Category Archives: Global: Bench and Bar

Religion Clause Blog: In Israel, government-appointed judges of rabbinical courts have jurisdiction over issues of Jewish marriage and divorce in the country. The rabbinical court judges are chosen by the Selection Committee for Rabbinical Judges.

UKConstitutionallaw.org: Much progress has been made following the agreement of the Brighton Declaration on reforms to the working practices of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).  The Brighton Ministerial Conference in April 2012 prompted renewed reflections on the role and legitimacy of the ECtHR itself.

Piero Tozzi at LifeSiteNews: Ten years ago, the late, great American jurist Robert Bork wrote a short book entitled Coercing Virtue: The Worldwide Rule of Judges. He described how the “American disease” of judicial legislating—activists using constitutional courts “to outflank majorities and nullify their votes” on controversial social issues—was becoming a global phenomenon.

Piero Tozzi at Turtle Bay and Beyond: Ten years ago, the late, great American jurist Robert Bork wrote a short book entitled Coercing Virtue: The Worldwide Rule of Judges. He described how the “American disease” of judicial legislating—activists using constitutional courts “to outflank majorities and nullify their votes” on controversial social issues—was becoming a global phenomenon.

AP: In the judiciary’s latest face-off with Egypt’s Islamist rulers, the country’s top council of judges decided Wednesday to suspend its participation in a government-backed judicial reform conference following a renewed push by lawmakers on a controversial bill that would force thousands of their colleagues into retirement.

Christian Institute: An MP has praised a cross-bench Peer’s attempts to curb the growth of quasi-legal systems in the UK, which discriminate against women.

AP: A Pakistani court on Tuesday banned former military ruler Pervez Musharraf from running for public office for the rest of his life, the latest blow since he returned from exile last month to make a political comeback.

Austin Ruse at C-FAM: The proposed code also addresses the outsize influence of the UN bureaucracy and non-governmental organizations on treaty bodies. Over the past fifteen years, the commissions have succumbed to pressure to promote abortion on demand as well as special rights for homosexuals, though no human rights agreement mentions either. The nature of treaty bodies compounds the influence that the UN bureaucracy and nongovernmental organizations exert on human rights monitoring.

AP: The legal adviser of Egypt’s Islamist President Mohammed Morsi resigned Tuesday, alleging that the Muslim Brotherhood has monopolized decision-making and encroached on the governing of the country.

Boston Globe (AP): Egypt’s main opposition group and judges vowed Monday to step up their fight against plans by the Islamist-dominated legislature to debate a bill critics say aims to impose Muslim Brotherhood control over the courts.

FT Magazine: Don’t misunderstand: this is not a tieless, first-naming internet start-up; these are courts of law, and based on hierarchy and deference. But the grandeur and remoteness that were inevitable when the court was an adjunct to the Lords have been swept away.

Reuters: Former President Pervez Musharraf fled a courtroom on Thursday after judges ordered his arrest to answer allegations he committed treason in 2007, an ignominious retreat for a man who once dominated Pakistan and had hoped to revive his political fortunes.

AP: Liberia’s new top judge is vowing to address concerns from human rights groups about lengthy delays for people facing trial.

Irish Times: A new forum for communication between the judiciary and the Government has been formed, the Chief Justice has announced.

AP: Hungary has failed to reinstate judges and prosecutors it forced into early retirement in breach of EU law, the European Union’s justice chief said Wednesday . . .

AP: Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf says Francis Korkpor will be the country’s new chief justice.

The Globe and Mail: Constitutional experts are questioning whether the Supreme Court of Canada still has the stomach to guarantee fundamental rights. Not only is the court hearing fewer Charter cases, they contend, it increasingly releases timid, confusing judgments that confound lawyers and restrict the potential of the Charter.

Interdependent.com: The fact that the arrest and transfer of one of the ICC’s most wanted criminals was facilitated by the United States and Rwanda—two states that are not members of the court—demonstrated both the growing influence of the court and its changing relationship with the U.S. The United States’ increasing cooperation with the court continued even more recently . . .

Prague Daily Monitor: The European Human Rights Court has stopped dealing with a complaint by the dissolved Czech Workers’ Party (DS) and its former chairman Tomas Vandas, the Justice Ministry has said on its website, saying this means the party’s dissolution can be considered definitive.

