Canadians must urge Parliament to put a leash on the Supreme Court

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ABBOTSFORD, BC, Sept. 27, 2004 � The recent ruling by a Nova Scotia court, legalizing same-sex 'marriage' � the fifth province to take this unconstitutional and irrational position � underscores the urgent need for Canadians to demand that Parliament put a halt to the social engineering of the Supreme Court, says Ron Gray, National Leader of the Christian Heritage Party.

In BC, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec and Nova Scotia, provincial courts have now ruled that the traditional definition of "marriage" � the union of one man and one woman � is "unconstitutional". What most Canadians do not realize is that these provincial courts had virtually no option, because of a 1995 ruling by the Supreme Court of Canada requiring that the term "sexual orientation" � deliberately omitted in 1980 by Parliament and the provincial legislatures � must be "read into" the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

That Supreme Court action was itself unconstitutional, because changing the Charter in fact amends the Constitution (of which the Charter is a part); but the Constitution has a formula for amendments, requiring the consent of the federal Parliament and concurrence of seven of the ten provincial legislatures, covering more than half the population, for even a minor change. A major amendment requires the unanimous consent of all 11 legislatures.

Furthermore, the inclusion of the term "sexual orientation" � or any other term that would legitimatize sodomy and other sexual perversion � renders the Charter (as well as federal or provincial human rights legislation) self-contradictory, since those laws also ensure freedom of religion � and every major world religion abominates sodomy.

Anglican priest Rev. Lewis How, in a letter to the Nova Scotia government resigning his authority to register marriages as a protest against the recent court ruling, pointed out that legislation governing marriages in Nova Scotia is now a nullity:

"The purpose for which Church and Province originally set up the system that replaced Ecclesiastical banns with a government licence has thus been dissolved by fiat redefinition of the court, in collusion with Parliament and Legislative Assembly," he wrote. "Under law, a judgement procured by collusion is a nullity."

How can we restore order and morality?

Since most Canadians, in the last federal election, overlooked the only federal party that had put forward a clear plan for restraining unconstitutional judicial activism � and since the high court has been further stacked against conventional morality by the Prime Minister's high-handed railroading of the appointment of two radical feminist, pro-gay justices � it is now imperative that all pro-moral Canadians bombard Parliament with demands that such unconstitutional judicial activism be restrained, and the courts made accountable to the Constitution.

How can that be done?

Parliament could create a Standing Committee on the Judiciary, and arm it with the authority to review any court decision on the grounds of conformity to the letter and spirit of the Constitution. (That limitation on the grounds is important to preserve the legitimate independence of the judiciary.) The Committee should also have the power, if it considered any court decision to be ultra vires or unconstitutional, to bring a bill into Parliament to amend that decision.

This is not a radical proposal. Long before the patriation of the Constitution by the Trudeau government � in fact, from Confederation � Canadians had the right to appeal decisions of the Supreme Court to the Privy Council. The most famous example of this was in the well-known "persons" case in 1929, when the group of women now known as the "Famous Five" appealed a Supreme Court of Canada ruling that said women were not persons under the law. The Privy Council reversed that erroneous court decision.

The creation of such a committee would restore accountability of the high court, which right now is accountable to nothing but the judges' personal opinions. It is urgently necessary to restore the principle that the Constitution stands higher than the opinions of judges, the vagaries of changeable public opinion, or "political correctness".

The federal Parliament's Standing Committee on the Judiciary should also have the power to approve or reject appointments to the high court bench, giving that authority to a panel of elected MPs, not the Prime Minister; and to impeach judges for moral turpitude, bias, corruption or neglect.

The Christian Heritage Party of Canada urges all Canadians, regardless of party, to write, phone, fax or e-mail their Members of Parliament, the Cabinet, and the Senate, to demand � before any other business � the creation of a Parliamentary Committee with the power to compel courts to behave constitutionally.

The mail and e-mail addresses of MPs and Senators, and their telephone and fax numbers, can be found on the Internet at
http://www.parl.gc.ca/common/SenatorsMembers.asp?Language=E
You can also write to your MP, postage free, at
Parliament of Canada,
Ottawa, Ontario,
K1A 0A9.

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