Unwritten Constitutionalism

Maxime St-Hilaire holds a doctorate in law (LLD) from Laval University and is an associate professor at the Faculty of Law at Université de Sherbrooke, where he teaches constitutional law and legal philosophy. In 2021, he won this University’s research and creation award, in the human sciences category, for his book titled Les Positivismes juridiques au XXe siècle. Normativismes, sociologismes, réalismes (PUL, 2020). In 2014, he won the “Prix Minerve 2014” award for his book titled La lutte pour la pleine reconnaissance des droits ancestraux: problématique juridique et enquête philosophique (Yvon Blais, 2015). He co-edited, with Joanna Baron, the book/special-issue Attacks on the Rule of Law from Within (Lexis/SCLR, 2019), and has published more than 35 articles and chapters, among numerous other publications in scholarly and media sources, and given more than 60 talks around the world. While a doctoral student, he served as law clerk to the hon. Marie Deschamps J., at the Supreme Court of Canada (2009-10), after an internship at the Venice Commission (2007-8).

Ryan Alford is Professor at the Bora Laskin Faculty of Law, Lakehead University. An expert on the rule of law and the importance of non-derogable rights during states of emergency, he is the author of Permanent State of Emergency (MQUP, 2017) and Seven Absolute Rights (MQUP, 2020), along with numerous other published works. Professor Alford was the only academic granted standing by the Public Order Emergency Commission, where he made submissions on the necessity of amendments to the Emergencies Act. He is also a Bencher of the Law Society of Ontario, where he serves as the Vice-Chair of the Tribunal Committee, and he is also an Adjudicator of the Law Society Tribunal.

Kristopher Kinsinger is an associate with Smith Valeriote LLP in Guelph, Ontario. He received his Juris Doctor from Osgoode Hall Law School in 2019, where he was the recipient of several scholarships and prizes, before completing his articles of clerkship with a national law firm in Waterloo, Ontario. He was called to the Ontario Bar in 2020, and received his Master of Laws from McGill University in 2021 on a SSHRC scholarship and with the Pilarczyk Graduate Award in Law. Between 2021 and 2024, he served full-time as the national director of the Runnymede Society, a major Canadian legal association. In 2021, Kristopher was selected to join the inaugural cohort of the prestigious NextGen Fellowship with the Cardus think tank, and served two terms between 2017 and 2023 on the board of directors of Christian Legal Fellowship, Canada’s national association of Christian lawyers and law students. He currently serves as a past chair of the Canadian Bar Association’s Constitutional and Human Rights Section.