Progress and Principle: The Legal Thought
of Sir John Beverley Robinson
Bernard J. Hibbitts*
In recent years, legal scholars have portrayed
Sir John Beverly Robinson, Chief Justice of
Upper Canada from 1829 to 1862, as a pro-
foundly conservative thinker who believed in
ordered and hierarchical society based on tra-
ditional Christian and Tory ideals and who
therefore declined to shape law in the interest
of economic growth. The author questions
this interpretation and claims that a careful
analysis of Robinson’s decision in the areas
of property, commercial and transportation
law reveals that he was more receptive to
commercial development than scholars have
suggested. Moreover, far from adhering
strictly to precedent, The Chief Justice was
willing to interpret the law to fit colonial cir-
cumstances. After comparing the Chief Jus-
tice with certain American contemporaries,
the author concludes that Robinson’s legal
thought is better understood in a continental
context.
Sir John Beverly Robinson fut juge en chef
du Haut-Canada de 1829 A 1862. Les histo-
riens du droit l’ont d~crit comme un penseur
profond6ment conservateur. Selon eux, il ad-
h6rait a une vision hi6rarchique et ordonn~e
de ]a soci6td bas~e sur des id6aux chr6tiens
et tory ; il refusait d’adapter le droit dans l’in-
t6r~t de Ia croissance economique. L’auteur
conteste cette interpr6tation et soutient
qu’une analyse attentive des decisions de Ro-
binson en mati~re de droit des biens, de droit
commercial et de droit des transports r6v~le
qu’il 6tait plus ouvert au d6velopement com-
mercial que ne le laissent croire les 6tudes
r~centes. De plus, n’adh6rant pas strictement
aux prEcddents, le juge en chef interpr6tait le
droit d’une fagon qui tenait compte des cir-
constances de Ia colonie. Une comparaison
du juge en chef avec certains de ses contem-
porains am6ricains permet de conclure que
la pens6e juridique de Robinson se comprend
mieux dans un contexte continental.
*Assistant Professor, University of Pittsburgh School of Law. This is an abridged version of
an LL.M. thesis written at the Harvard Law School in 1987-88. My first thanks must go to
Professor R.C.B. Risk of the Faculty of Law, University of Toronto, under whose guidance the
project was originally conceived in 1986. At Harvard, Professor Morton Horwitz was a sage
counsel and an invaluable source of suggestions. My debt to him is profound. Any mistakes,
errors of interpretation or other faux pas are of course my own.
McGill Law Journal 1989
Revue de droit de McGill
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
Synopsis
Introduction
I.
Law and the Judicial Enterprise
II. The Law of Property
III. The Law of Commerce
IV. The Law of Transportation
Conclusion
Introduction
Sir John Beverley Robinson was the greatest Canadian jurist of the
nineteenth century. Chief Justice of Queen’s Bench for the province of Upper
Canada from 1829 to 1862, he left a judicial legacy extending through more
than thirty volumes of Upper Canada Reports.1 His decisions in virtually
all major areas of jurisprudence did much to define Canadian common law
in its formative period. When Robinson took office in 1829, Upper Canada’s
legal system was still in a primitive state. The first set of official reports
(Taylor’s) had only commenced six years previous; there was no court of
equity and no regularly constituted court of appeal in the modem sense. 2
Upper Canada itself was still little more than a struggling English outpost
on the edge of the Canadian wilderness –
its capital, York, was a town of
hardly three thousand souls. 3 By the time ill-health forced Robinson’s re-
tirement in 1862 significant changes had occurred. The legal and judicial
structure of the province was well-established, and Upper Canadian judges
‘The main sources for this paper were Draper’s Reports (Draper), Upper Canada Queen’s
Bench Reports (U.C.Q.B. and U.C.Q.B. (O.S.)),Grant’s Chancery Reports (Grant), Practice
Reports, Chambers Reports, and Error and Appeal Reports (E & A).
2The highest Court of Appeal in the province during this period was the Executive Council,
an appointed political body. It was composed of the Attorney-General, senior members of the
colonial judiciary, and important political officials.
3C.W. Robinson, Life of Sir John Beverley Robinson (Toronto: Morang and Co., 1904) at
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
were known and respected even in Westminister Hall. 4 The colony’s pop-
ulation had grown to well over one million 5 and Toronto itself was ap-
proaching 50,000.6 The construction of canals and railways had set the stage
for industrialization and the colonies of Canada West (Upper Canada), Ca-
nada East (Lower Canada), Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick were just five
years short of becoming provinces in a new nation.
Robinson’s judicial career was the centerpiece of a remarkable life. Born
of Loyalist stock in Lower Canada in 1791, he was educated at York by the
high Anglican churchman John Strachan. In 1807, he followed his father
Christopher Robinson into the practice of law by commencing his articles
with D’Arcy Boulton, the colony’s Solicitor General. In 1811 he came under
the supervision of the Attorney General, John Macdonell. When the latter
was killed resisting American invaders at the battle of Queenston Heights
in 1812, the precocious Robinson, barely 21 and not yet a member of any
Bar, became acting Attorney-General. At the end of the war he became
Solicitor-General of the colony, and, in 1818, Attorney-General –
this time
officially. After two lengthy sabbaticals in England, he was finally called to
the Bar at Lincoln’s Inn in 1823.
During his years in the colonial government, Robinson exercised sig-
nificant and even commanding political power. Elected to the Legislative
Assembly for the first time in 1820, Robinson quickly became a dominant
member of the so-called “Family Compact”, the elite of officials, landowners
and merchant-capitalists who in fact ran the colony. Even after becoming
Chief Justice of Queen’s (then King’s) Bench in 1829, Robinson remained
President of the Executive Council (roughly equivalent to today’s provincial
cabinet), and Speaker of the Legislative Council (the colonial upper house).
He only resigned from the Executive Council in 1831 because of pressure
from the politically unsympathetic provincial Assembly; he retained his
position on the Legislative Council, but his political influence there grad-
ually waned as that body became increasingly impotent under responsible
government. Robinson nonetheless remained a force to be reckoned with
by virtue of his connections at home and abroad. Given his personal prestige
and judicial achievements, it was no exaggeration when the Upper Canada
Law Journal suggested on his death in 1863 that he was “the greatest man
that Canada has ever produced. ‘ 7
In light of such a contemporary testimonial, it is unfortunate (not to
say somewhat perplexing) that Canadian scholars have largely ignored Ro-
41bid. at 375ff.
