Why no minorities on the Country' s Highest Courts?
Judicial impression revisited
The recently announced retirement of Chief Justice Antonio Lamer of the Supreme Court of Canada and his possible replacement and another pending appointment to the Supreme Court, has again resulted in deafening silence about a possible appointment of a visible minority.
Qualified minority candidates include Juanita Westmoreland-Troare, former Ontario Employment Equity Commissioner and University of Windsor ‘s law school dean and now a Quebec provincial court Judge. There are others as well.
Why is it recognized that appointment of female judges is critically important to the enhancement of equality but nothing is said about the importance of appointing judges from minority communities?
In the November 1998 issue of Elm street, for example, Judy Rebick, former president of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women said this: 'There is no question that the Charter is the principle reason for more progressive decisions of our courts, but the contribution of the female judges has been critical.'
In that famous February 1990 speech. 'Will Female Judges Make a difference?' Justice Bertha Wilson said:' if women lawyers and women judges through their differing perspectives on life can bring a new humanity to bear on the decision-making process, perhaps they will make a difference. Perhaps they will succeed in infusing the law with an understanding of what it means to be fully human.'
Does the rubric 'women' include female judges minority communities? I don’ t think so. Rebick says that Justice Minister Anne McLellan has kept her promise to appoint more women judges. Of almost 1,000 federal judges, 19.25 percent are women compared to 12 percent in 1993. Thirty-seven percent of McLellan' s appointments have been women.
But neither Rebick nor anyone else has statistics for minority judges appointed. Why? Because there are hardly any and because no one cares. Some of us do. The omission of any mention of a possible minority appointment to the Supreme Court of Canada is troubling. Is Canada never going to set an example?
I go to a lot of courts and administrative tribunals. I have never appeared before a parole board panel that had a visible minority member. There is only one immigration adjudicator that I know of who is of African ancestry. There are handful of minority board members at the refugee Division and none at the appeal level of the Immigration and Refugee Board. There is no minority judge that I am aware of at the Ontario Courts and Superior Court of our province. There is none at the Supreme Court of Canada.
If female judges 'make a difference', why can' t it be recognized that minority judges can also make a difference? If the feminist impression is encouraged, required and celebrated, why can' t a minority impression on the judiciary be encouraged, required and celebrated?
