Source: http://www.lapres.net/stare1.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 18:49:55+00:00

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The question which continues to beg an answer is, why must the Court of Appeal follow the most recent decision of the House of Lords on any given subject.
The case followed upon the publication by Cassell & Co. of a book authored by David Irving, entitled The Destruction of PQ17. The book purported to be a true account of one of the greatest naval disasters suffered during the Second World War. The book placed the blame for the disaster on a Captain Broome and made allegations that his conduct had been improper and cowardly. At trial, Captain Broome adduced evidence which vindicated him and which suggested that both the author and the publishers knew that their charges against him were false. The author and the publisher presented no evidence.
The trial judge directed the jury that they could award punitive damages because the defendants had persisted in their wrongful acts believing the prospects of a best-seller outweighed the possibility of material loss as a result of libeling Captain Broome.
The Court of Appeal held that according to the formulation of the law by the House of Lords, in Rookes v. Barnard,9 punitive damages were available in this case, and that the damage award of £ 40,000 was not excessive. This was sufficient to dispose of the appeal. The Court of Appeal went on to say that Rookes v. Barnard had been decided per in curiam by the House of Lords" and that judges should no longer follow it in instructing juries on punitive damages.11 But it is not the purpose of this comment to assess the merits of the Court of Appeal's comments on the circumstances in which juries should be permitted to assess punitive damages in civil cases.12 Here attention will be focused on the constitutional implications of the case.
pronouncements of the House in this context are rules of "practice" or rules of "law"," the decisive question in positive terms is how will the Court of Appeal respond to the admonition given to it by the House of Lords. If the Court of Appeal is prepared to say that the rule respecting punitive damages in Rookes v. Barnard was given per incuriam, will it balk at saying that the rule respecting stare decisis in Cassell v. Broome was decided per incuriam?
No solution to this "unedifying"18 divergence of opinion will be reached unless the argument is extracted from the emotional context in which it is presently lodged.
apparently function to the general satisfaction of those subject to them without stare decisis.
Stare decisis is not an element of the civil law.
The law would be a strange science if it rested solely upon cases .... Precedent indeed may serve to fix principles, which for certainty's sake are not suffered to bc shaken, whatever might be the weight of the principle, independent of precedent. But precedence, though it be evidence of law, is not law in itself; much less the whole of the law.
adoption in the first place have long since disappeared.34 The value of stare decisis in today's society must be assessed in functional terms.
actual reasons for judicial theories are often concealed, then "reliance on precedents is illusory because judges can seldom tell precisely what has been theretofore decided' .
inflexibly bound by the decisions of higher courts.
It happens again and again, where a question is a close one, that a case which one week is decided one way might be decided another way the next if it were then heard for the first time.
While Cardozo's solution to the problem was to "stand by the errors of our brethren of the week before",53 one is left wondering whether it would not better serve the interests of justice to hold no single decision binding and await the formulation of a practice by a consensus of judicial opinion.
This search for a static security - in the law or elsewhere - is misguided. The fact is that security can only be achieved through constant change, through the wise discarding of old ideas that have outlived their usefulness, and through the adapting of others to current facts.
As I understand the judicial functions of this House, although they involve applying well established principles to new situations, they do not involve adjusting the common law to what are thought to be the social norms of the time. They do not include bowing to the wind of change. We have to declare what the law is, not what it should be.
If the common law stood still while mankind moved on, your Lordships might still be awarding bot and were to litigants whose kinsmen thought the feud to be outmoded.
It has been said that the issue of relaxation of the rigid enforcement of stare decisis on lower courts only arises in minds harboring a "complex of unreal assumptions concerning the day-to-day appellate judicial process".59 It is undoubtedly the case that judges of lower courts can avoid the effect of decisions of higher authorities through the manipulation of the rules of stare decisis."
reasonably understandable account of why society regulates their behavior in particular ways. This ideal presupposes that decisions affecting behavior are made openly and honestly. To encourage courts to obscure their actual reasons in the interest of preserving the shibboleth of stare decisîs advances neither progress nor certainty nor justice.
Daniel Laprès, of the Nova Scotia Bar, Halifax. The author thanks Innis Christie and Brian Flemming for their suggestions.
1 Broonie v. Cassell & Co. Lid. and Another, [197112 W.L.R. 853, at p. 871 (C.A.), affd in part, Cassell & Co. v. Brooinc and Another,  A.C. 1027 (H.L.).
after careful deliberation, decline to follow the House of Lords - because they are satisfied that it was wrong - that is excellent reason for the House to think again. It is not beneath its dignity, nor is it beyond its power, to confess itself to have been in error." at p. 1263.
3 Supra, footnote 1, at pp. 873-875 and 884-885.
4 Ibid,, at P. 1053.
5 Ibid., at p. 1054.
6 Ibid., at p. 1084.
7 Ibid., at p. 1131.
8 Ibid., at p. 1007.
10 Supra, footnote 1, at pp. 869-871, 874-875, 878-880, 884-888.
11 Ibid., at p. 873, 879 and 887.
12 On the Liberation of Appellate Judges - How Not to Do It! (1972),35 Mod. L. Rev. 449, at p. 451.
13 [19661 1 W.I,.R. 1234.
