POLS 3130 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Ratio Decidendi, Bertha Wilson, Peer Group
2 Nov 2016
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Document Summary
Trial courts: determine facts, resolve disputes using settled law (they never make new law themselves: recipe for decision making: identify relevant facts in the case, identify the relevant law. Supreme court: clarify the law, develop the law: new issue, scc will create a new precedent (succession, decisions are binding upon lower courts, provide a general application for lower courts. Appeals by right: automatic appeal to higher court: no leave granted, fundamental feature of fairness to allow the losing party to appeal, provincial courts of appeal, federal court of appeal. Appeals by leave: cases require the approval of the court to be heard: most cases heard by the scc, prior to 1975 scc had little discretion on which cases it heard. Most cases were appeal by right: 1975 - greater docket control. Appeal by right at the supreme court: lower appeal court overturns an acquittal and substitutes a guilty verdict, indictable offences with a dissenting opinion on a matter of law.
