Category: Richard Albert
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Call for Papers on Comparative Law
As Chair of the Younger Comparativists Committee of the American Society of Comparative Law, I am pleased to share with our readers the Call for Papers below, which is directed to comparative law scholars who have been engaged as law teachers for ten years or fewer as of July 1, 2011.
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The Indian Supreme Court as Superlegislature
Does the Indian Supreme Court sometimes act like a legislature? Apparently so, according to Indian Supreme Court Chief Justice Shri Kapadia. In quite provocative comments delivered a few days ago at the 5th annual M.C. Setalvad Lecture on Canons of Judicial Ethics, Chief Justice Kapadia cautioned that the Indian Supreme Court “must refuse to sit…
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The Future of the Canadian Supreme Court
Last week, Canada entered its 41st federal election. Voters will head to the polls in a few weeks on May 2. The contest will pit the incumbent Conservative Party, which held a minority in the last Parliament, versus the four major opposition parties: the Liberal Party, the separatist Bloc Québécois, the New Democratic Party, and…
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The Indian Supreme Court and the Government of Pakistan
In a recent judgment issued just last week (Gopol Dass thr. Brother Anand Vir vs. Union of India & ANR, writ petition No. 16 of 2008), the Supreme Court of India addressed its decision directly to the Government of Pakistan. Speaking on behalf of an Indian citizen imprisoned in Pakistan since 1984, the Indian Supreme…
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French Court Affirms Ban on Gay Marriage
Yesterday, the French Constitutional Council upheld a law prohibiting gay marriage. The ruling appears to be as much about the institutional relationship between courts and legislatures in France as it is about marriage itself. In its short decision, the Constitutional Council made two points of note.
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Three Modalities of Comparison: Arizona’s Exceptionalism?
For comparativists, South Africa is a gold mine. It offers comparative law scholars a rich repository of judgments that often develop in exquisite detail instructive comparisons between and among states. Of course, this is not a matter of happenstance. South Africa’s constitutional text actually commands courts to compare in some instances and also invites courts…
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A Comparativist Joins the German Constitutional Court
The Federal Constitutional Court of Germany will welcome a new judge in 2011: Prof. Dr. Susanna Baer, an enthusiastic comparativist whose work probes a number of fields including human rights, gender equality, law & religion, and legal theory. Baer, who most recently held a professorship at the Humboldt University Berlin, has written a number of…
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On this Day in the History of Comparative Constitutional Law
Forty-two years ago today in 1969, Canada bade farewell to Ivan Rand, a former Associate Justice of the Canadian Supreme Court, who passed away at age 84. In his judgments, Rand made frequent and effective use of foreign legal and constitutional materials to decide matters of purely domestic law.
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American Miranda Rights in Canada
In a judgment that is certain to breed controversy, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled yesterday that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms “does not mandate the presence of defence counsel throughout a custodial interrogation” (R. v. Sinclair, 2010 SCC 35, para.
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A Canadian at Guantanamo Bay
Yesterday, the United States Supreme Court denied the request of Omar Khadr to block his military commission trial at Guantanamo Bay. Khadr is a 23 year-old Canadian citizen whose prosecution arises from acts he is alleged to have committed as a 15 year-old in Afghanistan.