The Forgotten Fundamental Freedoms of the Charter

Dwight Newman, K.C., B.A., M.A.T.S., J.D., M.Sc., B.C.L., M.Phil., D.Phil., is a Professor of Law and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Rights in Constitutional and International Law at the University of Saskatchewan, where he started in a faculty position in 2005 and has also served a three-year term as Associate Dean. He has also taught during shorter visiting terms at Alberta, McGill and Oxford. In recent years, he has been a visiting fellow at Princeton, the Université de Montréal, Cambridge, the University of Western Australia and Oxford. Dr. Newman has published around 150 articles or book chapters and fifteen books. His books include two monographs on the duty to consult doctrine, a book on Natural Resource Jurisdiction in Canada (2013), both the Charter of Rights title of Halsbury’s Laws of Canada and The Law of the Canadian Constitution (a general treatise with co-author Justice Guy Régimbald) (2013; second edition 2017), and Mining Law of Canada (2018). His edited collections include Religious Freedom and Communities (2016), Business Implications of Aboriginal Law (2018), Indigenous-Industry Agreements, Natural Resources, and the Law (co-edited in 2021) and the Edward Elgar Research Handbook on the International Law of Indigenous Rights (2022).

His writing has been cited by all levels of Canadian courts, including repeatedly by the Supreme Court of Canada. He is a Munk Senior Fellow of the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and has contributed to policy discussions by publishing a number of think tank reports. He has also served as an expert member of the International Law Association (ILA) Committee on Implementation of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and contributed to discussions on international norms on related issues. He has delivered dozens of presentations to a variety of audiences on six continents and has published many op eds in leading Canadian and American newspapers. Prior to entering a faculty role, Dr. Newman clerked for Chief Justice Lamer and Justice LeBel at the Supreme Court of Canada, worked for NGOs in South Africa and Hong Kong and for the Canadian Department of Justice, and completed his graduate studies at Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar. He is a member of the Ontario and Saskatchewan bars and he has done legal work for industry, government and Indigenous communities on constitutional law issues, as well as consulting work on resource issues for international investment entities. In 2017, he was named to the College of the Royal Society of Canada, and in 2018 he was designated a Queen’s Counsel (now King’s Counsel).

Derek B.M. Ross, LL.B. (Western), LL.M. (Toronto), is Executive Director and General Counsel for Christian Legal Fellowship (CLF). He has appeared before all levels of court, including the Supreme Court of Canada, and has acted for public interest interveners in a number of cases involving the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. He has also appeared before legislative and Parliamentary committees to present on legal and constitutional issues.

Derek is a centre associate with the University of British Columbia’s Centre for Constitutional Law and Legal Studies, and a former Vice-Chair of the Ontario Bar Association’s Constitutional, Civil Liberties and Human Rights Section. Derek also served as editor/co-editor of Assisted Death: Legal, Social and Ethical Issues after Carter (2018), Canadian Pluralism and the Charter: Moral Diversity in a Free and Democratic Society (2019), The Forgotten Fundamental Freedoms of the Charter (2020), and Forgotten Foundations of the Canadian Constitution (2022).

Brian Bird is a Lecturer at the Peter A. Allard School of Law at the University of British Columbia. In 2019-2020, Brian was a John and Daria Barry Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. His research focuses on constitutional law, constitutional theory, and human rights. His writing on these topics has appeared in several academic journals and media outlets. A lawyer by training, Brian clerked for judges at the Supreme Court of British Columbia and for Justice Andromache Karakatsanis at the Supreme Court of Canada. Brian completed his doctorate in law at McGill University. He also holds a B.C.L. from the University of Oxford, a J.D. from the University of Victoria, and a B.A. from Simon Fraser University.

Sarah Mix-Ross, B.A., M.S.W., J.D., serves as associate legal counsel at Christian Legal Fellowship. Sarah was called to the Ontario Bar in 2016 after articling with an insurance defence boutique in Toronto. In 2015, Sarah earned a Juris Doctor cum laude from the University of Ottawa (Dispute Resolute and Professionalism specialization) where she was the recipient of an oral advocacy award. Sarah also earned a Master of Social Work from the University of Windsor in 2012 and a Bachelor of Arts (Honours, with distinction) from Western University in 2010. Sarah served as Assistant Editor of the Supreme Court Law Review, 2nd series Volume 91 (2019) and provided editorial support for Volume 85 (2018). Sarah serves as Associate Editor of the Christian Legal Journal, CLF’s periodical examining the relationship between law and religion. Sarah serves as an Executive Member of the Canadian Bar Association’s Health Law section and the Ontario Bar Association’s Child and Youth Law section. Sarah remains an active alumni member of the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law in both the Legal Writing Academy and JurisMentor programs. Sarah serves on the board of the Brescia Alumnae Association (Western University).