Talk:Edwards v Canada (AG)

Who is Edwards?
If someone knows who the "Edwards" in the title is, they should add it somewhere in the article. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 22:48, 22 January 2009 (UTC)


 * * Done! a mere 33 months later! Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 03:59, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

The Reference Process
The article stated that: "In Canada, at least five people must sign a petition asking for constitutional clarification from the Canadian Supreme Court." This is not correct. The reference process is in the exclusive control of the federal Cabinet. I've changed the opening line of that section accordingly, with a link to the wiki article on reference questions. As well, it referred to the Governor General forwarding the question to the Supreme Court. While that is formally correct, the reality is that it was a decision of the federal Cabinet, not the Governor General, so I've changed that as well. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 11:49, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

Citation Style
You have been working on the article on the Persons case and I like what you have done. WP:VER requires us to reference all material, particularly quotations. I've been working on that. I'm not 100% sure of the citation style for a judicial case located on a website, so I've done my best to figure out the appropriate title and credit it to the site where it is located. You may have some suggestions for improving that. Here is a WP page for citations with examples.

Also, since we are (necessarily) using many primary references in the article, we should also look for reliable secondary sources for all evaluation, or commentary about the Persons case. I look forward to working with you on further improvements. Sunray (talk) 18:08, 25 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the comments. As to legal citations, one of the key issues is giving what are called pinpoint citations, to the page number, paragraph number, or section number.  Particularly when dealing with a case that may be 20 pages long, or a statute like the Constitution Act, 1867 which has over a hundred sections, pin-point citations are very important to assist the reader to identify the passage or section number that the author is relying on in the article. That's the standard practice, so that the reader doesn't have to plough through pages of the decision to find the relevant passage.   So when I cited to the Supreme Court Reports, which is the official reporting series for the Supreme Court, I gave pinpoint citations.  I'm afraid that by combining those citations, you've eliminated the pinpoint citations, which in my respectful opinion reduces the value of the article as a reference work.  [No pun intended. :)] There is also the issue of official cites - whenever possible, I prefer to cite to an official or semi-official legal source, using parallel citations where there is more than one source.  For example, for the JCPC decision, I've been giving the cite to the AC volume (that is, the "Appeal Cases") published by the Council of Law Publishing for England and Wales, which is an official source.  I've also given the links to the on-line source published by the British and Irish Legal Information Institute.  I notice that you've changed the cite to the JCPC decision to the website run by the Canadian Human Rights Commission, which I prefer not to use, because it has the name of the case wrong.  When the case was before the Supreme Court of Canada, the name of the case was Reference re the Meaning of the Word 'Person' etc., but when it went on appeal, the name of the case was Edwards v. Canada (Attorney General).  It is better, in my opinion, to cite to official sources (whether on-line or hard copy) that use the standard name, and to avoid on-line sources that do not get the basic citation right.  I appreciate that standards for on-line encyclopedia like Wiki are still evolving, and the standard citation rules which have been used in hard copy legal works may not always be applied on-line.  However, I do deplore the loss of pinpoint citations in your edits - pinpoint citations have a long-established tradition and practical purpose in citing legal sources. (I must also admit that I am limited by my lack of technical expertise;  I took at quick look at the page you linked to, and it was largely Greek to me.) I am quite willing to work through these issues of citation. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 03:30, 26 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I certainly agree that pinpoint citations are best for printed works. They usually are not needed for online references due to the capability of using search tools. One way to deal with that is to give an official cite with page number and then state: "Available online at: ..." As to the source of the citation, I do agree with using the more accurate website. Sunray (talk) 05:22, 28 October 2011 (UTC)


 * The above exchange was originally on my Talk page, but I thought it useful to have it on the Talk page for the article, so I've moved it here. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 00:57, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Rights
Removed "... and more generally, that Canadian women had the same rights as Canadian men with respect to positions of political power" from the beginning of the article, because the JCPC judgment includes the following: "Nor are their Lordships deciding any question as to the rights of women but only a question as to their eligibility for a particular position. No one either male or female has a right to be summoned to the Senate. The real point at issue is whether the Governor-General has a right to summon women to the Senate." Of course the impact of the judgment may well contradict its own content, so the removed text could perhaps be restored with appropriate rewording. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.1.18.227 (talk) 17:47, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

More specifically, the judgment also states for example: "At the present time women are entitled to vote and to be candidates :— (1) At all Dominion elections on the same basis as men. (2) At all provincial elections save in the Province of Quebec." The ruling neither established the equality already evidenced by (1) nor removed the inequality evidenced by the Quebec exception to (2). It simply held that the constitution made the Senate case like (1) and not like Quebec in (2).

Suggestion: that the "more generally" clause instead explain how equality was extended in the sense that language would no longer be read as discriminatory to women, giving mere past custom the force of law, when it could be read otherwise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.1.18.227 (talk) 18:06, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Citation for Cairine Wilson first woman senator
In the aftermath section, there was a CN for Cairine Wilson being the first woman senator. I've added a ref from her article. It isn't the best ref, but has the advantage of being available online. Newystats (talk) 01:07, 18 October 2019 (UTC)