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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 March 2016
On the occasion of a conference in honour of Ronald St. John Macdonald, the author revisits Macdonald’s important 1974 article “The Relationship between International Law and Domestic Law in Canada.” Macdonald’s discussion of the judicial notice of international law by Canadian courts is considered in light of recent case law. In particular, the practice of international lawyers giving expert evidence on international law is criticized as inconsistent with the doctrine of judicial notice. Finally, the author reflects on Macdonald’s view that a theoretical framework is needed to explain the reception of international law in the law of Canada
À l’occasion d’une conférence en l’honneur du professeur Ronald St. John Macdonald, l’auteur considère à nouveau l’article de Macdonald, paru en 1974, intitulé “The Relationship between International Law and Domestic Law in Canada.” L’auteur passe en revue, à la lumière de la jurisprudence récente, les propos de Macdonald quant à la connaissance d’office du droit international. Plus précisément, la pratique permettant aux spécialistes du droit international de témoigner à titre d’experts sur des questions de droit international est qualifié d’allant à l’encontre de la doctrine de la connaissance d’office. En terminant, l’auteur réfléchit sur l’opinion de Macdonald qu’il faut une base théorique pour expliquer la réception du droit international en droit interne au Canada.
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7 Statute of Westminster 1931, R.S.C. 1985 App. II No. 27.
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9 See van Ert, supra note 5 at 142-44. Chief Justice Duff had gained some international legal experience as junior counsel for Canada in the Alaska boundary arbitration of 1903 (in which an Anglo-Russian boundary treaty of 1825 fell to be interpreted to determine the border between Alaska and British Columbia), and later in his role as joint commissioner on the report into the I’m Alone incident (in which an American navy vessel sunk a Canadian-registered rum runner in international waters off the coast of Louisiana). See Williams, D. Duff: A Life in the Law (Vancouver: UBC Press, 1984) at 44–52, 169–77Google Scholar; Award of the Alaska Boundary Tribunal (UKv. USA), reported in External Affairs, Treaties and Agreements Affecting Canada (Ottawa: King’s Printer, 1927) at 153; and I’m Alone arbitration (USA v. Canada) 3 R.I.A.A. 1609.
10 Re Offshore Mineral Rights of British Columbia, [1967] S.C.R. 793.
11 Baker v. Canada, [1999] 2 S.C.R. 817 [hereinafter Baker].
12 Lotus case (1927) P.C.I.J. Series A No. 10 at 75.
13 See generally van Ert, supra note 5 at 30–40.
14 Lauterpacht, supra note 3 at 59, n. 1 .
15 The Scotia, (1871) 14 Wall 170 at 188.
16 Halsbury’s Laws of England, vol. 17, 4th ed. (London: Butterworths, 1977) at para. 100.
17 The Ship “North” v. The King (1906), 37 S.C.R. 385.
18 Ibid.. at 394.
19 Macdonald, supra note 4 at 100.
20 There is a type of court that, while constituted by domestic judges, exercises a purely international jurisdiction, namely prize courts. (Prize is the law that allows belligerent states to seize and sell commercial vessels of the enemy.) In Canada, see the Canada Prize Act, R.S.C. 1970, c. P-24, which grants prize jurisdiction to the Federal Court of Canada and requires prize matters to be determined “according to the Course of Admiralty and the Law of Nations” (per s. 5(1)). Admiralty courts are not prize courts, however; they decide controversies by applying Canadian law (which, according to the judicial notice rules described above, includes international law).
21 Jose Pereira E Hijos S.A. v. Canada (Attorney General), [1997] 2 F.C. 84 [hereinafter Jose Pereira].
22 Spain brought Canada before the Inter national Court ofJustice over this matter. The court was forced to conclude that it lacked jurisdiction, given that Canada had conveniently amended its acceptance of the court’s compulsoryjurisdiction, adding a reservation concerning fisheries matters, only a year before. See Fisheries Jurisdiction case (Spain v. Canada) (Jurisdiction), [1998] I.C.J. 432.
23 Jose Pereira, supra note 21 at para. 22; see also para. 25.
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25 Lauterpacht, supra note 3 at 59.
26 Baker, supra note 11 , is the leading example of this. See van Ert, supra note 5 at 207–27.
27 Foreign laws and jurisprudence may of course be persuasive authority in the interpretation of Canadian laws.
28 Karen Knop has argued that international law is similar to foreign law because both are “external sources of law” — the relevance of which “is not based on bindingness”: K. Knop, “Here and There: International Law in Domestic Courts” (2000) 32 N.YU.J. Int’l L. & Pol. 501 at 520.Knop goes on to say that “the blurring of international law into comparative law” allows international lawyers “to develop a more complex and critical model of international law in domestic courts” (at 525). I disagree. In my view, this rule of judicial notice, and other rules of international law and Anglo-Canadian reception law, refute this approach.
29 West Rand Gold Mining v. TheKing, [1905] 2 K.B. 391 (per Lord Alverstone). See, inter alia, SaintJohn v. Fraser-Brace Overseas, [1958] S.C.R. 263 at 268-9 (per Rand J.); Re Regina and Palacios (1984), 45 O.R. (2d) 269 (CA Ont); and Re Canada Labour Code, [1992] 2 S.C.R. 50 (per La Forest J.). See generally van Ert, supra note 5 at 137–70.
