Tripping Over The Light Fantastic

It was, I believe, the poet Robert Frost who once wrote, "Isn't it funny how the Supreme Court is always right?"

Now while I would normally support Frost in his poetic endeavours, in terms of prose he is somewhat wide of the mark. There are, in fact, a number of decisions of the Supreme Court in the U.S. that stand out as being simply wrong.

The best example would be the Dred Scott decision of 1857. Mr. Scott, a black man, had sued for his freedom. After some support for this view from lower courts, the Supreme Court, under a Chief Justice known as a strong supporter of slavery, wrote a majority opinion rejecting Mr. Scott's claim.* Not the Court's finest hour.

In the modern era, the  U.S.Supreme Court proceeded to make another serious error: the Citizens United decision in 2010 that opened the floodgates for the corporations to give massive financial support to Political Action Committees to ensure a candidate's electability, whether to the Senate, the House of Representatives, or, indeed, the Presidency itself. The principle of government of the people, by the people, for the people somehow got lost in this particular shuffle.

Well, you say, that's just in the United States. Canada's Supreme Court avoids such nonsensical rulings.

Not so fast -- a recent decision trips right into the magical and fantastic. To wit, the recent decision to strike down the mandatory minimum sentence law for illegal gun possession. And it is important to note that the mandatory three and five year sentences handed down to the two individuals in the case under appeal were acknowledged by the justices to be appropriate.

Then six of the nine justices went further, and tripped right into the land of make believe by suggesting that there could be some future case where the law would constitute "cruel and unusual punishment". And since the majority couldn't find one single case to make this argument, the Chief Justice, Beverley McLachlan, entered the world of the fantastic and MADE ONE UP!

She put forward the hypothetical situation of a licenced and responsible gun owner who stores his unloaded firearm safely with ammunition nearby and then makes a mistake as to where it can be stored. She then added, "similar examples can be envisaged."

Envisaged.

Chief Justice, I would humbly suggest that "envisaging" is one thing, interpreting the law another. Ponder this.

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* Chief Justice Roger Taney, rarely cited as a beacon of  wise jurisprudence. -- Ed.