5lbid. at 322.
6Toronto had passed the 50,000 mark by 1867. See R.C.B. Risk, “The Law and the Economy
7″The Late Sir John B. Robinson, Baronet” (1863) 9 U.C.L.J. 57 at 66.
in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Ontario: A Perspective” (1977) 27 U.T.L.J. 403 at 404.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
binson. Until very recently, the only monograph available on his life was
that written by his son Christopher in 1904.8 The Chief Justice was otherwise
avoided by liberal historians more interested in the rise of Canadian de-
mocracy than in a man who had dedicated himself to the preservation of
tradition and empire. Lawyers likewise paid little attention to their erstwhile
hero. D.B. Read, who pleaded before Robinson, devoted a chapter to his
old Chief in his 1888 work Lives of the Judges of Upper Canada, but apart
from this the members of Robinson’s own profession were content to be
silent. 9 As the Canadian legal community of the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries became increasingly deferential to imperial precedent
and the dictates of classical legal science, Robinson and his colonial age
seemed somehow irrelevant. The lack of interest was so complete that one
might have thought a curtain had been drawn on a past that was better off
forgotten.10
In the late 1960s and 1970s, however, nationalist academics began to
rediscover Robinson. Their rediscovery was part of a general attempt to
resurrect an allegedly distinctive Canadian historical identity within North
America by focusing on the supposed “Tory touch” in Canadian culture.
According to Canadian disciples of American historian Louis Hartz, this
was the surviving ideological manifestation of the Loyalist-conservative so-
cial “fragment” cast off from the liberal United States in the years imme-
diately following the American Revolution. 1 Robinson, it was argued, was
8Robinson, supra, note 3.
9D.B. Read, The Lives of the Judges of Upper Canada and Ontario (Toronto: Roswell and
Hutchison, 1888).
10″The central-Canadian common law community appears to remember relatively little about
its own development or the attitudes and values its first century was committed to furthering.
Its maturation, especially in the very late nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, is largely
a story of disruption and subsequent dissociation from the past … . The need and desire
almost to repress systematically that which was distinctive about nineteenth-century British
North American legal culture … was merely one aspect of a larger shift in outlook which
constituted a discontinuity in the organic development of Canadian legal culture.” G.B. Baker,
“The Reconstruction of Upper Canadian Legal Thought in the Late-Victorian Empire” (1985)
3 Law & Hist. Rev. 219 at 285-287.
“The literature from the 1960s and 1970s on “Tory touch” and the Canadian conservative
tradition is considerable. See, e.g., K. McRae, “The Structure of Canadian History” in L. Hartz,
ed. The Founding of New Societies (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1964); G. Grant,
Lament for a Nation: The Defeat of Canadian Nationalism (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart,
1965); G. Horowitz, “Conservatism, Liberalism and Socialism in Canada” (1966) 32 Can. J.
Eco. & Pol. Sci. 141; S.E Wise, “Upper Canada and the Conservative Tradition” in Ontario
Historical Society, eds, Profiles of a Province: Studies in the History of Ontario (Toronto: Ontario
Historical Society, 1967); S.E Wise, “Conservatism and Political Development: The Canadian
Case” (1970) 69 South Atlantic Quarterly 226; T. Cook, “The Canadian Conservative Tradition:
An Historical Perspective” (1973) 8:4 J. Can. Stud. 31. Ironically, the Tory touch movement
began as an attempt to demonstrate the similarities between Canada and the United States.
In the early years of the movement, theorists maintained that Tory ideals had been imprinted
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
the quintessential Canadian Tory, less a believer in individualistic com-
mercial enterprise and colonial economic development than in the creation
and perpetuation of a structured and hierarchical Christian society based
on duty, order, and deference to authority, all encompassed in the notion
of overriding loyalty to the British crown.12 He sought to make Upper
Canada a virtual transcript of the mother country’s ancient traditions and
mixed constitution, thus sparing the colony from the chaos of American
republicanism.
It was within this context of academic nationalism that modern Ca-
nadian legal scholars made their first attempts to assess Robinson’s judicial
contribution. Embracing certain Tory ideals themselves, they projected onto
Robinson those “classical” conceptions of law and the judicial enterprise
which they associated with the last decades of the nineteenth century. The
lawyers thus came to regard the Chief Justice as an historical progenitor
(even, perhaps, a legitimator) of a precedent-bound domestic judicial “tra-
dition”. Thus, R.C.B. Risk’s 1977 characterization:
Robinson’s [political and economic] beliefs were strongly held, but … they [do
not] seem to have influenced his judgements … . Robinson led the common
law courts throughout a long and important period and he was one of the early
makers of a tradition that has become dominant among Canadian judges:
deference to authority, denial of any significant creative power, and denial of
any general attitudes beyond fidelity to statutes and the accumulation of
precedent. 13
Risk’s work was at once the starting and finishing-point for Patrick
Brode’s 1984 biography, Sir John Beverley Robinson: Bone and Sinew of the
Compact.14 In light of Risk’s discouraging words, it is not surprising that
Brode (although a lawyer himself) chose to focus on Robinson’s political
life as a Tory to the relative exclusion of his judicial career. Brode introduced
some interesting evidence concerning Robinson’s judicial attitudes (in the
areas of commercial and transportation law in particular), but chose in the
on Anglo-Canadian culture by the Loyalist migrations in the late 18th and early 19th centuries,
but they nevertheless emphasized that Canada remained an essentially “liberal” society. As
the 1960s progressed and Canadian nationalism grew stronger, however, the movement became
preoccupied with stressing historical-ideological differences between the two countries. Thus,
while Toryism was just a “touch” for Kenneth McRae in 1964, it became the distinctive
characteristic of Canadian culture in George Grant’s book in 1965 and Gad Horowitz’s famous
article in 1966.
Canadian Community” (1974) 64 Ont. Hist. 79.
12See, e.g., T. Cook, “John Beverley Robinson and the Conservative Blueprint for the Upper
13Risk, supra, note 6 at 431. In fairness to Risk, it should be said that his own views of
Robinson’s significance and his place in the Canadian legal tradition have changed since this
article was written.
14p Brode, Sir John Beverley Robinson: Bone and Sinew of the Compact (Toronto: University
of Toronto Press, 1984).