ACLU: When the U.N. Human Rights Committee reviews U.S. compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) this October, the review will tackle many of the human rights violations plaguing Florida. Last week the committee released its list of issues, which will form the basis for the U.S. review, and demanded answers to questions regarding U.S. laws and policies in areas such as juvenile solitary confinement, felon disfranchisement, and discriminatory enforcement of criminal law

UKSC Blog: One reason for the absence of legal contest over these issues in the UK is the lack of a mechanism for constitutional challenge to the validity of laws. The powers of parliament not being limited by a written constitution, there has traditionally been no way of testing the propriety of laws against general principles. However, things are slowly changing.

AP: A radical Muslim cleric thwarted another effort by Britain to have him deported to Jordan after a court accepted arguments Wednesday that he would face testimony obtained by torture.

AP: A Zimbabwean court on Friday postponed a bail appeal to release the nation’s top rights lawyer, Beatrice Mtetwa.

AP: The American Bar Association on Wednesday condemned Mtetwa’s treatment in detention and called on Zimbabwean authorities to “cease further harassment of political opponents and their representatives exercising their rights under international law.”

NPR: In rebel-held parts of Syria, a clash of ideologies is playing out. Powerful Islamist brigades are competing with pro-democracy civilians to shape Syria’s future. One battlefront is in the courts. In many areas in northern Syria, Islamists have set up religious courts that deliver rulings under Shariah, or Islamic law — a fundamental change in Syria’s civil legal system.

FT.com: Critics say the amendments contain provisions threatening the independence of the judiciary, and potentially violating freedom of religion and the principle of separation of state and church. They narrowly define heterosexual marriage and “marriage and parent-child relationships” as the basis of the family.

Eugene Kontorovich at Volokh Conspiracy: I have put up a new working paper on SSRN, entitled Jurisdiction Over Israeli Settlement Activity in the International Criminal Court . . . In the wake of the U.N. General Assembly’s recent recognition of Palestinian statehood, the Palestinian government has made clear its intention to accept the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC), where it could challenge the legality of Israeli settlements. This Article explores the previously unexamined jurisdictional hurdles for such a case.

Mary Langlois at LifeSiteNews: Although the lofty treaties, speeches and other goings-on at the United Nations often seem irrelevant to parents with busy lives, it is increasingly important that we pay attention to some troubling developments that could gravely effect the lives of all U.S. citizens.

AP: The court says in its Wednesday ruling that the law organizing the elections must be reviewed by the Supreme Constitutional Court to determine its conformity to the constitution.

Charles C.W. Cooke at National Review: If the Canadian Supreme Court is happy to indulge the prosecution of those whose speech apparently “opposes the targeted group’s ability to find self-fulfillment,” then I wonder if it wouldn’t also be happy to bring back Spectral Evidence, which William Stoughton allowed into his courtroom with such famous success at the Salem Witch Trials.

AP: Lawmakers at the Czech parliament’s upper house have decided to press high treason charges against outgoing president Vaclav Klaus over his controversial amnesty – an unprecedented move that taints the end of his presidency.

Pascal Emmanuel Gobry at The American Scene: But of course, as any freshman philosophy student can tell, the problem comes when you try to ground those universal human rights. Where do they come from? Who confers them? Why should they be respected? There’s basically only two ways to do so, one theistic and one non-theistic. Universal human rights are perfectly grounded if they come from God, as the Declaration of Independence asserts and as I believe in my heart of hearts. But not everybody likes that, and it sort of defeats the purpose of creating this secular moral system to begin with. The only other way that I’m aware of to ground the idea of universal human rights is in, wait for it, the natural law.

Middle East Forum: It is a truism that the de-Baathification process in Iraq was turned into virtual “de-Sunnification” in many respects and thus helped to fuel the Sunni Arab insurgency in the period 2003-2005. However, one area that stands out as a notable exception is the judiciary.

UK Supreme Court: Lord Neuberger, President of the Supreme Court, today welcomes the announcement of three appointments to the Court.

Turtle Bay and Beyond: While bioethics is a well established academic discipline, biolaw is often overlooked. Unlike bioethics, which is concerned with the question of what should be done or avoided, biolaw aims to answer the question what must or must not be done.

