Bill C-51 Research Report

The entrenchment of rights in the Canadian Constitution comes after long experience with a system of parliamentary supremacy. The American judicial tradition of treating the written constitution as fundamental law cannot have an instant Canadian counterpart. Thus, it does not follow that the Canadian courts will necessarily claim a role comparable to that of courts in the United States, nor is it clear that the representative bodies in Canada would tolerate such a judicial assertion of power. Opposition by government bodies to the Charter have already occurred in Canada, where the Parti Quebecois government of Quebec invoked the “notwithstanding the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms” clause for the purpose of protecting their language laws from attack under the charter. This report will attempt to note some of the common and distinctive features of the text of the two constitutions as well as to how they differ.

One of the most misinterpreted aspects of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is the freedom of expression. Group organizations have misused this much too often. In the past, many extremist groups have misused this right to protect themselves. A great example is the Westboro Baptist Church. This church is one of the many groups across North America that uses the Charter to protect themselves. The Charter protects them even though their actions and messages are harmful and not beneficial to society. If the Charter was to recognize these groups as dangerous, they wouldn’t have the chance to misuse these freedoms. Also, the fact that if a Canadian citizen were to use the excuse of the freedom of expression to defend their actions, they wouldn’t

After 9/11, Netanyahu argued against regarding basic liberties such free speech and the right to bear arms as absolutes. In modern western society, we have rights, such as freedom of speech, and in some countries, the right to bear arms. In response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Netanyahu argues that these rights are not universal to everybody. We need to set limits as to how far these rights can take us and suspend these rights for some people, because not everybody deserves to be granted these rights. At times when we are under threat from terrorism, we need to reduce freedom of speech and the second amendment in order to protect ourselves. There are also people who do not deserve these rights at all, because they will use them in order to further the terrorists’ agenda. Freedom of speech will encourage people to convince others that terrorist acts are acceptable, and will further convince people to join terrorist organizations and participate in terrorist acts.

America’s first president George Washington once argued at the [whenever he said this] that “If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.” It is an essential component to the daily life of any constitutional republic, such as that of the United States even though it is a right granted to all American citizens, in the past, freedom of speech has been abridged to accommodate political correctness, to prevent disruptive behavior that could negatively affect others, and to protect confidential military information.

Since the 9/11 attacks on U.S. soil at the outset of the twenty-first century, western states have enacted vast changes in the way that they deal with terrorist groups and terrorists. Due to the fact that civilian casualties have escalated as a result of terrorist acts, western polities have steered away from a punitive paradigm that criminalizes terrorist acts and aims at penalizing individuals who perpetrate such acts. Instead, there has been a dramatic shift towards a preventative approach in which terrorist acts are prevented prior towards any manifesting and inflicting harm on innocent victims. In Jonathan Shapiro’s “An Ounce of Cure for a Pound of Preventive Detention: Security Certificates,” published in Queen’s Law Journal in 2008, discusses the paradigm shift in Canadian foreign policy as it pertains to terrorism through a cogent discussion of Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA). The IRPA authorizes the government to detained suspected terrorists amidst deportation proceedings. However, the Supreme Court of Canada rendered a decision that the Charter was provisionally violated by certain provisions of the Act, which is the central point of contention Shapiro has in this article. Indeed, he critiques the approach of the Supreme Court in the Charkaoi v. Canada decision, positing that the security certificate process violates several of the liberty and equality

This limited analysis does exclude other other newspapers with high rates of circulation, however, this was done in order to provide sufficient focus for the analysis. Due to time and length constraints, I will only look at two weeks’ worth of coverage when providing analysis of the content from the Globe and Mail, the National Post and the Toronto Sun. It is recognized that this limited level of analysis may not provide an accurate outlook of how newspapers have represented the Idle No More movement. It is likely that the coverage presented in the Globe and Mail, the National Post and the Toronto Sun varied significantly depending on which author wrote the article, how much space was allotted and what other issues were present in the news that day. Therefore, the analysis presented in this paper should not be interpreted as a conclusive representation of all media coverage of the Idle No More movement. Rather, it should be interpreted as a snapshot of the mainstream media’s coverage which illustrates how the movement was represented in the initial few weeks of the protests. Finally, when discussing the individuals and communities associated with the Idle No More movement, I will use the term “Indigenous” to refer to the First Nations, Métis and Inuit protesters. Although these three groups are distinct from one another and face different realities

