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Work on Trial: Canadian Labour Law Struggles
2010 
edited by Judy Fudge, Lansdowne Professor of Law, University of Victoria, and Eric Tucker, Professor of Law, Osgoode Hall Law School. Published with Irwin Law, 2010.
The world of work, so important to individuals’ economic well-being and to their sense of self, has been fundamentally shaped by law, both collective bargaining law and individual employment law. We are grateful to Professors Fudge and Tucker for putting together this volume, which looks behind significant Canadian court battles over many aspects of labour law to unearth the historical context of the cases and analyse the individuals involved. Authors from across the country each take on a famous labour case in a series of case studies, from early cases about constitutional jurisdiction (Snider; John East), though picketing classics (Hersees; Harrison v. Carswell), to more recent employment law and human rights milestones (Wallace; Meioren). Each chapter tells an interesting story of how and why the case got to court and how the issues were resolved. This volume will interest not just those in the labour and employment law field; anybody concerned with the litigation process will enjoy reading the details of what lies behind the law reports.
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Contents
CONTENTS
FOREWORD vii
PREFACE ix
HARRY ARTHURS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS xiii
Introduction 1
JUDY FUDGE AND ERIC TUCKER
PART ONE: CONSTITUTIONS AND INSTITUTIONS 13
“Capitalist ‘Justice’ as Peddled by the ‘Noble Lords’”: Toronto Electric Commissioners v. Snider et al. 15
R. BLAKE BROWN AND JENNIFER J. LLEWELLYN
John East Iron Works v. Saskatchewan Labour Relations Board:
A Test for the Infant Administrative State 43
BETH BILSON
PART TWO: RESPONSIBLE UNIONS:
SECURITY, ORDERLY PRODUCTION, AND DISSENT 75
How Justice Rand Devised His Famous Formula 77
WILLIAM KAPLAN
Dissent, Democracy, and Discipline: The Case of Kuzych v.White et al. 111
MARK LEIER
Organizing Offshore: Labour Relations, Industrial Pluralism, and Order in
the Newfoundland and Labrador Oil Industry, 1997-2006 143
SEAN T. CADIGAN
PART THREE: COURTS AND COLLECTIVE ACTION
IN THE POST-WAR REGIME 173
The Royal York Hotel Case: The “Right” to Strike —
And Not Be Fired for Striking 175
MALCOLM E. DAVIDSON
Hersees of Woodstock Ltd. v. Goldstein:
How a Small Town Case Made it Big 217
ERIC TUCKER
A Certain “Mallaise”: Harrison v. Carswell, Shopping Centre Picketing,
and the Limits of the Post-war Settlement 249
PHILIP GIRARD AND JIM PHILLIPS
PART FOUR: HUMAN RIGHTS NORMS AT WORK 281
Debating Maternity Rights: Pacific Western Airlines and
Flight Attendants’ Struggle to “Fly Pregnant” in the 1970s 283
JOAN SANGSTER
Challenging Norms and Creating Precedents: The Tale of a Woman
Firefighter in the Forests of British Columbia 315
JUDY FUDGE AND HESTER LESSARD
PART FIVE: CHANGING COMMON LAW NORMS 355
The Micropolitics of Wallace v. United Grain Growers Ltd. 357
DAPHNE G. TARAS
Afterword: Looking Back 393
HARRY GLASBEEK
CONTRIBUTORS 411
INDEX 415
Reviews
Work on Trial...provides an engaging and accessible account of various labour battles in the courts over the past 85 years involving human rights, employment fairness and union recognition. Read against the landscape of today's declining strength of Canadian unions, the essays in the book remind us of the centrality of work in our lives and the many forms that the struggle for individual dignity and fairness has taken.... Lucidly written and astutely argued. This book deserves a wide readership...These essays, written as social histories of these legal cases, will appeal to anyone interested in the human stories of those ordinary Canadians who found themselves fighting, often unexpectedly, for fairness in the workplace. S. Michael Lynk, Literary Review of Canada, 2011.
James Muir, Canadian Public Policy, Vol 37, 2011, p. 583.
Dan Ernst, http://legalhistoryblog.blogspot.ca/2010/10/labor-race-and-canadian-legal-history.html">Legal History Blog, 30 October 2010.