The Guardian: Senior legal figures believe promotion of three male judges to highest court delayed because ministers want a woman to fill one of the vacancies

Religion Clause Blog: As reported by the Hodge Jones & Allen law firm, the English and Wales High Court (Family Division) last week handed down a judgment that for the first time in Britain endorsed the determination of a matrimonial dispute through reference to a Jewish religious court (Bet Din).

LegalCheek.com (includes video): Amid the glow of the UK Supreme Court’s psychedelic carpets (the work of Sgt Pepper’s album cover designer Peter Blake), former Linklaters trainee Cameron Sim tells me what it has been like to spend the last year working as the judicial assistant to Supreme Court president Lord Neuberger…

Charlie Savage at the NY Times: In certain respects, the current dispute is knottier and more abstract than Bush-era fights over the laws of war. But a common concern connects them: reciprocity, or the principle that a military should treat wartime prisoners the same as it wants adversaries to treat its soldiers.

How Appealing reports.

The Blog of the Legal Times: A Washington federal judge today ordered the Russian government to pay $50,000 for each day officials refuse to comply with a court order calling for the return of Jewish religious texts seized in the early twentieth century.

Catholic Culture: “There is a real risk that moral relativism, which imposes itself as a new social norm, will come to undermine the foundations of individual freedom of conscience and religion,” the archbishop said.

Matthew J. Franck at National Review: Far be it from me to suggest that the Supreme Court look to foreign sources or opinions to guide its deliberations in the two cases now pending on same-sex marriage. But the shape of things in the current French debate over this issue is instructive indeed.

AP: Sri Lanka’s president on Tuesday swore in a trusted aide to replace the chief justice he fired, a move that could lead to a judicial crisis if lawyers and judges who say the move was illegal refuse to cooperate with the new head judge.

AP: Sri Lanka’s leading lawyers on Monday denounced President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s dismissal of the chief justice as illegal and said they still recognize Shirani Bandaranayake as the South Asian country’s top judge.

AP: The only female judge to sit on Egypt’s highest court says she has filed the first legal challenge against the country’s highly contentious constitution, which cost her the seat she held.

AP: A Sri Lankan appeals court on Monday quashed a guilty verdict reached by lawmakers against the country’s chief justice in a much-criticized impeachment hearing, a move that could intensify a monthslong dispute between Parliament and the judiciary.

Gatestone Institute: Shortly before Christmas the European Court threw out a lawsuit filed almost three years ago, which would have led to the EU being required to release the details of its funding of non-governmental organizations [NGOs].

Boston Globe: Thousands of protesters in Honduras’ capital of Tegucigalpa are blocking Supreme Court judges from entering the court’s building, saying they want to ‘‘clean up Honduras’ justice system.’’

AP: Sri Lanka’s highest court declared on Thursday that a parliament committee does not have the legal power to probe allegations of misuse of power and unexplained wealth against the country’s chief justice, escalating a showdown between the Indian ocean island nation’s legislature and the judiciary.

Eugene Volokh at the Volokh Conspiracy: Should American courts refuse to send the child back to the country of origin, because the judicial system in that country is biased against women and non-Muslims?

Boston Globe: They said that the president’s appointment of Abdullah was improper. They said the Supreme Judicial Council should have been the one to nominate him, in order to ensure a separation of powers

Guardian: The government is facing a clash with some of the country’s most senior judges who will this week attempt to force ministers to relinquish control of the running of the supreme court. The constitutional dispute between the judiciary and the executive focuses on who should have the power to appoint the chief executive of the UK’s highest court – ministers or the judges who sit on it.

AP: Chile’s government has apologized to a lesbian judge who was denied custody of her three daughters because she is gay.

The Spectator: A showdown between the government and the European Court of Human Rights over prisoner votes drew that bit closer today. The government hoped that having parliament vote to uphold a blanket ban on prisoners voting would buy it some time, as the European Court of Human Rights would then have to start examining the issue all over again.

AP: Sri Lankan opposition lawmakers Friday withdrew from a committee looking into impeachment charges against the country’s chief justice, saying the process is flawed and unfair.