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
end not to depart from the conventional wisdom fostered by Risk. Finally,
in 1985, an article by David Howes in the McGill Law Journal took Risk’s
conservative analysis one step further by trying to demonstrate that Ro-
binson’s Tory respect for property and authority in fact made his Upper
Canada “the converse of Wisconsin” (a reference to the research focus of
pioneering American legal historian Willard Hurst).15 While Robinson’s ju-
dicial contemporaries in the United States were enthusiastically engaging
in what Hurst’s followers termed “instrumentalism” (i.e. molding estab-
lished legal rules and precedents to favour economic growth and suit pe-
culiarly American circumstances), Howes contended that the Canadian
Chief Justice persisted in restrictive legal thinking and reasoning more con-
sistent with the eighteenth century pre-Revolutionary formalism of the
American colonies. 16
An exhaustive review of Robinson’s reported decisions reveals such an
assessment of his legal character to be based less on historical fact than on
a misconceived marriage between the Tory myth of Canadian history and
the ideological precepts of classical legal thought. Instead of a convincing
picture of an independently-minded jurist who was praised by his contem-
poraries for his concern for colonial conditions,17 his support of commerce, 18
and his opposition to the “triumph … of technicality over truth,”’19 what
has emerged from the recent literature is a caricature of a man “mindlessly
aping”20 English practice and precedent in a colonial backwater cut off from
the intellectual current of the nineteenth century legal world.
While not wishing to suggest that Toryism or formalism was absent in
early nineteenth century Canada, or that these notions are irrelevant to an
understanding of Robinson’s thought, it is nevertheless evident that the
Tory-formalist thesis has obscured as much about Robinson as it has re-
vealed. In reaching for a distinctively Canadian explanation of Robinson’s
thought, it has overlooked much of what was most interesting about the
Chief Justice, and in the process has artificially divorced him from his
broader North American legal context. More importantly, it has hindered
15D. Howes, “Property, God and Nature in the Thought of Sir John Beverley Robinson”
(1985) 30 McGill L.J. 365 at 367.
‘6″It could be said that Robinson conceived of the common law in much the same way as
an eighteenth-century American judge would, ‘as a body of essentially fixed doctrine to be
applied in order to achieve a fair result between private litigants in individual cases’. He did
not regard common law rules as instruments of social policy, nor did he view himself as effecting
social change (or stasis) by applying them.” Ibid. at 377.
17Read, supra, note 9 at 136.
18lbid.
9Supra, note 7 at 62.
20The phrase is that of D.G. Bell interpreting Risk. D.G. Bell, “The Birth of Canadian Legal
History” (1984) 33 U.N.B.L.J. 312 at 318.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
the study of an important phenomenon in Canadian legal history: the late
nineteenth/early twentieth century transformation of Canadian legal culture
from a relatively lively context-sensitive continentalism, to a plodding im-
perial formalism.2′ In a phrase, the Tory-formalist conceptualization of the
Chief Justice has done much to turn Canadian legal history on its head.
The purpose of this article is to help right the enterprise. This can be
done by demonstrating the inaccuracies in the current understanding of
Robinson, and by offering an interpretation of his legal thought which places
it in the context of contemporary North American legal culture. To accom-
plish this, the article has been divided into five sections. Section I examines
Robinson’s views on the sources of law, the functions of courts, and the role
of legislatures in the making and changing of law. Section II explores Ro-
binson’s thinking in the substantive area of property law. Section III deals
with Robinson and the law of commerce, that is, the law relating to contract,
bills and notes, franchises, corporations, and debtor-creditor relations. Sec-
tion IV reviews Robinson’s decisions on the law of transportation –
com-
mon carriers, canals, road companies and railways. Finally, Section V
reconsiders the allegation that Upper Canada was the legal “converse of
Wisconsin”, and attempts to place Robinson’s judicial thinking in a broader,
continental context.
I. Law and the Judicial Enterprise
One hundred and twenty-six years after his death, Robinson’s legal
philosophy can only be reconstructed through a painstaking examination
of his judicial decisions. Even these, however, provide but incidental evi-
dence of his beliefs – Robinson was necessarily more concerned with re-
solving disputes and establishing rules than he was with documenting his
personal principles for posterity. The cases nonetheless yield much in the
form of reasoning, comments, complaints and results.
Consistent with suggestions in recent scholarship, Robinson’s judg-
ments demonstrate that he shared many of the rhetorical truths of 19th
century English common law. Law in general was founded on reason, com-
posed of principles, and evidenced through precedent. 22 Where necessary
for purposes of public policy and convenience, it could be modified by
statute. The province of the judge was to discover the law and administer
21See Baker, supra, note 10. See also J.E Newman, “Reaction and Change: A Study of the
Ontario Bar, 1880-1920” (1974) 32 U.T. Fac. L. Rev. 51; B.J. Hibbitts, “A Change of Mind:
The Supreme Court of Canada and the Board of Railway Commissioners” [forthcoming (1990)
40 U.T.L.J.].
220n the view that law is founded on reason, see Starr v. Gardner (1843), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.)
512 at 523.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
461
it to resolve individual disputes between litigants. In Upper Canada, he was
constitutionally bound by English authority: the colony’s first statute, 32
Geo. 3, c. 1, had declared that “in all matters of controversy relative to
property and civil rights, resort shall be had to the Laws of England as the
rule for decision of the same.”‘ 23 Judges were not to introduce new legal
principles into the system, depart at pleasure from settled rules, or offer
gratuitous opinions, lest they disturb existing rights;24 neither were they to
give any weight to public policy arguments unless “they…[were] so clear and
so decisive as to form in themselves a clear ground of deciding the question
upon legal priciples”. 25 Above all, they were not to act upon “considerations
of policy, or even of compassion”, where a legal duty was prescribed. 26 To
do these things would be to “[depart] from our proper sphere”, i.e. to adopt
a prohibited legislative function and arbitrarily substitute a sense of what
the law ought to be for what it, in fact, was. 27
The existing literature fails to recognize the extent to which these con-
ceptions turned out to be rather more pliable in Robinson’s hands than
some of the rhetoric implied. This pliability was partly a function of in-
determinacy inherent in the common law and partly a response to pressures
of the colonial condition. In the first place, Upper Canada’s Chief Justice
recognized that the law was not a constant; rather, it evolved with society,
23Section 3. Robinson’s substantive approval of English law as the basis for the Upper Ca-
nadian legal system was most apparent in Gardiner v. Gardiner (1832), 2 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 554
where he commented at 586 that “we have had the good sense happily to adopt the common
law of England”, and, later at 595 that “we have in this colony .. .very wisely taken to ourselves
the law of England as our rule of decision.”
