Law Students

Canadian Constitutional Law #31: Life, Liberty, and Security of the Person

By Erin

Moving on to section 7 of the Charter, the first and broadest of the legal rights (ss7-14), we consider life, liberty, and security of the person. This is often used in a criminal law setting, but the cases we looked at in class were more unique. In this podcast, we consider the meaning of fundamental justice in the Motor Vehicle reference, then we look at the Morgentaler case in detail. In Morgentaler, the court found the existing abortion laws to violate security of the person without ever deciding whether women have the right to an abortion under the charter (only Wilson J expressly dealt with the substantive aspect of this issue). Next podcast we will continue section 7 rights with Rodriguez v BC.

Lochner v New York (1905)

Reference re sections 193 and 195.1(1)(c) of the Criminal Code

Reference re Section 94(2) of the Motor Vehicle Act (BC) (1985)

R v Morgentaler (1988)

Full post as published by Life of a Law Student on April 13, 2007 (boomark / email).