AP: Lawyers for Chile’s government argued Thursday that judges at the United Nations’ highest court should reject a request by Peru to draw a maritime boundary between the two countries, arguing the boundary was settled in a 1952 treaty.

NY Times: The Supreme Court on Wednesday struggled to decide whether it was capable of doing anything to affect the outcome of a custody dispute before the Sheriff Court in Airdrie, Scotland.

Christian Concern: A complaint against a High Court judge who spoke out in favour of marriage has been dismissed by the Office for Judicial Complaints (OJC). Sir Paul Coleridge has served in the Family Division for over 50 years. He set up the Marriage Foundation to promote marriage as the “gold standard for relationships” and to lobby for marriage-friendly policies.

Peter Zeughauser at the Wall Street Journal (via Google): The Shanghai Bar’s invitation confronts Big Law with a dilemma. Joining a Chinese bar is viewed by some Americans as condoning and helping to perpetrate a judicial system that is corrupt and badly in need of reform. Others regard joining the bar as an opportunity to advocate for reform from within the Chinese judicial system.

AP: Attorney General Eric Holder and European Union Commissioner for Home Affairs Cecilia Malmström will launch a global alliance targeting online child sexual abuse, building on the success of cross-border police operations that have dismantled international pedophile networks.

AP: Egypt’s two highest appeals courts suspended their work Wednesday to protest presidential decrees that gave the country’s Islamist leader Mohammed Morsi nearly absolute powers, state television reported.

CNN: President Mohamed Morsy will meet Monday with members of Egypt’s highest judicial body, which has slammed his recent decree slashing judges’ authority as an “unprecedented attack,” state news reports.

Guardian: Government proposals to expand secret courts suffered a series of crushing defeats in the House of Lords on Wednesday night , significantly narrowing the scope of the justice and security bill.

AP: When Shirani Bandaranayake was appointed Sri Lanka’s chief justice, rights campaigners assailed her as a puppet of a government that was steamrolling opponents and consolidating power. A year later, she is on the verge of becoming its latest victim.

Turtle Bay and Beyond: In Spain, the Constitutional Court has irremediably devalued the Constitution of which it was supposed to be the guardian by stating that the law that allows same-sex marriage was not unconstitutional.

Reuters: Saudi judges who enforce sharia (Islamic law) have condemned what they see as “the stench of Western ideas” in sweeping legal reforms pushed by King Abdullah, underscoring friction between government modernizers and religious hardliners.

AP: The EU’s highest court ruled Tuesday that Hungary’s reduced retirement age for judges constituted unjustified discrimination on the grounds of age . . .

Religion Clause Blog: According to the Wall Street Journal last Friday, in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula Shariah courts are proliferating to fill the void in governmental services. Islamic courts have long operated in the Sinai to adjudicate minor disputes among individuals, but since the revolution they are expanding their role.

AP: The Supreme Court of Canada says it will hear a government appeal of a ruling striking down a ban on brothels.

AP: An Egyptian court on Tuesday asked the country’s highest tribunal to rule on whether to disband the body tasked with writing a new constitution. That could give Islamists time to finish drafting the document before a legal ruling.

Turtle Bay and Beyond: Today’s “globalistas” rarely expose their material interests to public debate, but rather couch their aims in terms of “universal human rights.” At first these seem noble enough, ridding the world of slavery and genocide, but the system of global governance by its nature ever expands its reach. Forty percent of the UK’s parliamentary agenda simply rubber stamped laws already set by the EU, a legislator told Fonte, and the figure was some 60-70% in Austria. The European Union is both the world’s best example of global governance, and its most powerful proponent at UN conferences.

Boston Globe (AP): Egypt’s highest court lashed out Tuesday at an Islamist-led panel tasked with writing the country’s new constitution, saying that some provisions proposed for the text undercut the court’s mandate and keep it under the president’s power.

Eugene Volokh at the Volokh Conspiracy: An interesting case, S.B. v. W.A. (N.Y. trial court Sept. 26, 2012). A quick and oversimplified summary . . .

LifeSiteNews: In a landmark decision last Friday, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that people who are HIV-positive do not need to tell their sex partners they have the disease, as long as they have low levels of the virus and use a condom during sexual intercourse.