24See, e.g., Commissioners of Public Works v. Daly (1849), 6 U.C.Q.B. 33 at 43. See also
Phillips v. Redpath (1830), Draper 68 at 74 (U.C.K.B.): “Law is administered upon general
principles, and if without some satisfactory reason we should forbear to apply a well-known
rule… which is applied in other cases we should be acting arbitrarily and against authority.”
Rowland v. Tyler (1834), 3 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 630 at 637: “[W]e should do more evil than good
by casting off an adherence to principles, and disregarding all settled distinctions, in the attempt
to afford a remedy….” On the unsettling effect of gratuitous opinions, see McDonell v. Bank
of Upper Canada (1850), 7 U.C.Q.B. 252 at 289: “[F]or all that we know, an extra judicial
opinion.. .might tend to unsettle a good deal of property without necessity.”
25Bank of Montreal v. Bethune (1835), 4 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 341 at 349.
26Re John Anderson (1860), 20 U.C.Q.B. 124 at 174. See also A.G. v. Grasset (1857), 6 Grant
200 at 218 (U.C. Ch. Ct.): “A court ofjustice.. .can dispose of no question as a merely abstract
or speculative question, with a view to its bearing upon political considerations, and without
regard to the legal interest that may be involved.”
27From a Grand Jury charge, quoted in Brode, supra, note 14 at 178. See also Robinett v.
Lewis, (1830), Draper 260 at 264 (U.C.K.B.): “I think it would be in some measure assuming
the power to legislate … if the court were to attempt to fix what they cannot shew to have
been clearly settled by former adjudications.” See also Genesee Mutual Insurance Co. v. West-
man (1852), 8 U.C.Q.B. 487 at 498: “If the Legislature should think that either justice or policy
points to a different course, they can apply a remedy. We have no discretion to say that the
law is different from what we consider it to be.”
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
reflecting its changing conditions and responding to them in the interests
of the common weal. In Belcher v. Cook (1847), for instance, he openly
acknowledged “changes in the system of society which have gradually
moulded and altered some parts of our common law, so as to make them
more suitable to a new state of things”. 28 By the same token, he was critical
of “more subtle reasoning than was suited to the actual affairs of life”. 29
Robinson was sensitive to the context and consequences of his decisions;
precedent and principle permitting, he tended to interpret the law in the
manner which made the most functional sense to him. Pro-offered rules
were often rationalized or rejected in terms of their practical impact. In
Boulton v. Jeffrey (1845), for instance, Robinson (sitting on the Executive
Council) ruled that the Court of Chancery had no power to declare a grantee
of land under Crown patent a trustee for another party on the basis of prior
equities once the actual legal grant had been made; such a power would be
nothing less than a prescription for social and administrative chaos. 30 The
judicial process itself was frequently regarded in the same practical sense.
Thus, in Ballard v. Ransom (1831), a case arising out of problems in the
colonial timber trade, Robinson seemed to conceive his responsibility not
merely in terms of setting a rule, but of actually facilitating commerce by
forestalling the emergence of disputes. 31
The potential for such instrumentalism was greatest where precedents
were absent or less than dispositive, or where colliding principles forced
judges to consider problems of interpretation for themselves in light of
analogy, reason, and public policy. Both situations occurred. Robinson found
himself confronting the former sort more frequently than he would have
liked. He often complained of “unsettled” law, or of no authoritative guid-
ance for problems newly thrown up by technological innovation or economic
development. 32 Recourse to existing principles sometimes offered little com-
28(1847), 4 U.C.Q.B. 401 at 414. See also Bank of Upper Canada v. Widmer (1832), 2 U.C.Q.B.
(O.S.) 256 at 284: “[R]eason and experience… have led to great changes in many departments
of the law.”
29Belcher v. Cook, ibid. at 422.
30(1845), 1 E & A 111 at 113-14.
31(1831), 2 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 70 at 72.
32Thus, in Ramsay Cloth Co. v. Mutual Fire Insurance (1854), 11 U.C.Q.B. 516 at 523, he
expressed surprise at “how meagre English text books are on the subject of fire insurance, and
how few cases are to be met with in the reports upon questions arising out of such policies.”
That Robinson should have made such a complaint in the context of a fire insurance case is
hardly surprising. Even in the United States, which appears to have been in advance of England
in this area, the law was such that the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court complained in
1852 that “[flire insurance … is in its rudiments”. As quoted in M. Horwitz, The Transfor-
mation ofAmerican Law, 1780-1860 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1977) at 230. On
the dearth of English authority, see also Mamora Foundry Co. v. Jackson (1852), 9 U.C.Q.B.
509 at 515: “I am surprised that we find so little on the point in our books, and regret it, for
it would have been satisfactory to have found a decision or precedent expressly in point.”
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
fort. For instance, in Bell v. Levy (1844), Robinson found himself confronted
with a conundrum. The case involved the interpretation of a recent Upper
Canadian statute abolishing imprisonment for debt. The question was
whether the statute applied to those individuals against whom process had
been commenced prior to its enactment, but who were not actually charged
in execution until after the act had been passed. Robinson explained his
position in a remarkable passage which, to modem eyes, seems more char-
acteristic of a legal realist than of a nineteenth century colonial jurist:
Considering the nature of the enactment, there are two principles in the con-
struction of statutes which bear upon it in opposite directions. On the one
hand, we ought not to give a statute an ex post facto operation, injurious to
the rights of parties, by any latitude of construction. On the other hand, a
statute passed in favour of liberty, and with the avowed purpose of mitigating
the pre-existing law, ought to receive a favorable, that is, a benign construction.
The fair effect of these opposing maxims perhaps is, that they neutralize each
other, and make it our duty simply to go as far as we conscientiously believe
the act goes …. 33
The absence of clear English authority encouraged Robinson to look
in other directions for guidance, a tendency which opened Upper Canada’s
common law to refreshing foreign influences. The most significant “exter-
nal” source of law was the United States. Indisputably similar geographical,
economic and even social circumstances encouraged this broadening of ju-
dicial horizons, especially in areas where North American conditions dif-
fered substantially from those in England. Robinson had no love for
American democracy, but he acknowledged the circumstantial similarities
between Upper Canada and the southern republic. As he declared in Bank
of British North America v. Ross (1844):
In any doubtful question before us, it will be always an advantage to know the
light in which it has been viewed by a tribunal in another country, which
follows, in the main, the same system, and where the judges are known to be
men of great ability and research; and it is especially desirable when the point
happens to be a novel one, arising out of transactions or circumstances unusual
in England, and with which people in America are more familiar.34
Recourse to American thinking was particularly common in the context of
commercial law, where Robinson relied heavily on prolific writers such as
33(1844), 1 U.C.Q.B. 9 at 9.
