Oral History What is Oral History? Historians have traditionally relied on documents of various kinds while conducting their research. But documents are often insufficient for fully reconstructing the past, and this is as true of legal history as of any other field of history. Court and other legal records from the past have been lost,… Read more »
14 Search Results for: Women Judges
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Claire L’Heureux-Dubé: A Life
By Constance Backhouse. Published by the University of British Columbia Press. Claire L’Heureux-Dubé was the second woman appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada, in 1987, and the first from Quebec. This deeply-researched biography takes us through the judge’s origins and life in the Quebec of the 1920s to the present, and its portrait of… Read more »
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The Spinster and the Prophet: Florence Deeks, H.G.Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past
by A.B. McKillop, Professor of History, Carleton University. Published with Macfarlane, Walter & Ross, 2000. One of Canada’s pre-eminent historians, A.B. McKillop has restored to life a unique tale of heroism and intrigue, obsession and betrayal. The novelist and social prophet H.G. Wells had a way with words, and usually had his way with women. That is,… Read more »
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Essays in the History of Canadian Law, Volume III: Nova Scotia
edited by Jim Phillips, Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto, and Philip Girard, Professor, Osgoode Hall Law School. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 1990. An introduction by the editors is followed by ten essays grouped into four main areas of study. The first is the legal system as a whole: essays in this section discuss… Read more »
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A History of Law in Canada Volume II: Law for the New Dominion, 1867-1914
By Jim Phillips, Philip Girard, and R. Blake Brown, published by the University of Toronto Press. Winner of the Canadian Law and Society Association Prize for the best book published in 2022. Jim Phillips is Professor of Law and History at the University of Toronto. Philip Girard is Professor of Law and History at Osgoode Hall… Read more »
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A Passion for Justice: The Legacy of James Chalmers McRuer
by Patrick Boyer. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 1994. Patrick Boyer’s portrait of James Chalmers McRuer (1890-1985) reveals the complexities of one of Canada’s outstanding jurists, and shows the character and personal dilemmas of the man who was arguably Canada’s greatest law reformer. McRuer’s career of more than fifty years included periods as a… Read more »
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Northern Justice: The Memoirs Of Mr. Justice William G. Morrow
edited by William Morrow. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 1995. One of the first Canadians to champion the legal and cultural cause of the North’s indigenous peoples, William George Morrow, the senior partner in an eminent Edmonton law firm, seized the opportunity to go to the North in 1960, and act as a volunteer… Read more »
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Essays in the History of Canadian Law, Volume IX, Two Islands: Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island
edited by Christopher English, Department of History, Memorial University of Newfoundland. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2005. Voices from the East beyond the Northumberland and Cabot Straits. This volume of essays on the legal histories of Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland opens with innovative essays on the historiography of two ‘island’ jurisdictions of Atlantic… Read more »
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Judging Bertha Wilson: Law As Large As Life
by Ellen Anderson, Lawyer, Barrie, Ontario. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2001. Bertha Wilson is the first woman to be appointed to the Ontario Court of Appeal. She is the first woman to be appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada at that critical moment when the Charter was entrenched. Nevertheless, Bertha Wilson has… Read more »
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The Supreme Court of Nova Scotia, 1754 – 2004: From Imperial Bastion to Provincial Oracle
edited by Philip Girard, Professor, Dalhousie Law School, Jim Phillips, Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto, and Barry Cahill, independent scholar. Published with the University of Toronto Press, 2004. This volume was prepared to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia, Canada’s oldest surviving common law court. The thirteen… Read more »
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What is Oral History?