30 See Sullivan, R. Driedger on the Construction of Statutes, 3rd ed. (Toronto: Butterworths, 1994) at 330.Google Scholar For a history of the presumption and recent case law applying it, see van Ert, supra note 5 at 99–136.
31 Lord Advocate’s Reference No. 1 of 2000, 2001 S.L.T. 507 (Scot. High Court ofJus-ticiary Appeal Court) [hereinafter Lord Advocate’s Reference]. Reported in Quick-law under HM Advocate v. Zelter, [2001] Scot. J. No 84 (QL). Recall that the Appeal Court of the Scottish High Court of Justiciary is the supreme criminal court in Scotland; there is no appeal from it to the House of Lords.
32 Lord Advocate’s Reference, supra note 31 at paras. 23–4, 26–7.
33 Macdonald, supra note 4 at 88.
34 Baker, supra note 11; Suresh v. Canada, 2002 S.C.C. 1; and Ahani v. Canada, 2002 S.C.C. 2, [2002] O.J. No. 431 (Ont CA) (QL).
35 114957 Canada Ltée (Spraytech, Société d’arrosage) v. Hudson (Town), [2001] 2 S.C.R. 241.
36 Chua v. Minister of National Revenue, [2001] 1 F.C. 608 (FCTD), supplemental reasons [2001] 1 F.C. 641.
37 Reference Re Secession of Quebec, [1998] 2 S.C.R. 217.
38 Black v. Chrétien (2001), 54 O.R. (3d) 215 (Ont CA).
39 Millerv. Canada, [2001] 1 S.C.R. 407.
40 Gosselin v. Quebec (Procureur général), [1999] R.J.Q. 1033 (Que CA), and M.B. v. British Columbia, [2001] 5 W.W.R. 6.
41 United States of America v. Burns, [2001] 1 S.C.R. 283.
42 Lavoiev. Canada (Public Service Commision), 2002 S.C.C. 23.
43 Canadian Egg Marketing Agency v. Richardson, [1998] 3 S.C.R. 157.
44 Ordon Estate v. Grail, [ 1998] 3 S.C.R. 437.
45 Macdonald, supra note 4 at 89.
46 See, for example, 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, (1980) Can. T.S. no. 37, arts. 26 and 31.
47 Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Part 1 of the Constitution Act, 1982, being Schedule B to the Canada Act 1982 (U.K.), 1982, c. 11 [hereinafter Charter]. See: Heyns, C. and Viljoen, F. eds., The Impact of the United Nations Human Rights Treaties on the Domestic Level (The Hague: Kluwer Law International, 2002) at 123, 132Google Scholar; Dickson, B. “The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms: Context and Evolution” in Beaudoin, G.-A. and Mendes, E. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, 3rd ed. (Toronto: Carswell, 1996) at 1–4, 5Google Scholar; Bayefsky, A. F. International Human Rights Law: Use in Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms Litigation (Toronto: Butterworths, 1992) at 33–47 Google Scholar; Bayefsky, A. F. Canada’s Constitution Act 1982 and Amendments: A Documentary History (Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1989) at 15offGoogle Scholar; Turp, D. “Le recours au droit international aux ins de l’interprétation de la Charte canadienne des droits et libertés: un bilan jurispru-dentiel” (1984) 18 R.J.T. 353 Google Scholar; La Forest, G. V. “The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms: An Overview” (1983) 61 Can. Bar Rev. 19 at 25 Google Scholar; Cohen, M. and Bayefsky, A. F. “The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and Public International Law” (1983) 61 Can. Bar Rev. 265 Google Scholar; Elliott, R. “Interpreting the Charter: Using the Earlier Versions as an Aid” (1982) Charter Edition U.B.C. L. Rev. 110 Google Scholar; and Tarnopolsky, W. S. “A Comparison between the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights” (1982) 8 Queen’s L. J. 211.Google Scholar
48 Charter, supra note 47, s 11 (g): “Any person charged with an offence has the right & not to be found guilty on account of any act or omission unless, at the time of the act or omission, it constituted an offence under Canadian or international law or was criminal according to the general principles of law recognized by the community of nations.”
49 Toope, S. J. “Keynote Address: Canada and International Law” in The Impact of International Law on the Practice of Law in Canada. Proceedings of the 27th Annual Conference of the Canadian Council on International Law, Ottawa October 15-17, 1998 (The Hague: Kluwer Law International, 1999) 33 at 35.Google Scholar
50 That this is so is not simply fortuitous or a case of necessity being the mother of invention. The written constitution explicitly contemplates that unwritten rules will determine such matters as are not addressed by it. Thus, the preamble to the Constitution Act 1867 (UK) 30 & 31 Vict. C. 3, reprinted in R.S.C. 1985 App. II No. 5 provides that Canada will have a constitution “similar in principle to that of the United Kingdom.”
51 See Turp, D. “Un nouveau défi démocratique: l’accentuation du rôle de parlement dans la conclusion et la mise en oeuvre des traités internationaux” in The Impact of International Law on the Practice of Law in Canada (Dordrecht: Kluwer Law International, 1999) 115 Google Scholar; and van Ert, supra note 5 at 68–71.