34(1844), I U.C.Q.B. 199 at 210. See also Hill v. Gander (1844), 1 U.C.Q.B. 3 at 5: “I do
not cite these dicta as decisions binding upon us, but it is satisfactory to find these expositions
of the principle in question by eminent judges, though of a foreign country, founded as we
know they are in their judgement, upon the common law of England, and bearing upon ques-
tions, which from the nature of things are much less frequently called upon in England than
in America, and upon which therefore it is not always easy to find adjudications in our book.”
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
Joseph Story.35 As the Chief Justice noted in Bank of Montreal v. DeLatre
(1849):
[T]he American Courts have generally gone before those in England, in intro-
ducing such relaxations as have seemed necessary for the convenience and
safety of those engaged in commerce; and they have in some instances gone
further without the aid of legislative enactments, in moulding the principles
of common law to suit supposed exigences, than English Courts of Justice have
yet ventured to go.36
Robinson nonetheless appreciated that, as a colonial judge, he could
only go so far in relying on American jurisprudence, regardless of how
helpful it might seem to be. Put simply,
[t]he tribunals of the United States, both legal and equitable, have in the de-
cisions of the English courts a pattern which they may work by. We have in
them a pattern which we must work by, unless where the legislature has sanc-
tioned a deviation. Besides constitutional principles binding upon us as an
English colony, our adoption of the English law … make [s this] mandatory…
[emphasis in the original]. 37
A second significant “foreign” influence was the civil law. While hardly
as important in Robinson’s intellectual scheme as American jurisprudence,
civil law occasionally offered the Chief Justice guidance on principle where
the English law was unclear and American authority was of little or no
assistance. In Ballard v. Ransom, for example, Robinson relied directly on
Justinian’s Institutes and the Digest to settle a point in the law of sales. 38
In other instances, he relied on the modern French treatise writer Pothier.39
To be sure, the move to civilian authority was not original on Robinson’s
part –
in the late eighteenth century, eminent English judges such as Lord
35Story’s works were relied or cited in: Davidson v. Bartlett (1844), 1 U.C.Q.B. 50; Beckett
v. Cornish (1847), 4 U.C.Q.B. 138; Bank of Upper Canada v. Smith (1847), 4 U.C.Q.B. 483;
Bank of Montreal v. DeLatre (1849), 5 U.C.Q.B. 362; McCuniffe v. Allen (1849), 6 U.C.Q.B.
377; Wilcocks v. Tinning (1850), 7 U.C.Q.B. 372; Ingersoll and Thamesford Gravel Road
Company v. McCarthy (1858), 16 U.C.Q.B. 162; Sinclair v. Robson (1858), 16 U.C.Q.B. 211;
Hard v. Palmer (1860), 20 U.C.Q.B. 208.
36(1849), 5 U.C.Q.B. 362 at 368.
37Street v. CommercialBank (1844), 1 Grant 169 at 189-90 (U.C. Ch. Ct.). See also Hamilton
v. Niagara Harbor & Dock Co. (1842), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 381 at 399: “[Wle must still consider
that our adherence to the principles of the English common law is a duty imposed on us by
written law, and is therefore more strongly obligatory than it may be acknowledged to be in
the courts of the United States. Our statute says that we are to be governed by it ‘in all
controversies relating to property and civil rights,’ and the English ‘rules of evidence’ are
expressly made binding upon us. Whatever liberties therefore may have been assumed in foreign
countries in departing from principles which are binding upon English courts, we are not
allowed to exercise such discretion …
38Supra, note 31 at 79.
39See, e.g., McKinnon v. Burrows (1834), 3 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 590 at 593; Rochleau v. Bidwell
(1831), Draper 345 at 358 (U.C.K.B.); Jones v. Capreol (1835), 4 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 227 at 240.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
Mansfield had drawn heavily on continental and Roman authority to ac-
commodate traditional English law to the requirements of a commercial
age. 40 Robinson’s willingness to follow their lead suggests that he was open-
minded and concerned with the same general problem of fitting law to suit
society.
Surprisingly, the least cited external source of authority was the juris-
prudence of the rest of British North America. The constitutional systems
of the other colonies (with the exception of Lower Canada) made them
obvious standards of legal comparison, as did their similar physical and
economic circumstances, yet only rarely did Robinson consider their case
law or their legislation. His hesitation did not seem to be grounded in
principle, for, as he said in Gardiner v. Gardiner (1832),41 interpretations
from other colonies were not inappropriate, especially where the colonies
were operating under similar statutes. Perhaps his failure to refer more often
to colonial sources was simply the result of the dearth of colonial reports
and records relative to English and American materials. 42
Even where English authority was clear and undisputed, however, Ro-
binson did not always apply it –
32 Geo. 3, c. 1 notwithstanding. Robinson
declined to wear the straight-jacket of precedent. In the first place, he rec-
ognized that to some extent law had to change with society. The Chief Justice
was no hide-bound slave of the past. As he put it in one case on the law of
corporations,
it would be as reasonable to insist that the dress of an infant should be made
to fit a grown-up man, as that a set of maxims and principles could have been
framed two or three hundred years ago, which without any modification would
suit the present circumstances of mankind. 43
Second, Robinson refused to put blind faith in the rulings of English tri-
bunals. Recognizing that mistakes could even be made by the best known
metropolitan jurists, he preferred to take personal responsibility for the
integrity of the common law in Upper Canada.
In attempting to avoid what he considered to be inappropriate or in-
correct English decisions, Robinson took advantage of the comparative flex-
ibility which prevailed in the early nineteenth century doctrine of
400n Mansfield, see C.H.S. Fifoot, Lord Mansfield (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1936).
41Supra, note 23.
42A darker explanation might lie in the “hostility of the Law Society [of Upper Canada]
towards Nova Scotian, Newfoundland, [and] New Brunswick … lawyers” during most of the
nineteenth century. See Baker, supra, note 10 at 241.