Freedom of expression, set under section 2(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, is one of Canada’s most valued rights in the bill of rights of the Constitution. It has paved the way for the society in which thirty-five million people reside today. With this level of influence and admiration, it is truly a fundamental right. However, many ground-breaking cases have illustrated the need to limit freedom of expression. A prime example is the landmark case that took place in 1990 surrounding high school teacher, James Keegstra. This Supreme Court case touched mainly upon two sections of the Charter, and one section of the Criminal Code of Canada. These two sections in the Charter included section 1 (reasonable limits), and

ARTICLE 2: Another concern that’s being addressed is one of many that we face in Canada whether at work, school, family, or in the political sphere, Racial Discrimination. “Hate Lives in Canada Too” article by Sarah beech, discusses hate-speech and hate-based attacks in Canada being

On June 9th 2015, Stephen Harper and the Canadian government passed Bill C-51. It’s an anti terrorism act, with only the best intentions at mind for Canada and its national security. However since it’s approval, there has been much controversy surrounding the bill. There are five key changes in Bill C-51 and many Canadians aren’t pleased with them, such as, the right to exchange information between national agencies, unwarranted arrests and also the increase in surveillance that will occur with both of these new conditions (Watters, 1). Bill C-51 also interferes with sections of the Charter and other key legal philosophies such as the Magna Carta and the Rule of Law.

Under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, everyone is guaranteed certain rights. One that stands out and is essential to our society is the fundamental freedom of expression. Anyone can speak their opinion in public. However, the government can in some instances limit these freedoms. The question that causes a lot of debate is in what instances can the government genuinely limit people’s rights while being justified in doing so. I believe the restrictions on speech in Canada are appropriate. I believe that the government was correct in not intervening with the debate between Mark Steyn and the Muslim petitioners because his article did not warrant enough to risk the safety of Muslims, and by coercing Maclean’s to post an opposing viewpoint would be a violation of their fundamental freedom of expression.

Security mechanisms used to protect the entirety of the Canadian state at the behest of certain ethnic and religious categories become legitimized through violence acts towards political institutions or figures (Bell 155). These ethnic and religious categories that experience biopolitical racial profiling by the security state are typically Middle Eastern or Islamic in appearance or action. These groups of people are increasingly being viewed as connected to terrorist activities in Middle Eastern countries. Critics arguing the Canada’s security regime breaches the Charter of Rights and Freedoms because of the possible use of surveillance and security provisions against Canadian citizens who are members of these ethnic and religious groups (Shaffer 200). Racial profiling in the surveillance provisions of these security acts against politically unpopular groups should not be underestimated” (Shaffer

Banning the promotion of terrorism was also a major part of the bill. The law applies to private conversations as well as public lectures and articles. Essential this law kind of opposes the right to free speech. Before this law came into power promoting a specific terrorism act was considered a crime but terrorism in general wasn’t. Also, the meaning of “terrorism offences” is a vague and unknowable term that could cause confusion and mistakes. Judges could also order the seizure of “terrorist propaganda”, again a vague statement. Mr. Trudeau

I 've selected the article because for several reasons: it 's importance in the context of this class, and the First Amendment rights of the defendants. Second, my final paper topic was “Free Speech, First Amendment Rights and 'Terroristic ' Messages”. I 've used the article in my paper and presentation, as well I 've particularly valued the case of Tarek Mehanna, 2012 while giving the examples for the Free speech rights and its protection in case of use and distribution of ' Terroristic ' Messages '.

This essay will thoroughly discuss the censorship and fundamental rights to Canadian and American Freedom of Speech.

As always, there are those individuals that oppose the power to censor. There are members of society that believe in the freedom to speak publicly and to publish. This is a basic belief in the freedom of expression and is to be protected by the First Amendment to the Constitution. On the eve of the bicentennial of the Bill of Rights, the first wave of a nationwide survey, comprising more than 1500 citizens was conducted. Through this survey it was found that American rate free speech as their second most precious First Amendment right and regard a free press highly in the abstract. Although there are strong cases made for and against censorship, the rising trend calling for censorship can threaten our basic rights to free expression and the right to be informed. At the center of the debate is the First Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees our right to read, speak, write, and communicate freely. The government at the state or federal level cannot