Susan Martinuk: TWU court decision is a warning to activist lawyers

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http://blogs.theprovince.com/2015/02/02/susan-martinuk-twu-court-decision-is-a-warning-to-activist-lawyers/

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The proposed law school at Trinity Western University continues to be the subject of great scrutiny by provincial law societies, the courts and the B.C. government.

 

The school itself is fine. TWU is a fully-accredited, private, Christian-based university located in Langley. Everyone seems to agree that the educational standards, the teaching and agreed-upon program would result in lawyers who are properly qualified and trained.

 

Rather, the issue that has generated so many billable hours for so many lawyers across Canada is, essentially, sex. TWU’s community covenant, a moral agreement that its students must sign, asks them to refrain from having sex outside the bonds of heterosexual marriage.

 

That means no sexual relationships for single heterosexuals or LGBTQ students.

 

So far, no lawyer has seen the need to intervene and pose a legal challenge to the covenant on behalf of the sex-starved, heterosexual students.

 

But some members of the legal community believe that this policy overtly discriminates against LGBTQ students and, as a result, have asked their provincial law societies not to recognize law degrees granted by TWU.

 

According to the latest reports, law societies in Alberta and New Brunswick have accredited TWU’s program. Legal battles are ongoing in Ontario, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and B.C.

 

The latter three provinces had initially supported TWU’s law school but have since caved to pressure exerted by some of their members who are more concerned with gay advocacy than the law.

 

Last week, a Nova Scotia court ruled against that province’s law society and its declaration that it would only accept individuals with TWU law degrees if TWU changes its policy.

 

The judge essentially said that the association had no authority to require any university in Canada to change any policies.

 

He reminded the law society that its job was to protect the public interest by governing the conduct of lawyers practicing law within Nova Scotia.

 

Going one step further, the judge said that even if the law society had the authority to ban TWU students, it failed in making the right decision by not “reasonably considering” such matters as religious freedom and liberty of conscience.

 

How is it that a provincial law society believes it should intervene in, and have the power over, who has sex with whom at any law school?

 

First, where’s the evidence that is supposedly all important to making judgments within the law?

 

The provincial law societies that are taking a stand against TWU are making a mockery of the legal tenet that requires evidence to support an accusation of wrongdoing.

 

There is no evidence to suggest that TWU graduates would be discriminatory towards LGBTQ (or single heterosexuals) or that TWU graduates are or have ever been discriminatory toward homosexuals (and sexless single, straight folk).

 

The law society is using the guise of equality rights to smear TWU, its Christian principles and its graduates by making erroneous assumptions that have no validity and no reality.

 

Second, the lawyers pushing their law societies to challenge TWU’s code of conduct show what happens when lawyers cross the line to become advocates for special interests. In their haste to make change, they are choosing to ignore a Supreme Court of Canada ruling that has already set a legal precedent for dealing with this very same issue.

 

The B.C. College of Teachers refused to approve the education program at TWU because of this same code of moral conduct and their same belief that it would create intolerant teachers. In 2001, the Supreme Court said there was no evidence of intolerance or discriminatory actions.

 

Yet, 14 years later, lawyers/gay rights advocates are making the same claim about the influence of the student covenant on TWU’s law school — and they still have no evidence of wrongdoing.

 

The rights of Canadians to freely associate and practice their religious beliefs are on shaky ground when our lawyers allow their private beliefs to take precedence over Supreme Court rulings and to take discriminatory legal action based on assumptions, not evidence.

 

Susan Martinuk is a Vancouver-based columnist with the Calgary Herald.