43Bank of Upper Canada v. Widmer, supra, note 28 at 284.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
precedent. 44 Precedents at this time were regarded less as actual law than
as mere evidence of more abstract and independent legal principles. Insofar
as a precedent appeared to depart from principle, it was (as Blackstone put
it in his famous Commentaries) not so much bad law as no law, with no
binding force and effect.45 In this context the last word on a particular
question of law was not necessarily the best word. Nor was this approach
always a prescription for conservatism. Occasionally it worked to preserve
progressive elements of English common law and permitted Robinson to
avoid some of the reactionary constructions of the post-Mansfieldian
period.46
In particular, Robinson hesitated to apply English precedents which
were unsuited to colonial conditions. The experience of the early American
colonies had demonstrated that English common and statute law was not
universally transferable to North America. Blackstone had written in his
Commentaries that in the case of an uninhabited country discovered and
populated by English subjects, colonists took with them “only so much of
the English law as … [was] applicable to their own situation and the condition
of an infant colony”. Upper Canada was not an “uninhabited country” by
Blackstone’s definition, it having in fact been taken from the French, but
Robinson insisted that Blackstone’s general approach was nonetheless ap-
propriate. Deploring what he called “a servile adherence to English deci-
sions”, he commented in Jordan v. Marr (1847):
However ready we are to follow the decisions of the English courts, founded
as they are upon the reasoning of judges of great learning and experience, yet
we are not to adhere to them in disregard of all circumstances; for it is not in
that spirit, nor to that extent, that the courts which made those decisions hold
themselves to be bound by their own judgements or those of their
predecessors. 47
44On precedent in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, see C. Allen, Law in
the Making, 6th ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1958) especially at 206-230; NV. Holdsworth, A
History of English Law, vol. 12 (London: Methuen, 1938) especially at 146-153.
45″It is an established rule to abide by former precedents, where the same points come again
in litigation … . Yet this rule admits of exception, where the former determination is most
evidently contrary to reason … . But even in such cases the subsequent judges do not pretend
to make a new law, but to vindicate the old one from misrepresentation. For if it be found
that the former decision is manifestly absurd or unjust, it is declared, not that such a sentence
was bad law, but that it was not law …. ” Sir W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of
England, vol. 1 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1765) at 69-70. In light of such statements, Duncan
Kennedy has characterized “reason” in the pre-classical version of legal thought as a “disrup-
tive” factor in the system. D. Kennedy, “The Structure of Blackstone’s Commentaries” (1979)
28 Buffalo L. Rev. 205 at 250-51.
46See, e.g., Clark v. Hamilton and Gore Mechanics’ Institute (1854), 12 U.C.Q.B. 178.
47(1847), 4 U.CQ.B. 53 at 72.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
Similar considerations repeatedly led Robinson to deny the relevance
of certain English statutes. In Anderson v. Todd (1845), he limited the overall
range of acts applicable to the colony by reading down the general words
of 32 Geo. 3, c. 1. That Act, he suggested, was in effect a re-enactment for
Upper Canada of a 1763 proclamation designed for the province of Quebec,
directing that all causes civil and criminal should be determined according
to law and equity “as near as may be agreeable to the laws of England. 48
Such an interpretation permitted the Upper Canadian courts to ignore Eng-
lish enactments beyond those relating to the English poor law and the law
of bankruptcy which the statute had explicitly excepted. Robinson believed
that this reading, however radical on its face, was consistent with parlia-
mentary intention:
It would have been hardly possible for the legislature to have excepted in special
terms all those British statutes which, being inapplicable to the condition of
the colony, they might not wish to include as parts of the law of England. And
it is impossible to allow that they could have intended, by the words they used,
to embrace every provision in the British statute book which they did not
specifically except … The game laws, for instance, are not excepted in the
statute; nor the statutes which disable persons from using a trade who have
not served seven years apprenticeship; nor any of the multitude of acts relating
to certain trades and manufactures … which, having been passed upon grounds
and for purposes peculiar to England and either wholly or in a great degree
foreign to this colony, have never been attempted to be enforced here, and
have never been taken to apply to us. 49
Robinson appreciated the implications of such an approach for judicial
power, but could see no alternative consistent with policy and common
sense:
That misera servitus which is said to exist where “Jus est vagum”, is so justly
dreaded in these times, that no one can consent to admit that there exists in
any tribunal an arbitrary discretion to say what British statutes shall be in force
here, and what not; and yet, on the other hand, in the present state of our
jurisprudence there cannot be said to be any other method of settling all these
doubts as they arise, than for courts of justice to determine them, not by any
arbitrary exercise of their will, for they can claim no such rights, but upon the
best views which they can take of arguments which cannot in their nature lead
to any clear and incontestable conclusion. 50
By 1844, decisions exempting Upper Canada from general English statutes
had already become so common in Queen’s Bench that a writer of an article
on law reform in the Upper Canada Jurist complained that the colony’s law
48(1845), 2 U.C.Q.B. 82 at 85.
491bid. at 86-87.
501bid. at 87.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
was “on very much the same footing as it would have stood, if the English
law had never been formally introduced”. 51
While adopting a critical attitude towards English statute law, Robinson
nevertheless displayed considerable deference to the enactments of Upper
Canada’s own legislature, the “supreme power acting in this province”. 52
Anderson v. Todd was a case in point; in that decision Robinson went beyond
the mere words of the statute to look for the substantial intention of the
legislature even where it appeared to be inconsistent with those words.
Robinson’s pre-eminent concern was with public policy, and he seemed in
practice to regard the judiciary as a partner of the legislature. He refused
to read legislation in a way that rendered it absurd or unworkable. In Bell
v. Levy, he said that it was “undoubtedly a principle in the construction of
statutes, that they … [should] receive a reasonable interpretation, that is, so
as to make their operation reasonable, if that … [is] possible. ’53 This did
not mean that private rights –
in particular, the rights of property – were
to be ignored in the policy process. As the Chief Justice said in Myers v.
Howard (1835):
[A]cts which give powers infringing upon private rights are to be construed
with a strict regard to the property of the subject, allowing no undue extension
of the terms in which the authority is conferred. 54
Robinson’s profound commitment to policy led him to interpret legislative
mandates broadly. Public officers exercising delegated legislative power were
allowed to exercise very wide discretion, even if it brought the threat of
abuse of power.55 Similarly, particular institutional creatures of the legis-
lature, such as municipalities, were given leeway in order to exercise powers
in the public interest.56
Robinson demonstrated a similar capacity for flexibility in interpreting
rules of legal procedure and practice. The complicated pleadings system of
51″Law Reform” (1844) 1 U.C. Jurist 16 at 18.
