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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 24/08/2026

Timely, from Benjamin Constant

Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 25/06/2026

ICYMI: I have resigned as Senior Fellow of the Macdonald Laurier Institute, because I think it has turned away from, and indeed against, judicial independence and the Rule of Law. doubleaspect.blog/2026/06/24/n...

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 04/06/2026

So this is happening! Many thanks to the reviewers, and to those who have read my proposal and sample chapter draft, and heard me present ideas that will be going into this over the years. I'm looking forward to sharing more as the manuscript takes shape.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 23/02/2026

Finally published, in the Dalhousie LJ: a piece looking at widespread, and sometimes wilful, forgetting of some constitutional conventions in Canada, and wondering what, if anything, might be done about it. Paper available at: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 14/01/2026

I guess the shambles of a "constitution" wasn't enough to save Mr Legault's political career, whose highlight will remain banning teachers from wearing headscarves. Good riddance to him, and, hopefully, to the "constitution" gambit too.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 12/01/2026

New paper with @guyjbaldwin.bsky.social, in which we argue that, in finding whole life sentences to be contrary to human rights, the ECtHR and the SCC have made important doctrinal and philosophical mistakes. Forthcoming in the EHRLR, but pre-print available on SSRN: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 12/01/2026

Hot off the @publiclaw.bsky.social presses, my review of Lord Sumption's recent book is now available on Westlaw, or in its pre-publication format on SSRN: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers..... Many thanks to @lewisgrahamlaw.bsky.social for inviting me to do this!

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 26/12/2025

Good thing he isn't also the historian-in-chief

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 26/12/2025

I'm not persuaded by the argument that a province can't repeal the oath of allegiance for its legislators. But you know who was? Quebec's constitutional-reformer-in-chief, whose government proceeded to do just that, and who is now trying to get rid of the Lieutenant Gorvernor for good measure.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 18/12/2025

This builds on my article on the oath of allegiance required of naturalized citizens, available here: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 05/12/2025

My newest piece, forthcoming in the Constitutional Forum, is a comment on the Fair Voting BC decision of the Court of Appeal for Ontario, which upholdds the constitutionality of first-past-the-post elections. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 04/12/2025

Email from a well-liked editor at a major academic press, in response to a request for an update on a proposal and sample chapter I submitted (with the editors encouragement) three months ago. If anyone wants to suggest careers outside academia, I'd love to hear from you.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 10/11/2025

My new favourite bit of notwithstanding clause trivia:

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 07/11/2025

George Brown on Canadian union and American insanity. (The American government was, in fact, insane; not for the last time.)

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 07/11/2025

More George Brown on immigration and ambition for one's country.

"On this question of immigration turns, in my opinion, the whole future success of this great scheme which we are now discussing. Why, sir, there is hardly a political or financial or social problem suggested by this union that ..."

"... does not find its best solution in a large influx of immigration. The larger our ¡population, the greater will be our productions, the more valuable our exports, and the greater our ability to develop the resources of our country. The greater the number of tax-payers, and the more densely they are settled, the more lightly will the burden of tîixation fall upon us all. And in this question of immigration is found the only true solution of the problem of defence. Fill up our vacant lands, double our population, and we will at once be in a position to meet promptly and effectually any invader who may put his foot with hostile intent upon our soil."

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 07/11/2025

George Brown on Comeau. Oopsie!

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 07/11/2025

George Brown on how to think about taxation and trade.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 07/11/2025

George Brown on the people whose opinion you want to get on the right side of when you have ambitions and aspirations for your country's future.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 05/11/2025

Been called "some clown in England" at the other place, by some sad creature who goes by @TheKaiserSpeaks, which means I'm required to share this. I didn't make the rules!

A chronic complaint:
Aide-de-Camp: "The English force, so please you"
Kaiser: "Take thy face fence... I am sick at Heart."
(Macbeth, Act V, sc 3)

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 01/11/2025

John A Macdonald on Yes, Kings (but not *that* kind)!

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 31/10/2025

Sir John A Macdonald stating the obvious during the Confederation Debates, February 6, 1865. The population of Canada at the time: a bit over 3 million. Being ambitious for your country means being open to immigration. Is there any country today that has this much ambition?

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 31/10/2025

Sir John A Macdonald, describing the heights of political enmity during the Confederation Debates (February 6, 1865)

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 28/10/2025

Profound commentary from the longtime member of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal. ¿Por qué no te callas?

"We can't tolerate situations where executives tell judges what they should do or accuse them of terrible things if they don't do it."