15 Roy Stone, The Precedence of Precedents,  C.L.J. 35, at p. 37.
16 (11th ed., 1957), pp. 187-188.
17 For a discussion of whether stare decisis is a rule of substantive law or a rule of practice, and the implications of this issue, see Julius Stone, Chains of Precedent (1969), 69 Col. L. Rev 1162, at p. 1165.
18 Supra, footnote 1, at p. 1154.
19 lbid., at P. 1131.
20 Planiol and Ripert, A General Survey of Events, Sources, Persons and Movements in Continental Legal History (1912), Vol. 1, Ch. III, p. 299.
21 John P. Dawson, The Oracles of the Law (l 968), ppª 378-379.
22 Bissonette J., in Bellefleur V. Lavallée, [19571 R - L. 193, at p. 205. But see also Anglin C.J., in Daoust, Lalonde and Cie Liée. V. Ferland, [19321 S.C.R. 342, at p. 345, and contra Anglin, Stare Decisis, quoted by Bissonette 1 ibid., at p. in Also, P. B. Mignault, The Authority of Decided Cases (1925), 3 Can. Bar Rev. 1; W. Friedann, Stare Décisis at COMMOn Law and under the Civil Code of Québec (1953), 31 Can. Bar Rev. 723; Mark R. MacGuigan, Precedent and Policy in the Supreme Court (1967), 45 Can. Bar Rev. 627- Jean-Gabriel Castel, The Civil Law System of the Province of Quebec (l962), Ch. 4.
23 Decisions of the international Court of Justice have no binding force except between the Parties and in respect of that particular case". Article 59 or the Statute of the International Court of Justice.
24 A tribunal which has to exercise discretion must therefore be carefui not to treat itself as bound by its own previous decisions.- H. W. R. Wade, Administrative Law (3rd ed, 1971), p. 66.
Interpretations given to it by courts, see authorities, supra, footnote 22..
26 W. L. Holdsworth (J 934), 50 L.Q. Rev. 180, at p. 185.
27 Commentaries 1, p. 70.
28 Jones v. Randall (1774), Lofft. 384.
29 "I think authorities established are so many laws; and receding from them unsettles property; and uncertainty is the unavoidable consequence", per Lord Hardwicke, Ellis v. Smith (1754), 1 Ves. Jur. 9, at p. 17.
30 "It is the judges . . . that make the common law. Do you know how they make it? Just as a man makes laws for his dog. When your dog does anything you want to break him of, you wait till he docs it and then beat him. This is the way you make laws for your dog, and this is the way the judges make laws for you and me." Works, Vol. 5, p. 235.
32 Stone, op. cil., footnote 12, at p. 477.
imitation of the past." 0. W. Hoinies, Collected Legal Papers (1920), p. 187.
34 Robert L. Birmingham, The Neutrality of Adherence to Precedent,  Duke L.J. 541, at p. 552.
35 D. Lewis, Convention: A Philosophical Study (1969), p. 36, cited in Birmingham, op. cil., ibid., at p. 552.
36 Law and the Modern Mind (1930). pp. 158-159.
would be no better than any other man without them."
Quoted in Jeroine Frank, Courts oit Trial (1949), P. 271.
39 P. P. Howell, A Manual of Nuer Law (1954), p. 22.
40 Moreover, the importance of precedent in the broadest sense is growing with increased pressure on judges in civil law jurisdictions to elaborateon their reasons for decisions, op. cit., footnote 21, p. 430.
Friedman has noted the relationlip between the relatively expansive decision of Quebec judges and the extent of their reliance on precedent. Op. cit. 22, at P, 741.
42 op. cit., footnole 16, p. 1201.
43 Op. cit., footnote 36, p. 152.
45 Bright and Co. v. Kerr, [19391 S.C.R. 63.
Parker V. The Queen (1962-63), 111 C.L.R. 610, at p. 632.
48 (1967), 41 A.L.J.R. 66.
49 Supra, footnote 1, at pp. 869-871, 874-875, 878-880, 884-888.
51 (1973), 86 Harv. L. Rev. 1307.
52 The Nature of the Judicial Process (1921), pp. 149-150.
54 "All drastic breaks with law that has long been considered estiblished must be regarded by many of the legal professional with misgivings." D. M. Gordon Hedley Byrne v. Heller in the House of Lords (1964-66), 2 U.B.C.L. Rev. 112.
55 (1949), 49 Col. L, Rev. 735.
56 Supra, footriote 1, at p. 1107.
57 Ibid., at p. 1127.
59 Julius Stone, op. cit., footnote 12, p. 468.
First National Bank summarized in U.S. Law Week, Oct. 30th, 1973.
61 Frank, op. cil., footnote 36, pp. 156-157.

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