Constitutional Law

[CuriousLad]

Is there a law school that is best known for its constitutional law, or is every school fairly reputable in terms of their coverage on this subject? I think Queen’s is known for providing a good foundation on constitutional law, but I may be wrong. Only asking so that I can figure out where I should apply next year! 

[SmallBart]

Every law school in Canada is at least "fairly reputable" and I don't think there is anywhere that would be particularly bad for studying constitutional law. The generic advice to law students is that you shouldn't focus on a specific area of law since it's hard to predict what area you'll be most interested in until you're actually studying it, and instead focus on schools in the geographic area you want to practice in.

That said, McGill supplies about a quarter of federal Supreme Court clerks so they must be doing something right. You have to have excellent stats and a decent working knowledge of French to get in. 

Edited January 24 by SmallBart

[CleanHands]

55 minutes ago, SmallBart said:

That said, McGill supplies about a quarter of federal Supreme Court clerks so they must be doing something right.

Yeah bruh, if you're interested in constitutional law, just do an SCC clerkship, duh.

[SmallBart]

24 minutes ago, CleanHands said:

Yeah bruh, if you're interested in constitutional law, just do an SCC clerkship, duh.

That's true, I should be clear that an SCC clerkship is on the extreme end of graduate outcomes even for McGill. You should not go to law school with the expectation that you'll end up clerking, let alone for SCC. 

[scooter]

Constitutional law is a mandatory course so you are going to learn it wherever. I think the main differences are going to show up in upper-year courses, research opportunities, etc.

I can only speak directly about uOttawa, but the school has a number of well-known constitutional law professors, and a fair number of upper-year constitutional law courses. Ottawa has this course search engine, and other schools have similar pages or lists/spreadsheets of course offerings: https://www.uottawa.ca/faculty-law/common-law/student-centre/courses/course-search-engine

UofT has the Asper Centre. Idk about other schools but I'm sure many/most have at least a few well-known constitutional law profs and some interesting constitutional courses. 

It's true that the general advice is to prioritize schools based on other factors like geography etc. I agree to an extent, but if you have strong interests in a specific area, it's fair to take that into consideration (particularly if that interest is based on at least some actual experience with the subject, either through school or work or whatever, so you know it's not just some hypothetical idea that sounds nice on paper)

 

1 hour ago, SmallBart said:

That said, McGill supplies about a quarter of federal Supreme Court clerks so they must be doing something right

I don't think this says anything about McGill's strength in constitutional law specifically. It's really just:

1. McGill is a strong school and has a lot of smart students

2. Bilingualism is incredibly valuable for SCC clerkships

3. McGill students learn both common law and civil law, and the SCC deals with both

 

[BlockedQuebecois]

The answer to this question depends a lot on what OP means when they say "constitutional law". 

The vast majority of constitutional law work is done by criminal practitioners bringing Charter applications and, to a lesser extent, Charter challenges. If that is what OP means by "constitutional law", then they should be focused on minimizing debt and attending a school in the jurisdiction they want to practice. 

If OP is talking about the sexy, high-end constitutional litigation – the Bedfords, Tsilhqot'ins, Frasers of the world – then the first thing they should know is that very few people do that kind of work, at least on a regular basis. The vast majority of Canadian litigators will never appear before the SCC, and a good majority will never appear in a case of any real note. 

If they're content to give it a go, the clearest route there is going to be attending UBC, McGill, U of T, or (as a last choice) Osgoode, doing well enough to secure an appellate clerkship (including a second clerkship at the SCC if possible) and then going to work for either the government or one of a handful of notable boutiques.