Substantive Law Webinar Series on Constitutional Law

This webinar, aimed at legal information professionals, will provide an overview of substantive first-year law school constitutional law.

 There are two goals: 

1. to give a sense of what law school students study and learn in their first year constitutional law class, including explanations of substantive constitutional law, and 
2.  to provide practical tips on researching constitutional law issues.

Questions / topics to be covered will include: How is constitutional law taught in law school?

More specifically, the following concepts will be discussed:

• Division of powers in the Constitution Act, 1867
• The "Peace, Order and Good Government" Clause ("POGG" powers)
• Doctrine of paramountcy
• Charter of Rights and Freedoms, including discussion of the basic rights and freedoms and section 1 "reasonable limits" on those rights and freedoms
• Research tips for researching constitutional law
• Creating your own research guides and pathfinders for researching constitutional law

Attendees interested in doing so are encouraged to read in advance of the webinar the decision inR v Big M Drug Mart Ltd, [1985] 1 SCR 295 (the famous "Sunday shopping" decision). As part of this webinar, the instructor will "simulate" a first-year constitutional law class using the Socratic method in discussion of this case.

Attendees will be provided a detailed, annotated research pathfinder for constitutional law. Attendees are invited to contact Ted Tjaden in advance with any particular questions or content they would like covered.

Speaker: 

Ted Tjaden, a long-time member of CALL/ACBD and the 2010 recipient of the Denis Marshall Memorial Award for Excellence in Law Librarianship, is the national litigation precedents lawyer in Gowlings' Toronto office. Ted works closely with the firm's national precedents team and litigation lawyers to organize and annotate the firm's litigation research and precedents for use by the firm's advocacy professionals. Ted has extensive experience as a litigator and knowledge management lawyer and is called to the bar in both British Columbia and Ontario. In addition to being the author of Legal Research and Writing, 3rd ed (Toronto: Irwin Law, 2010) and The Law of Independent Legal Advice, 2nd ed (Toronto: Carswell, 2013), he is a regular speaker at conferences on issues of knowledge management, technology and the effective organization of litigation documents. E-mail: Ted.Tjaden@gowlings.com.