Osgoode Society Books
Our books are listed here chronologically by date of publication. Please note that information on our 2020 titles will be released soon. You can still join for 2019 now using the membership page. Use the Search function to the right to find a particular book, or author.
Criminal Law
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Borderline Crime: Fugitive Criminals and the Challenge of the Border, 1819-1914
By Bradley Miller, Professor of History at the University of British Columbia, published by the University of Toronto Press. This is the first comprehensive history of cross-border Canadian-American interactions in relation to fugitive criminals, escaped slaves, and refugees. Miller examines the complexity of those interactions, which involved formal legal regimes governed by treaties as well… Read more »
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The African Canadian Legal Odyssey: Historical Essays
edited by Barrington Walker, Professor, Department of History, Queens University. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2012. One of the central themes of the new legal history of the past two decades has been exploration of the law’s role in shaping the lives and experiences of historically marginalised groups in our society. The Osgoode… Read more »
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Arming and Disarming: A History of Gun Control in Canada
R. Blake Brown, Professor of History, St Mary’s University. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2012. $45.00; Student Price: $20.00. The topic of gun control is never far from the public eye in this country, taking centre stage whenever a dramatic shooting occurs and invariably featuring in debates about Canadian-American distinctions. This is the… Read more »
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The Lazier Murder: Prince Edward County, 1884
by Robert J. Sharpe, Justice of the Court of Appeal for Ontario. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2011. Robert Sharpe is one of the Osgoode Society’s most prolific authors, and his latest offering is a compelling account of a late nineteenth century murder case in Picton, Ontario. This very thoroughly researched and engagingly… Read more »
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Westward Bound: Sex, Violence, the Law, and the Making of a Settler Society
by Lesley Erickson, Independent Historian and Researcher, Vancouver. Published with UBC Press, 2011. The history of crime and punishment is one of the principal lenses through which historians of the law investigate the relationship between the law in the books and the ‘law in action,’ and the uses of law to regulate relations among social… Read more »
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A Trying Question: The Jury in Nineteenth Century Canada
by R. Blake Brown, Professor of History, St Mary’s University. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2009. The jury has long been a central institution of both the trial process in particular and of the ideology of the common law in general, a body exemplifying the distinctiveness of our legal tradition. In this first book-length… Read more »
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Carnal Crimes: Sexual Assault Law in Canada, 1900-1975
by Constance Backhouse, Professor of Law, University of Ottawa. Published with Irwin Law, 2008. An engaging and powerful book about sexual assault crimes in Canadian history, by Professor Constance Backhouse, whose previous books for the Osgoode Society have won major awards. Using a case-study approach, Professor Backhouse explores nine sexual assault trials from across the country… Read more »
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My Life in Crime and other Academic Adventures
by Martin Friedland, Professor Emeritus, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2007. Professor Martin Friedland has been involved in many areas of legal research and law reform in his career, and the Osgoode Society is very pleased to be able to publish his account of that involvement, especially as… Read more »
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Magistrates, Police and People: Everyday Criminal Justice in Quebec and Lower Canada, 1764-1837
by Donald Fyson, Professor of History, Universite Laval. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2006. This book is a study of everyday criminal justice in Quebec and Lower Canada between the Conquest and the Rebellions, concentrating on the justices of the peace and the police. The first half explores the criminal justice system itself: the… Read more »
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Searching for Justice: An Autobiography
by Fred Kaufman, Quebec Court of Appeal, retired. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2005. As one reviewer wrote, this is a ‘a tale well told of a remarkable life well lived.’ Born into a middle-class Jewish family in Vienna in the mid-twenties, Kaufman managed to leave his native city on one of the last… Read more »