Supreme Court of Canada for free say in re­li­gious mem­ber­ships; WSO pleased

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Supreme Court of Canada af­firms that courts not to have any say in mem­ber­ship of pri­vate re­li­gious or­gan­i­sa­tions in the land­mark case of High­wood Con­gre­ga­tion of Je­ho­vah’s Wit­nesses v. Randy Wall (‘Wall’), wherein WSO had in­ter­venor sta­tus and pre­sented their views which were ac­cepted by the court.

In a land­mark judge­ment which can have far-reach­ing im­pli­ca­tion on mem­ber­ship of all re­li­gious or­gan­i­sa­tions in Canada, the Supreme Court of Canada, in the case of High­wood Con­gre­ga­tion of Je­ho­vah’s Wit­nesses v. Randy Wall (‘Wall’) has de­clared in a unan­i­mous 9-0 de­ci­sion that courts will not in­ter­fere in the de­ci­sions of pri­vate or­gan­i­sa­tions in de­cid­ing about their mem­ber­ship. 

The World Sikh Or­ga­ni­za­tion of Canada -WSO, which was an in­ter­vener in the case has wel­comed the de­ci­sion.

One Mr. Randy Wall was ex­pelled from his from his Je­ho­vah’s Wit­ness con­gre­ga­tion due to al­le­ga­tions of drunk­en­ness and mis­be­hav­ior with his fam­ily.  He sought a Ju­di­cial Re­view of the de­ci­sion al­leg­ing that the ex­pul­sion af­fected his “liveli­hood as a re­al­tor since many of his clients were Je­ho­vah’s Wit­nesses who no longer gave him busi­ness.” 

 

The courts will not con­sider the mer­its of a re­li­gious tenet; such mat­ters are not jus­ti­cia­ble.

Ac­cept­ing the right of the com­plainant to seek such a re­view, the Court of Queen’s Bench con­cluded that the Court had ju­ris­dic­tion to hear the Ju­di­cial Re­view ap­pli­ca­tion based on Wal­l’s eco­nomic in­ter­est on whether he was af­forded due process be­fore this dis­fel­low­ship. The Al­berta Court of Ap­peal up­held the lower court de­ci­sion.  The Con­gre­ga­tion then ap­pealed to the Supreme Court of Canada. 

The World Sikh Or­ga­ni­za­tion of Canada, which was hith­erto also gained in­ter­venor sta­tus in other cases, was granted in­ter­venor sta­tus in the case by the Supreme Court of Canada on Au­gust 24, 2017 and the ap­peal was heard by the Court on No­vem­ber 2, 2017.  

The WSO ar­gued that “the Char­ter Value of state re­li­gious neu­tral­ity con­strains the court from ju­di­cially re­view­ing the mem­ber­ship of pri­vate re­li­gious as­so­ci­a­tions, as courts have no ex­per­tise or stand­ing to con­sider mat­ters of faith.  Al­low­ing the court to in­ter­vene in such mat­ters would be im­pos­ing the court’s (and the state’s) views on re­li­gious or doc­tri­nal mat­ters over the views of the ac­tual faith com­mu­nity.”

The op­er­a­tive clause of the judg­ment is di­rect and forth­right. In his de­ci­sion on be­half of the Court, Jus­tice Mal­colm Rowe noted that “the courts will not con­sider the mer­its of a re­li­gious tenet; such mat­ters are not jus­ti­cia­ble”. 

Just Rowe’s de­ci­sion fur­ther rec­og­nizes that “some­times even the pro­ce­dural rules of a par­tic­u­lar re­li­gious group may in­volve the in­ter­pre­ta­tion of re­li­gious doc­trine…In the end, re­li­gious groups are free to de­ter­mine their own mem­ber­ship and rules; courts will not in­ter­vene in such mat­ters save where it is nec­es­sary to re­solve an un­der­ly­ing le­gal dis­pute.”

Spe­cific to the Sikh faith, de­ci­sions taken by the Punj Pyare -the beloved five saint-sol­diers of the Sikhs faith, will con­tinue to not be sub­ject to a ju­di­cial re­view.

This de­ci­sion of the Supreme Court of Canada will im­pact the mem­ber­ship of re­li­gious groups, po­lit­i­cal par­ties and vol­un­tary as­so­ci­a­tions. It has put to an end years of ac­ri­mony aris­ing out of dif­fer­ent judge­ments of lower courts. 

WSO le­gal coun­sel Bal­preet Singh said, “we are very pleased by the de­ci­sion of the Supreme Court of Canada in the Wall case.  This was a case that had an im­pact on not just Je­ho­vah’s Wit­nesses but po­ten­tially on all faith com­mu­ni­ties in Canada.” Bal­preet Singh went on to say that, “The Court has now clar­i­fied that pri­vate re­li­gious groups can set their own rules and choose whom to wor­ship with, with­out state in­ter­fer­ence.

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He fur­ther clar­i­fied that, “Spe­cific to the Sikh faith, de­ci­sions taken by the Punj Pyare will con­tinue to not be sub­ject to a ju­di­cial re­view.  We are pleased to have been able to pro­vide the per­spec­tive of the Sikh com­mu­nity in this case and are de­lighted that the Court has ac­cepted our sub­mis­sions on this mat­ter.”

227 rec­om­mended
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