Anonymous_opinions_of_the_Supreme_Court_of_Canada

By the Court decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada

By the Court decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada

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Justices of the Supreme Court of Canada have the option of releasing reasons for a unanimous decision anonymously by simply attributing the judgment to "The Court". The practice began around 1979 by Chief Justice Laskin, borrowing from the US Supreme Court practice of anonymizing certain unanimous decisions.[1] Unlike in the US, which uses it primarily for uncontroversial cases, in Canada, it is used almost always for important and controversial cases.[2]

It has been suggested that the practice has been used to give greater authority to the decision by having the entire Court speak as a single voice.[3]

Peter McCormick, a professor of political science at the University of Lethbridge who studies Canada's appellate courts, calls these 'per coram decision," but his terminology is not in general use. McCormick states that there were 9 reported per coram decisions prior to Bora Laskin's term as Chief Justice, 15 reported per coram decisions under Laskin's Chief Justiceship, and 51 reported per coram decisions under Dickson's Chief Justiceship.[4]

List

The following is a list of anonymous decisions that are attributed to "The Court":

More information Case name, Citation ...

See also

References

  1. [1]
    L'Heureux-Dubé, Claire. "The Dissenting Opinion: Voice of the Future?" 38 Osgoode Hall L.J. 495 at 500
  2. [2]
    McCormick, Peter. "The Political Jurisprudence of Hot Potatoes" (2002) 13 Nat'l J. Const. L. 271 at 176
  3. [3]
    Bzdera, Andre. "Comparative Analysis of Federal High Courts: A Political Theory of Judicial Review" (1993) 26 Canadian Journal of Political Science 3 at 25
  4. [4]
    McCormick, Peter. "The Supervisory Role of the Supreme Court of Canada: Analysis of Appeals from Provincial Courts of Appeal, 1949-1990" (1992), 3(2d) Supreme Court Law Review 1, at p. 27.
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