Justice in Paradise (Mcgill-Queen's Native and Northern Series)

Rating:
Summary: Is This about justice
Review: I have not read the book but wonder about the author who has such a desregard for public safety, public order of the role of the police to protect us from violence. His behaviour during the Gustafsen Lake occupation revealed someone on the edge and held him up to widespread public ridicule.

Rating:
Summary: An impressive Native American issues survey and biography.
Review: Justice In Paradise recounts how a commitment to Native rights and an extraordinary passion for the rule of law have determined the course of Bruce Clark's life. From a childhood in an Indian residential school, to the defense of aboriginal rights before the Word Court, to being disbarred, Clark's struggle has led him to fight against the justice system itself. Justice In Paradise explains the legal and philosophical position behind Clark's opposition to the Indian rights industry. Clark argues that the North American legal system causes the genocide of those indigenous peoples who embrace traditional religion and identity and accuses those who administer it with chicanery and abandoning the rule of law. Clark turned his back on a comfortable lawyer's life to defend the rule of law and Native rights across the whole of North America. Justice In Paradise is a candid, fascinating biography that will prove fascinating to students of law, Native American rights, and non-specialist general readers who enjoy reading of men and women who make their mark upon the world with an untiring and activist devotion to their ideals and principles.

Rating:
Summary: Galileo vs. Canada
Review: This is Bruce Clark's third book on the legality of Native land claims in North America. His first two books were: Indian Title In Canada (Carswell Law Publishers, Toronto, 1986) and Native Liberty, Crown Sovereignty: The Existing Aboriginal Right of Self-Government in Canada (McGill-Queen's University Press, Montreal, 1990).

Dr. Clark has made a career of defending native land claims in Canada and the US, based on legal arguments that the taking of native lands without purchase or treaty, by US and Canadian federal and/or state and provincial governments, has been unlawful. The argument is so open-and-shut, that courts refuse to hear it, since part of the argument is that the courts do not have jurisdiction. In over 40 cases, the court has refused to hear or respond to the argument. It is based on 18th century British constitutional law, which has not been repealed, and which is still in force in Canada and the USA. Starting with the Jackson administration in the US, the governments have simply decided to ignore the law on this matter. In the 1690s one of the branches of the great Mohican tribe made a treaty with the colony of Connecticut. The colony then allowed settlers onto the land. The Indians objected, saying the purpose of the treaty had been to prevent settlers from moving in. Connecticut felt the purpose was so that it could allow the settlers to move in. Absolutely opposite viewpoints of the same document. Rather than go to war, the Mohicans wanted to find a peaceful rule of law solution. But they did not want to go into the court system that the colony of Connecticut had set up, since doing that would admit that the intruding settlers had legal jurisdiction. And Connecticut would not accept the Mohican court. The Mohicans petitioned Great Britain's Queen Anne to find a solution. On March 9, 1804, as recommended by the Privy Council, Queen Anne issued an Order in Council (meaning that this decision was constitutionally binding on the British Crown and on all colonial governments in North America) asserting three principles: 1) Creation of a third-party court to adjudicate land disputes between Native Peoples and the colonial governments of the European settlers; 2) This court was to be a trial-level court; 3) Appeals against decisions by this court would be heard by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. From 1704 when the Mohicans first applied to the Queen to the beginning of the American Revolution in 1776, the case of Mohegan Indians vs. Connecticut was regarded as the single most important case in the history of the British Empire. It guaranteed colonized peoples the right to independent and impartial third-party adjudication in human rights matters. The genius of that court case was that, if it had not (illegally) been ignored, it could have prevented genocide in North America. Dr. Clark has been disbarred by the Ontario Law Society for making these arguments, and has been charged with contempt of court for making these arguments, even though the courts refuse to hear the arguments; hence, there is no basis for the court to say that they are wrong arguments. Dr. Clark's writing of this book is further basis for contempt of court. Like Galileo, Dr. Clark's only escape from imprisonment for making an argument is to renounce that argument. Which he refuses to do.

Law is based on Truth. Arguments are not disproved by the use of force of punishment and jail.