52McNab v. Bidwell and Baldwin (1830), Draper 144 at 152 (U.C.K.B.). In that case, Robinson
stated: “[I]ts legislative authority extends to the most important objects, and the instances in
which it is restrained are, perhaps, not those of the greatest and most immediate consequence
to the welfare of society.” The Chief Justice recognized the obvious implication of all this in
Smith v. McGowan (1855), 12 U.C.Q.B. 270 at 280: “It is not the proper business of courts of
justice to find fault with what the Legislature has done, though we often find them expressing
themselves strongly upon the incautiousness of particular enactments.”
53See supra, note 33 at 11.
i4(1835), 4 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 113 at 116.
5sSee, e.g., Ireland v. Guess (1847), 3 U.C.Q.B. 220 at 229-230. See also Cumming v. Guess
(1845), 2 U.C.Q.B. 125.
56″[I]t may be safely assumed that wherever there is fair ground of doubt.., the inclination
will always be to let the by-law operate, and leave it to the legislature to interpose if they see
a necessity.” Re Barclay and Municipality of Darlington (1854), 12 U.C.Q.B. 86 at 92.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
the early nineteenth century English common law – based at that time on
the forms of action –
frequently encouraged squabbles over technicalities.
The Chief Justice felt frustrated by this tendency, especially where technical
considerations stood in the way of considering the true merit of cases. At
the end of his career, he regretted that so many of his decisions had been,
as he put it, “vexatio de lana capricia” (disputes about nothing) and con-
fessed that “we … used to feel … shame, while we were unwillingly engaged
in them”. 57 Given this belief, it is hardly surprising that, while always ad-
vising parties to adhere to formal legal requirements, Robinson demon-
strated a willingness to tolerate departures from such requirements as long
as pleading remained intelligible. In McLeod v. Torrance (1846), for instance,
he suggested on a point of evidence given by affidavit that
[i]t is better and safer to comply closely with all that the statute directs; but I
do not, for my own part, hold that a literal compliance with the direction is
indispensable, and that any deviation must be fatal. It would expose parties
sometimes to most inconvenient consequences, if it were so … .58
On other occasions, Robinson relaxed English procedural rules as far as
possible to suit particular colonial circumstances. One example of this was
in dower, where traditional English law required proof of marriage by a
bishop’s certificate before a valid claim could be made. In two cases in the
1840s, Robinson held that, given the situation of many parties in Upper
Canada, dower could be claimed there merely on proof of reputation and
co-habitation. 59 Robinson stood by these judgments when he reviewed them
in 1856:
It may be thought that the court took rather questionable ground in admitting
proof of reputation and cohabitation in such cases. We had no express authority
for it, nor I think any against it, and we ventured to rule as we did from a
consideration of the impossibility in many cases of obtaining any other proof
here of the marriage of parties, especially in humble stations of life, who have
been emigrating to this country by thousands annually for forty years; and by
the further consideration, that where proof could be obtained, in Ireland for
57(1862), 8 U.C.L.J. 173.
5S8(1846), 3 U.C.Q.B. 146 at 147. See also Fraser Qui Tam v. Thompson (1845), 1 U.C.Q.B.
522 at 525: “Now it might go far towards defeating the good intentions of the legislature, if
courts were to be so rigid as to refuse peremptorily to allow to parties … to correct, in any
stage of the cause, any trifling inaccuracy in their practice or pleadings, so that the slightest
inadvertance might be fatal.”
59Stoner v. Walton (1841), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 190; Phipps v. Moore (1848), 5 U.C.Q.B. 16.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
instance, upon commission, the expense of obtaining it would in some cases,
perhaps in many, exceed the value of the dower which the widow is claiming.60
In a similar vein, in Henderson v. Stephens (1845), Robinson refused
to allow a plaintiff to enter an essoign in a dower proceeding even though
such a course was available as a matter of strict law. Robinson asserted that
the attempt
to revive the old English practice of casting an essoign, is embarrassing very
unnecessarily the administration of justice, and in this country, in the present
state of society, there is great absurdity in it.61
In the same practical spirit, Robinson prohibited parties from taking
advantage of the system’s formalities to promote fraudulent schemes. In
Tannahill v. Mosier (1832), he permitted the highly unusual introduction
of a counter-affadavit to contradict an affadavit of debt, the bona fides of
which was at best dubious. Challenging the alleged rigidity of accepted prac-
tice on this point, he ventured:
If no authority could have been found for granting relief in a case like the
present, I should still have been of the opinion that the general principle, that
the cause of action cannot be tried on affadavit, must admit of some control,
because circumstances may be imagined of so outrageous a character, that
common sense must compel us to admit the possibility of extending relief; and
the law is not so stem, that people must of necessity lose their liberty, and
perhaps in consequence their lives, while a court of justice must helplessly
look on, seeing and not doubting that a most oppressive and abusive use is
made of the process, but imagining themselves disabled from interfering, be-
cause they must hold a maxim to be inflexible that is just and sound as a
general rule, but which like most other maxims must in its application be
controlled by reason. 62
Such an approach was hardly the mark of a Tory-formalist; rather, it was
indicative of a jurist who, in the words of the Upper Canada Law Journal,
60Street v. Dolsen (1856), 14 U.C.Q.B. 537 at 539. See also Breakey v. Breakey (1845), 2
U.C.Q.B. 349 at 354: “[Adhering to the strict law] would be cruel, and the hardship in this
country would be grievous, where so many thousands of people have emigrated from distant
countries, and are of that station in life that they cannot be supposed always to have preserved
or to be able to procure such evidence as could satisfy any doubts and cavils in regard to the
regularity of their marriages …. ”
61(1845), 2 U.C.Q.B. 64 at 64.
62(1832), 2 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 483 at 489. For other instances of Robinson’s procedural flexibility,
see Commercial Bank v. Cameron (1846), 3 U.C.Q.B. 363; Hutchinson v. Munroe (1851), 8
U.C.Q.B. 103; Powell v. Currier (1851), 9 U.C.Q.B. 352; Springer v. Miller (1852), 10 U.C.Q.B.
