Title: The Canadian Department of Justice and the completion of confederation, 1867-78 /
Authors: Swainger, Jonathan Scott,
Date: 2000
Publisher: UBC Press,
Physical description: viii, 167 pages ; 24 cm
Language: English
LC classification: K
Abstract: "Jonathan Swainger considers the growth and development of the ostensibly apolitical Department of Justice in the eleven years after the union of 1867. Drawing on legal records and other archival documents, he details the complex interactions between law and politics, exploring how expectations both inside and outside the legal system created an environment in which the department acted as an advisor to the government. He concludes by considering the post-1878 legacy of the department's approach to governance, wherein any problem, legal or otherwise, was made amenable to politicized solutions." "The Canadian Department of Justice and the Completion of Confederation will be of particular interest to students and scholars of Canadian legal and political history."--BOOK JACKET.
Contents: Introduction -- An Apolitical Advisor: The Fiction of the Attorney General -- The Department of Justice and the Business of Governance -- Advisors to the Crown and the Prerogative of Mercy -- Canadian Penitentiaries and the Rhetoric of Nation, Centralization, and Reform -- The Department of Justice and the Judiciary -- Conclusion.
Subject headings (LCSH): Canada--Politics and government--1867-1914.; Canada. Department of Justice--History--19th century.; Justice, Administration of--Canada--History--19th century.