Drawing on historical records of women’s varying experiences as litigants, accused criminals, or witnesses, this book offers critical insight into women’s legal status in nineteenth-century Canada. In an effort to recover the social and political conditions under which women lobbied, rebelled, and in some cases influenced change, Petticoats and Prejudice weaves together forgotten stories of achievement and defeat in the Canadian legal system. Expanding the concept of “heroism” beyond its traditional limitations, this text gives life to some of Canada’s lost heroines. Euphemia Rabbitt, who resisted an attempted rape, and Clara Brett Martin, who valiantly secured entry into the all-male legal profession, were admired by their contemporaries for their successful pursuits of justice. But Ellen Rogers, a prostitute who believed all women should be legally protected against sexual assault, and Nellie Armstrong, a battered wife and mother who sought child custody, were ostracized for their ideas and demands. Well aware of the limitations placed upon women advocating for reform in a patriarchal legal system, Constance Backhouse recreates vivid and textured snapshots of these and other women’s courageous struggles against gender discrimination and oppression. Employing social history to illuminate the reproductive, sexual, racial, and occupational inequalities that continue to shape women’s encounters with the law, Petticoats and Prejudice is an essential entry point into the gendered treatment of feminized bodies in Canadian legal institutions. This book was co-published with The Osgoode Society for Canadian Legal History.
Annotation Attitudes towards crime, criminals, and rehabilitation have shifted considerably, yet the idea that there is a causal link between drug adiction and crime prevails.
This fifth volume in the distinguished series on the history of Canadian law turns to the important issues of crime and criminal justice. In examining crime and criminal law specifically, the volume contributes to the long-standing concern of Canadian historians with law, order, and authority. The volume covers criminal justice history at various times in British Columbia, Ontario, Quebec, and the Maritimes. It is a study which opens up greater vistas of understanding to all those interested in the interstices of law, crime, and punishment.
Historically Canadians have considered themselves to be more or less free of racial prejudice. Although this conception has been challenged in recent years, it has not been completely dispelled. In Colour-Coded, Constance Backhouse illustrates the tenacious hold that white supremacy had on our legal system in the first half of this century, and underscores the damaging legacy of inequality that continues today. Backhouse presents detailed narratives of six court cases, each giving evidence of blatant racism created and enforced through law. The cases focus on Aboriginal, Inuit, Chinese-Canadian, and African-Canadian individuals, taking us from the criminal prosecution of traditional Aboriginal dance to the trial of members of the 'Ku Klux Klan of Kanada.' From thousands of possibilities, Backhouse has selected studies that constitute central moments in the legal history of race in Canada. Her selection also considers a wide range of legal forums, including administrative rulings by municipal councils, criminal trials before police magistrates, and criminal and civil cases heard by the highest courts in the provinces and by the Supreme Court of Canada. The extensive and detailed documentation presented here leaves no doubt that the Canadian legal system played a dominant role in creating and preserving racial discrimination. A central message of this book is that racism is deeply embedded in Canadian history despite Canada's reputation as a raceless society. Winner of the Joseph Brant Award, presented by the Ontario Historical Society
This premium quality large print volume includes the complete and unabridged text of Jane Austen's timeless classic romance in a freshly edited and newly typeset edition. With a large 7.44"x9.69" page size, this Summit Classic Press edition is printed on heavyweight bright white paper with a fully laminated cover featuring an original full color design. Page headers and footers and modern design and page layout exemplify the attention to detail given this collector-quality volume. Set among the minor gentry in the vicinity of the fictional town of Meryton, near London in Hertfordshire, the novel follows the activities of Elizabeth Bennet, the second of five daughters of a country gentleman and his rather crass and intellectually limited wife. The story opens with the uproar surrounding the news than a nearby manor house has been rented by a well-to-do young single man from London, and the machinations of the local residents with marriageable daughters which ensue. From that starting point through a series of events both momentous and mundane, appearances and judgments are put to the test as various characters are gradually revealed to be something other than what they have appeared. Jane Austen Born into a family at the lowest tier of the English landed gentry, Jane Austen (1775-1817) found modest critical and financial success in her lifetime, but by 1830 her books had been out of print for a decade when the copyrights were purchased and new illustrated editions included in Richard Bentley's popular "Standard Novels" series. With wider exposure they gained popularity and stature, and sold steadily if not spectacularly. Throughout the 19th century Austen's work had an admiring following among Britain's self-proclaimed "literary elite," but it was really not until the early twentieth century that her novels became the object of academic studies as "great literature". "Pride and Prejudice", published in 1813, was her second published novel. It has become one of the most beloved novels in the English language, with millions of copies sold and numerous adaptations to stage, screen and other forms. Austen's work was part of the transition to realism in 19th century British literature, and her romantic fiction, set for the most part among the gentry of the English countryside was marked by dry wit, satire, and sharp social commentary, often directed at the unfairness of the British legal and cultural systems that left women virtually entirely dependent upon marriage and family for social standing and economic security. In "Pride and Prejudice", for example, Austen uses the repetitive complaints of the mother to attack, indirectly and humorously, the "entailed estate", a form of ownership in which only male heirs can inherit real estate, making the father's cousin, not his wife and daughters, the legal heir to their home. While it is common to identify Austen with Elizabeth, the relationship that develops between Jane, the oldest sister, and Mr. Bingley is remarkably reminiscent of a the brief relationship between young Jane Austen and Thomas LeFroy, a visitor who stayed for a time near Austen's family and would later become Lord Chief Justice of Ireland, perhaps the only romance of Austen's life. With the exception of a short period at a boarding school and visits to a brother who was, for a time, a London banker, Austen lived her entire life within a close-knit family group mainly located in the countryside very much like the settings of her novels. In a cruelly ironic twist, Austen's family would suffer the fate feared by Mrs. Bennet in "Pride and Prejudice" when her father died, unexpectedly, leaving his wife and unmarried daughters destitute and dependent upon her brothers for support.
Drawing on engaging case studies, Essays in the History of Canadian Law brings the law to life. The contributors to this collection provide rich historical and social context for each case, unravelling the process of legal decision-making and explaining the impact of the law on the people involved in legal disputes. Examining the law not simply as legislation and institutions, but as discourse, practice, symbols, rhetoric, and language, the book’s chapters show the law as both oppressive and constraining and as a point of contention and means of resistance. This collection presents new approaches and concerns, as well as re-examinations of existing themes with new evidence and modes of storytelling. Contributors cover many legal thematic areas, from criminal to labour, civil, administrative, and human rights law, spanning English and French Canada, and ranging from the mid-eighteenth century to the late twentieth century. The legal cases vary from precedent-setting cases to lesser-known ones, from those driven by one woman’s quest for personal justice to others in which state actors dominate. Bringing to light how the people embroiled in these cases interacted with the legal system, the book reveals the ramifications of a legal system characterized by multiple layers of inequality.
Pride and Prejudice is a novel of manners by Jane Austen, first published in 1813. The story follows the main character, Elizabeth Bennet, as she deals with issues of manners, upbringing, morality, education, and marriage in the society of the landed gentry of the British Regency. Elizabeth is the second of five daughters of a country gentleman living near the fictional town of Meryton in Hertfordshire, near London. Page 2 of a letter from Jane Austen to her sister Cassandra (11 June 1799) in which she first mentions Pride and Prejudice, using its working title First Impressions. Complete Original Unabridged Illustrated with book-end doodles about reading
Contains a collection of twelve essays about the practice of infanticide in different parts of the world. This book includes a multidisciplinary bibliography of the infanticide literature.
