Marie-Eve Sylvestre, President of the University of Ottawa and former Dean of the Civil Law Section, and Professor Yan Campagnolo, then Vice-Dean of the French Common Law Program, served on the independent committee appointed to select approximately twenty unilingual decisions of the Court to be prioritized for translation, ensuring their accessibility in both official languages.
The committee’s report, submitted on June 6 and released yesterday, recommends the translation of 24 landmark Supreme Court decisions rendered before the Official Languages Act came into force in 1970. These decisions were chosen for their significant contribution to the development of contemporary law. The translation of Roncarelli v. Duplessis, a landmark decision on the rule of law, is already underway.
The committee was created by the Supreme Court as part of its 150th anniversary celebrations. It was co-chaired by retired Justices Marshall Rothstein and Clément Gascon and included Teresa Donnelly, President of the Federation of Law Societies of Canada and former Treasurer of the Law Society of Ontario; Catherine Claveau, then Bâtonnière of Quebec; and Francis Barragan, President and CEO of CanLII.
This initiative by the Supreme Court represents an important first step in translating its past decisions, making it possible for Canadians to access, in the official language of their choice, key rulings that have profoundly influenced the development of Canadian law.
The meaningful involvement of members from both the Civil Law and Common Law Sections underscores the Faculty’s ongoing and unwavering commitment to truly accessible and bilingual justice.