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 15/09/2025

What's left is an argument about vibes. It was bad enough when that carried the day in the Nadon affair, but there was a plausible textual argument there too. Not so here. I hope this goes nowhere fast. 5/5

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 15/09/2025

Now statute: the Judges Act is where 10-year requirement comes from, but it can be met by bar membership in "any province", not necessarily the one from which the judge is ultimately appointed. The French text is a smidgen less explicit, but to the same effect. 4/5

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 15/09/2025

That's not exactly the case. Consider the Constitution first. The relevant provision is s 98 of the Constitution Act, 1867. Neither it nor the other provisions in the Judicature part specify a minimum length of bar membership. 3/5

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 09/09/2025

For the record, here's what I said in my earlier post (doubleaspect.blog/2025/08/28/o...). I do not want people to not be considered for academic positions because of the school or movement they belong to. I've reason enough to think that I'm a victim of that myself.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 04/09/2025

I have written about this before: doubleaspect.blog/2023/09/26/d.... Ideological bias in hiring is antithetical to a university's mission and indeed its status as a genuine academic institution.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 04/09/2025

Woke may be ending elsewhere but, in Canadian legal academia, ideological favouritism is still going strong. This is an ad from @windsorlaw.bsky.social (www.uwindsor.ca/faculty/recr...).

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 11/08/2025

But this, I am afraid, is flatly wrong: an obiter dictum per incuriam if there ever was one. 6/6

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 11/08/2025

Moreover, Huscroft JA calls into question the defrence to trial judges on "legislative facts" that the SCC demanded in Bedford. This was always one of my misgivings, probably the most clear-cut one, about the "empirical turn" Charter cases. The SCC should take note! 4/6

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 11/08/2025

Huscroft JA also makes important comments on the need for equality rights claimants to show *how* the law they challenge discriminates against them; it can't just be statistics. 3/6

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 11/08/2025

Huscroft JA tries very hard to limit the expansion of s 3 of the Charter. It's rule-like, he says; the vague purposes the SCC has recognized are not the right, and do not override the text. 2/6

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 11/08/2025

Mostly quite good decision by the ONCA rejecting a Charter challenge to Canada's first-past-the-post electoral system: coadecisions.ontariocourts.ca/coa/coa/en/i... Well worth reading, but here are some quick-fire thoughts. 1/6

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 29/04/2025

This is what the Elections Canada results page looks like at the moment. I do not think they should be highlighting a "winner", let alone a "winner" who falls short of a majority. This is a judgment for Parliament, not for the people counting the votes.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 01/04/2025

As I have written (doubleaspect.blog/2025/03/24/v...) this is Gaius Verres crucifyinig Roman citizens. But Verres had the decency (or at least self-interest) to run away when exposed. His spiritual heirs just tell the praetor and sneer. As Cicero said on another occasion, O tempora! O mores! 1/2

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 31/03/2025

AUT is where I used to work. Professor Quince was, briefly, my dean. I am lucky not to be there anymore, and sorry for anyone trying to do good work under this sort of "leadership".

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 14/03/2025

This gem of a Henry VIII clause is in BC's Bill 7, the Economic Stabilization (Tariff Response) Bill (www.leg.bc.ca/parliamentar...). If enacted, this would give away all legislative power to the executive, with no meaningful scrutiny possible by either the legislature or the judiciary.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 26/02/2025

The SCC is leaving the other place, but not, apparently, coming here. Are they afraid I'll keep up my snarky comments?

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 09/02/2025

He says this, and he goes on to contrast this system with what he argues is the English "system" of administrative lawlessness.

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 09/02/2025

I don't think that's fair. See:

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 09/02/2025

Professor Vermeule's instantly-notorious hot take is wrong, as Lord Hewart explained 85 years ago. ("The phrase" to which he is referring is "separation of powers", and the passage is from p 41 of The New Despotism.)

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 06/02/2025

I'm talking about the executive branch, not Parliament. From my post (ukconstitutionallaw.org/2023/11/16/l...):

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 06/02/2025

This, by @paolosandro.bsky.social, is generally right, whatever one makes of Miller II. One can't think about government accountability, or the whole legal-vs-political constitutionalism issue, without accounting for government size. See my post here: ukconstitutionallaw.org/2023/11/16/l...

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Leonid Sirota @doubleaspect.blog · 05/02/2025

An intrepid but, alas, anonymous commenter on my recent post on Canada's response to Trump's tariffs insists that only by forcing Canadians to overpay for their dairy can the government save them from American invasion. (doubleaspect.blog/2025/02/03/w...)

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