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> "suspend constitutional rights" (apparently that's a thing over there) That's a thing in the US too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_Am

> "suspend constitutional rights" (apparently that's a thing over there) That's a thing in the US too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_Americans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_America...

LegitShady 5y ago
its easier in canada. the charter of rights and freedoms has weasel words in it that make it not absolute. In the US they ignore it, in canada the courts can declare infringements 'reasonable' based on the 'limitations clause'. >1. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society. So its basically more of a guideline when it matters.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > its easier in canada No, its just explicit in Canada, where in the US it is, for the federal government, found implicitly in the tension between positive grants and negative restrictions in the Constitution, and, for States, the actual limits are only implicit in vague language (the 14th Amendment “Due Process” clause, into which much of the content of the Bill of Rights has been read in a form applicable against the States.)
  - inter_netuser 5y ago
    how does that interplay with the 10th, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.", where it seems the residual between positive grants and negative restrictions goes to the states/people?
  - LegitShady 5y ago
    In the us there are grey areas. In Canada they can just ignore it if they can convince a judge to say it doesn't apply, and the judges are political.
    - dragonwriter 5y ago
      > In the us there are grey areas. In Canada they can just ignore it if they can convince a judge to say it doesn't apply You realize that those are just two different ways of saying the exact same thing, right? > and the judges are political. While the judicial branch in the US is sometimes distinguished from the elected “political” branches, federal judges and especially thise of the highest court which serves as the ultimate arbiter of Constitutional interpretation are very much tied into partisan politics; if that hadn't been clear before, all doubt of that was erased during the Reagan Administration (continuing similarly thereafter), and the further heightened judicial political drama of the Obama and Trump Administrations has bolded and underlined that for anyone who still somehow had doubts.
      - LegitShady 5y ago
        >You realize that those are just two different ways of saying the exact same thing, right? It's really not.
- sbakzbsmx 5y ago
  I think the “Not Withstanding Clause” is the funniest bit of Chretien’s (the real author) constitution.
gpm 5y ago
Considering that the Canadian charter of rights and freedoms wasn't even in the constitution until 1982 (and up until then the constitution was controlled by the British parliament), I have no clue what he's on about with it being suspended in the 70s. Incidentally, that (the charter being put into the constitution and the constitution being put under Canadian control) happened during Pierre Trudeau's term. There's also the notwithstanding clause in the charter, which allows for the government to temporarily (for up to 5 years, subject to renewal) pass bills violating some of the charter rights so long as they declare they are doing so, but Pierre Trudeau, and Justin Trudeau, and in fact the federal legislature as a whole, have never used it. Edit: Ah, someone else pointed out that he's talking about Trudeau invoking the war measures act... that didn't implicate any constitutional rights, because there basically weren't any. There was a bill of rights and freedoms at the time, but that was a normal law not constitutional, and apparently exceptions had been passed for the war measures act...
- sbakzbsmx 5y ago
  Thats a very dishonest history of the rights of Canadians derived as subjects to her Majesty. And a very dishonest portrayal of the October Crisis, a time when English Canada was shocked that PET would go so far to stop the FLQ. A journo even asked PET how far he was willing to go to rid Quebec of the FLQ and got the famous answer: “just watch me” No, PET knew he was violating the basic principles of Canadian freedom, but didnt care.
  - gpm 5y ago
    > Thats a very dishonest history of the rights of Canadians derived as subjects to her Majesty. I assure you, it's not dishonest, it might be ill informed. I'm not a Canadian legal history scholar... What, pray tell, constitutional rights did Canadians derive as subjects to her Majesty prior to 1982? Also how was the Canadian parliament able to bypass those rights when they didn't have authority over the constitution? Sources would be appreciated. > And a very dishonest portrayal of the October Crisis It's not a portrayal of that at all, it's a simple statement that an act and was invoked and a point of law without discussing the events that caused it to be invoked.
AmericanChopper 5y ago
It’s very obviously a thing in the US, and you don’t need to look back into history to prove it. Every right guaranteed by the constitution can be suspended by the government, with the only limit being whatever SCOTUS thinks it should be. Given FISA courts are operated by the SCOTUS Chief Justice, it could be reasonable to conclude that SCOTUS hasn’t done a particularly great job of safeguarding those rights. The US arguably makes some of the robust constitutional guarantees in the world, but they still pose little obstacle for a government that wants to subvert them. The illusion of civil liberties is even weaker in most of the rest of the world, where they’re often granted only by ordinary legislation, which can of course be changed by ordinary legislative processes. The argument for this system is that the government must be able to suspend rights in response to an emergency, but the problem with that is that there’s always an emergency going on somewhere. The war on terror is already in its 4th presidential administration of being an emergency.

