Yesterday, the Law Society of Upper Canada - Ontario's bar admission board - voted to exclude graduates of the soon-to-open Trinity Western Law School from practice in the province because the school discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation. TWU, which is located in British Columbia, is a religious university and the law school will require all students to promise not to engage in “sexual intimacy that violates the sacredness of marriage between a man and a woman.”
BC's law board previously approved the law school, although there is a apparently a groundswell developing demanding that the BC committee reconsider its decision.
Another Canadian province has followed suit (Nova Scotia has said that it will only approve if students are able to opt out of the covenant or if the school abandons the covenant). The more interesting issue is perhaps how this reconciles with a 2001 Supreme Court of Canada decision relating to the British Columbia College of Teacher's refusal to recognize teachers educated at the same university that is now opening a law school (teachers had previously been educated partly at the private religious university and partly at a public university and the private university wanted to assume full responsibility). The SCC did not buy the argument that teachers subject to the covenant would encourage discrimination in public schools. Can an argument be made that lawyers are more likely to let their religious beliefs colour their work than teachers? Can an argument be made that the nature of lawyers' work (i.e. developing and interpreting law) is such that we should be more concerned about discrimination than in the context of educating children?
Posted by: Canuck Prof | April 26, 2014 at 06:21 PM