Today Canada's Commissioner of Official Languages said "I have difficulty comprehending how one could boast "a lifetime of legal scholarship" without being able to understand Canada's jurisprudence in French." (http://bit.ly/bY2Lm8).
Nonsense.
There are good reasons to make appointments to the Supreme Court of Canada bilingual but legal scholarship is not of them.
The Supreme Court of Canada is the highest Canadian Court and there is a good argument to say its judges ought to be able to understand the nuances of judgments in French and English. Moreover, the text of statutes in both languages can be important -- when I have trouble putting a definite meaning to a statute's text in English I often check the French text for clarity. Finally, as a statement of what Canada should be, having a bilingual Supreme Court (with judges who understand Common Law, Civil Law and First Nations Law (yes, remember them? the other founding nations...) ) is attractive.
The trouble is a truly bilingual court would exclude many leading Western jurists -- and that's not good for national unity.
Moreover, outside of Quebec and New Brunswick, French just is not the language of the law. You can have trials and appeals in French in, for example, Ontario (and that is right and proper) but it is unusual.
The deep structure of law in Quebec -- the main source of French texts in law in Canada -- differs from the rest of Canada. Outside Quebec the root texts of Canadian law come from the United Kingdom. To know the law of, say, Newfoundland, you do not need to know anything about Civil Law.
Saying you cannot be a legal scholar without being bilingual overreaches and reflects a desire for a country that doesn't exist.
3 comments:
I wonder if there is a Canadian law somewhere that puts an obligation on someone to speak English and French.
Would Godin's create a precedent?
More insanity from the victim-culture, brain-dead, left.
And I say this as a fluently bilingual lawyer myself.
We are used to "iniatives" like this one in New Brunswick. Mr. Godin is appealing to his base, making best efforts to appear relevant and ingratiate himself and his party. Making their mark so to speak.
Also furthering the ongoing reclamation and entrenchment project.
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