LegitShady 5y ago

its easier in canada. the charter of rights and freedoms has weasel words in it that make it not absolute. In the US they ignore it, in canada the courts can declare infringements 'reasonable' based on the 'limitations clause'. >1. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society. So its basically more of a guideline when it matters.

dragonwriter 5y ago
> its easier in canada No, its just explicit in Canada, where in the US it is, for the federal government, found implicitly in the tension between positive grants and negative restrictions in the Constitution, and, for States, the actual limits are only implicit in vague language (the 14th Amendment “Due Process” clause, into which much of the content of the Bill of Rights has been read in a form applicable against the States.)
- inter_netuser 5y ago
  how does that interplay with the 10th, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.", where it seems the residual between positive grants and negative restrictions goes to the states/people?
- LegitShady 5y ago
  In the us there are grey areas. In Canada they can just ignore it if they can convince a judge to say it doesn't apply, and the judges are political.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > In the us there are grey areas. In Canada they can just ignore it if they can convince a judge to say it doesn't apply You realize that those are just two different ways of saying the exact same thing, right? > and the judges are political. While the judicial branch in the US is sometimes distinguished from the elected “political” branches, federal judges and especially thise of the highest court which serves as the ultimate arbiter of Constitutional interpretation are very much tied into partisan politics; if that hadn't been clear before, all doubt of that was erased during the Reagan Administration (continuing similarly thereafter), and the further heightened judicial political drama of the Obama and Trump Administrations has bolded and underlined that for anyone who still somehow had doubts.
    - LegitShady 5y ago
      >You realize that those are just two different ways of saying the exact same thing, right? It's really not.
sbakzbsmx 5y ago
I think the “Not Withstanding Clause” is the funniest bit of Chretien’s (the real author) constitution.

gpm 5y ago

Considering that the Canadian charter of rights and freedoms wasn't even in the constitution until 1982 (and up until then the constitution was controlled by the British parliament), I have no clue what he's on about with it being suspended in the 70s. Incidentally, that (the charter being put into the constitution and the constitution being put under Canadian control) happened during Pierre Trudeau's term. There's also the notwithstanding clause in the charter, which allows for the government to temporarily (for up to 5 years, subject to renewal) pass bills violating some of the charter rights so long as they declare they are doing so, but Pierre Trudeau, and Justin Trudeau, and in fact the federal legislature as a whole, have never used it. Edit: Ah, someone else pointed out that he's talking about Trudeau invoking the war measures act... that didn't implicate any constitutional rights, because there basically weren't any. There was a bill of rights and freedoms at the time, but that was a normal law not constitutional, and apparently exceptions had been passed for the war measures act...

sbakzbsmx 5y ago
Thats a very dishonest history of the rights of Canadians derived as subjects to her Majesty. And a very dishonest portrayal of the October Crisis, a time when English Canada was shocked that PET would go so far to stop the FLQ. A journo even asked PET how far he was willing to go to rid Quebec of the FLQ and got the famous answer: “just watch me” No, PET knew he was violating the basic principles of Canadian freedom, but didnt care.
- gpm 5y ago
  > Thats a very dishonest history of the rights of Canadians derived as subjects to her Majesty. I assure you, it's not dishonest, it might be ill informed. I'm not a Canadian legal history scholar... What, pray tell, constitutional rights did Canadians derive as subjects to her Majesty prior to 1982? Also how was the Canadian parliament able to bypass those rights when they didn't have authority over the constitution? Sources would be appreciated. > And a very dishonest portrayal of the October Crisis It's not a portrayal of that at all, it's a simple statement that an act and was invoked and a point of law without discussing the events that caused it to be invoked.

AmericanChopper 5y ago

It’s very obviously a thing in the US, and you don’t need to look back into history to prove it. Every right guaranteed by the constitution can be suspended by the government, with the only limit being whatever SCOTUS thinks it should be. Given FISA courts are operated by the SCOTUS Chief Justice, it could be reasonable to conclude that SCOTUS hasn’t done a particularly great job of safeguarding those rights. The US arguably makes some of the robust constitutional guarantees in the world, but they still pose little obstacle for a government that wants to subvert them. The illusion of civil liberties is even weaker in most of the rest of the world, where they’re often granted only by ordinary legislation, which can of course be changed by ordinary legislative processes. The argument for this system is that the government must be able to suspend rights in response to an emergency, but the problem with that is that there’s always an emergency going on somewhere. The war on terror is already in its 4th presidential administration of being an emergency.