Curious readers of my blog might have noticed that in a recent blog of mine on the career of the Professor of Constitutional Law, Seth Barrett Tillman, by Tablet ‘s Amen Rosen, I highlighted one of Professor Tillman’s quotes.
It was:
“That is: If you’re trying to understand the past, the present often gets in the way and the past often gets rewritten to make itself useful to the present.”
Wow!
I thought of how the Judiciary in Canada today are rewriting the Charter of only 40 plus years ago to make itself useful to the present. The ‘present’ of the judiciary is not what the Charter section actually said.
And in the same article another of Tillman’s gems:
“We are too willing to accept explanations that have no explanatory force,” Tillman said.
How relevant to the ‘mootness’ argument in a case before the courts of which I am a part. There is no ‘explanatory force‘ in the court’s argument in favour of using this ‘mootness‘ ploy, denying almost six million Canadians a decision on the Constitutionality of the federal Government travel mandate, violating their mobility rights. The explanatory force is all on the other side.
Again, another quote
“What are we doing as a society that we tell stories that don’t make any sense, and there’s no recognition that the story on its face wasn’t palatable, wasn’t believable?”
In the Manitoba Baptist Church case where independent science was ignored, the court’s story then ——— ‘the story on its face wasn’t palatable, wasn’t believable.’ To ignore independent science.
And there is more.
In the Colorado case trying to deny Donald Trump a legitimate place on the Presidential ballot Professor Tillman and his colleague Professor Blackman advanced the following:
‘During the arguments in February, the former president’s lawyers led with an idea that Tillman and Blackman had honed over the course of a nearly decade long collaboration, the argument that had convinced an earlier Colorado trial court not to toss Trump from the ballot: Per Tillman and Blackman, the framers of the Constitution did not intend for “officer of the United States” to refer to a holder of high elected office but to officials appointed by the the president, cabinet members, or courts, which meant that voters still held the final say over whether an alleged “insurrectionist” could be president.’
The framers of the Charter (I being one of the signatories) did not intend for questionable science in an alleged pandemic to be used (Section 1) to deny citizens of their rights and freedoms enumerated in the Charter.
This is all in addition to the Judiciary ignoring the opening words of the Charter (Supremacy of God and the Rule of Law) and violating the conditions of Section 1– ‘demonstrably justify‘ and ‘free and democratic society.’
We desperately need a Tillman and Blackman in this country.
The Honourable A. Brian Peckford P.C. is the last living First Minister who helped craft the Canadian Charter of Rights.
Related Items:
Watch: Leaders on the Frontier with Brian Peckford here. (72 minutes) January 19, 2022
