an account of direct-dignity expressive harms and relates this account to the equality jurisprudence of s. 15 of the Charter. Finally, the author shows how the Supreme Court of Canada has implicitly incorporated expressive insights within s. 15, but suggests that the Court has done so with some incoherence. By failing to make explicit its reliance on several expressive and other rationales, the Court has produced an equality test with requirements derived from various conflated equality approaches, rendering the test unnecessarily onerous for some claimants.

scholarly journals SAME-SEX MARRIAGE AND THE SAME OLD CONSTITUTION*

2011 ◽  
Vol 14 (2 & 3) ◽  
pp. 2005
Author(s):  
Ronalda Murphy
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Social Institution ◽  
Supreme Court Of Canada ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Same Sex Couples ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Do So

The Reference re Same-Sex Marriage1 is not a major opinion on the rights of same-sex couples in Canada, but it is nonetheless an important and fascinating case. There are only a few lines that are about the “rights” of same-sex couples. Did the Supreme Court of Canada “duck” the issue? Was the Court carefully gauging how much or little political capital it had and making a political decision to say as little as possible on this topic? The Court certainly displayed strategic brilliance, but it did not do so in the name of avoiding the “political” hot topic of same-sex marriage. It is factually difficult to maintain the view that the Supreme Court of Canada is loath to enter into this political debate. It has been the lead social institution in Canada in terms of responding to the claims of gays and lesbians to equality in law,2 and it has never been shy of dealing with topics simply because they involve controversial political issues.3 Rather, the Court’s brilliance lies in its minimalist and almost weary tone. This approach had the effect of taking the wind out of the sails of those opposed to same-sex marriage: the same-sex advocates definitely win the constitutional race, but they do so because according to the Supreme Court, there is no provincial constitutional headwind that can stop them. In short, provinces can complain all they want about the federal position in favour of same-sex marriage, but the wedding will go on despite and over their objections to the ceremony.

The concept of human dignity in the case-law of the Supreme Court of Canada on Charter Equality Rights

2021 ◽  
Vol 30 (5) ◽  
pp. 118-137
Author(s):  
Tatiana Vasilieva ◽  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Supreme Court Of Canada ◽  
Equality Rights ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Additional Burden ◽  
The Impact

This article explores the evolution of the Supreme Court of Canada’s approach to the application of the concept of human dignity in constitutional equality cases. Traditionally, in human rights cases, this concept serves only to strengthen the argument, to show that the violation affects the person’s intrinsic worth. It is only in Canada and in South Africa that there is experience in applying the concept as a criterion for identifying discrimination. In 1999, in Law v. Canada, the Supreme Court recognized the purpose of Article 15(1) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms of 1982 to be the protection of human dignity and stated that discrimination must be established based on assessment of the impact of a program or law on human dignity. However, in 2008, in R. v. Kapp, the Court noted that the application of the concept of human dignity creates difficulties and places an additional burden of prove on the plaintiff. It is no coincidence that victims of discrimination have preferred to seek protection before human rights tribunals and commissions, where the dignity-based test is not used. Subsequently, the Supreme Court of Canada rejected the use of the concept of human dignity as a criterion for identifying discrimination. The unsuccessful experience of applying the concept of human dignity as legal test has demonstrated that not every theoretically correct legal construction is effective in adjudication.

I’m Sweet on You

2018 ◽  
pp. 280-322
Author(s):  
E. Patrick Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Court Case ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
Southern States ◽  
Legal Limits ◽  
Romantic Attachments ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Supreme Court Case

This chapter probes the narrators’ deep and enduring emotional and romantic attachments to other women, primarily by focusing on stories of dating and marriage. Johnson’s interlocutors recall: stories of how they met their partners, memories of particular dates, their family’s responses to their relationships, and, for some of them, how and when they decided to pursue marriage. Importantly, Johnson notes that all of these interviews took place before the Supreme Court case that legalized same-sex marriage across the nation in 2015. Despite the legal limits of partnership in Southern states, several of these women chose to remain in the region. Their choices reflect the need to think expansively about the possibilities for queer life for Black women in the South.

Same-Sex Relationships and Anglo-Canadian Choice of Law: An Argument for Universal Validity

1997 ◽  
Vol 34 ◽  
pp. 103-136
Author(s):  
Wendy A. Adams
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
International Law ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Supreme Court Of Canada ◽  
Private International Law ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Choice Of Law ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
The Face

SummaryThe distinction between formal and essential validity in Anglo-Canadian choice of law regarding marriage is an illogical bifurcation that unnecessarily invalidates same-sex relationships contracted in foreign jurisdictions. The Supreme Court of Canada has recently reformulated certain rules of private international law, taking into account both the constitutional and sub-constitutional imperatives inherent in a federal setting and the need for order and fairness when co-ordinating diversity in the face of increasing globalization. Reform of the choice of law rules regarding the validity of foreign marriages should proceed accordingly with the result being that a marriage valid where celebrated is valid everywhere. No principled reason exists to deny recognition to same-sex relationships validly contracted in other jurisdictions, nor to differentiate between the rights and obligations arising from the legal status of same-sex and different-sex relationships.

The Courts Begin to Appreciate Gay Rights: Romer and Baehr, 1996

2021 ◽  
pp. 86-101
Author(s):  
Michael J. Rosenfeld
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Gay Rights ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
State Court ◽  
Marriage Equality ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
Same Sex Marriage ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
First Time ◽  
The U.S

Chapter 6 describes two important breakthroughs in the courts for gay rights. In 1996 the U.S. Supreme Court decided Romer v. Evans in favor of gay plaintiffs from Colorado who had had their rights reduced by a voter referendum. The Supreme Court upheld state court rulings which had overturned the referendum. The Romer decision, written by Anthony Kennedy, was the first Supreme Court decision to affirmatively defend the rights of gay people. In the fall of 1996 in Hawaii a same-sex marriage trial, Baehr v. Miike, showed for the first time that the opponents of marriage equality had no scientific or empirical basis for preventing same-sex marriages from being recognized. The marriage plaintiffs won in court, but the voters of Hawaii reinstated the same-sex marriage ban. Hawaii did not become a marriage equality state until 2013.

scholarly journals The Truth About Canadian Judicial Activism

2011 ◽  
Vol 15 (1, 2 & 3) ◽  
pp. 2006
Author(s):  
Sanjeev Anand
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Attorney General ◽  
Supreme Court Of Canada ◽  
Judicial Activism ◽  
State Action ◽  
The People ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Recent Conference ◽  
Elected Representatives ◽  
Societal Preferences

The topic of judicial activism in Canada generates considerable disagreement. At a recent conference, retired Supreme Court of Canada Justice John Major stated that “there is no such thing as judicial activism in Canada.”1 In 2001, speaking in his capacity as the Canadian Alliance’s Justice critic, the current federal Minister of Justice and Attorney General, Vic Toews, told Parliament that the Supreme Court has “engaged in a frenzy of constitutional experimentation that resulted in the judiciary substituting its legal and societal preferences for those made by the elected representatives of the people . . . [producing] legal and constitutional anarchy.”2 One prominent constitutional scholar fears that the debate on judicial activism in Canada has begun to produce excessive judicial deference that allows legislatures and officials to act without scrutiny by the judiciary concerning the effects of state action on vulnerable minorities.

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