57; Nicolls v. Duncan (1854), 11 U.C.Q.B. 332; Elivood v. Middlesex (Corporation ofthe County
o) (1859), 19 U.C.Q.B. 25; Folger v. McCallum (1852), 1 Practice Reports 352 (Chambers);
R. ex rel. Ritson v. Perry (1854), 1 Practice Reports 237 (Chambers); Hopkins v. Haskayne
(1854), 1 Practice Reports 184 (Chambers); Morrell v. Capron (no date) I Chambers Reports
144.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
“objected to the triumph of form over substance, of technicality over
truth”. 63
Robinson’s views on law and the judicial enterprise did not reflect a
mindless deference to authority. On the contrary, he displayed a consistent
if somewhat cautious willingness within the constitutional confines of the
colony to think about the purposes and ends of law. While invoking con-
temporary English legal ideals and authorities, he insisted on considering
Upper Canadian circumstances to such an extent that he seemed occasion-
ally to indulge in the very judicial legislation he claimed to abhor.
This apparent contradiction begs explanation. Perhaps Robinson was
simply inconsistent, that is, “driven, … unconsciously, to contradict his ‘for-
malistic’ instincts. ’64 On the other hand, it is possible that his protestations
of loyalty and deference in some cases were merely designed to draw at-
tention away from his “legislative” activity in others. Neither of these hy-
potheses is satisfactory, however. The first detracts from Robinson’s
recognized intelligence and perception, and comes preciously close to sug-
gesting that he did not know what he was doing. Robinson may not have
been a profoundly original thinker, but he did understand the problems
posed by legal rigidity in a colonial environment that differed from England.
The second hypothesis ascribes to Robinson an uncharacteristic insincerity
and a cynical contempt for law and the judicial enterprise which can in no
way be reconciled with the considerable moral and legal reputation that
Robinson enjoyed among his contemporaries. 65 Upper Canada’s Chief Jus-
tice held English common law in the highest regard; he was quite genuine
in lamenting at one point that the “prevailing disposition for change” might
make the lifespan of English principles in the colony “not … so long as we
might some time ago have imagined. ’66
A better explanation is that, from Robinson’s perspective, there was
actually no contradiction between the ideals he proclaimed and his efforts
to shape the law to suit colonial conditions. In part this was because existing
legal principles and precedents did not cover all the contingencies of the
modem age. More fundamentally, however, the absence of contradiction
63Supra, note 7 at 62.
64p. Romney, “The Ten Thousand Pound Job: Political Corruption, Equitable Jurisdiction,
and the Public Interest in Upper Canada 1852-6” in D. Flaherty, ed., Essays in the History of
Canadian Law, vol. 2 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1983) 143 at 181.
65Note, e.g., the following editorial comment from the liberal Toronto Globe newspaper on
Robinson’s retirement from the Bench: “Doubtless he was often in the wrong – who has not
been proved by time to be in the wrong? – but no one will deny to him the credit of being
perfectly sincere and honest in his convictions, and having laboured for them with conscientious
zeal and assiduity.” As quoted in Read, supra, note 9 at 146.
66Greenshields v. Barnhart (1851), 3 Grant 1 at 45 (U.C. Ch. Ct).
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
was reflective of an early nineteenth century “pre-classical” conception of
law and the judicial enterprise which, despite certain rhetorical similarities,
was in fact very different from the “classical” conception which came to
replace it after 1870 and which survives in some respects even today.67 Pre-
classical legal thought did not insist on the harsh distinctions (e.g. law vs.
politics; public vs. private) that came to typify its successor. It interpreted
legislation more on the basis of its spirit than its text, and was as much
concerned with implementation as construction. It regarded the common
law itself as a manifestation of a robust natural reason rather than simply
a positivist aggregation of specific decisions. Not infrequently, judgments
in this early period proceeded by consideration of general points with min-
imal references to existing authority. When it was used, precedent was much
less binding and determinative than it later became. The system as a whole
was more deductive than inductive.
In this context, shaping the law to fit colonial conditions and promote
colonial interests was a legitimate judicial enterprise insofar as reason and
principle provided the means by which change could be accommodated in
the larger legal universe. Only in later classical times, when the creative role
of reason was radically de-emphasized in the interests of political reaction,
were judges discouraged from looking beyond the case law. Even while it
represented a fundamental departure from earlier thinking, classical legal
thought nevertheless appropriated to itself the existing language of legal
discourse. Unfortunately, the resulting combination of old discourse and
new substance was so powerful that even in the post-classical period it is
still tempting to see apparent contradictions in the thought of early nine-
teenth century judges where they conceived of none, and also (recalling the
Introduction to this paper) claim that a continuity exists between their
perceptions and those of much more recent jurists. 68 It is, however, necessary
670n the emergence of classical legal thought in the latter half of the nineteenth century, see
M. Horwitz, “The Rise of Legal Formalism” (1975) 19 Am. J. Leg. Hist. 251; D. Kennedy,
“Towards an Historical Understanding of Legal Consciousness: The Case of Classical Legal
Thought in America, 1850-1940” (1980) 3 Res. in Law and Sociology 3; T. Grey, “Langdell’s
Orthodoxy” (1983) 45 U. Pitt. L. Rev. 1; D. Sugarman, “Legal Theory, The Common Law and
the Making of the Textbook Tradition” in W. Twining, ed., Legal Theory and the Common
Law (Oxford: B. Blackwell, 1986). Legal classicism seems to have enjoyed a greater following
in the United States than in England perhaps because of the success in America of the case
method of legal education. Significantly, the reaction to classical legal thought, first in the form
of sociological jurisprudence and later in the form of legal realism, also developed most ex-
tensively in the United States. See R. Cosgrove, Our Lady the Common Law: An Anglo-
American Legal Community, 1870-1930 (New York: New York University Press, 1987).
68″To recollect the unities and, equally important, the separations constitutive of the 19th
century legal mind involves thinking across a watershed … [I]n order to be conversant with
the culture of argument in Old Ontario, the historian needs to develop skills analagous to those
of a translator.” D. Howes, Book Review (1986) 35 U.N.B.L.J. 231 at 233-234. The creation
19891
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
to penetrate these philosophic mirages in order to appreciate the reality
which Robinson himself experienced.
If Robinson was aware of contradiction in the law, it was not between
what modem scholars have termed “formalism” and “instrumentalism”
(corresponding broadly to “law” and “politics”) but rather between “law as
it is” and “law as it ought to be”. 69 This was not a pre-classical expression
of the basic classical dichotomy, but rather something substantively differ-
ent. While “law as it is” was made up of reason and principle expressed in
precedent, “law as it ought to be” was an arbitrary conception dependent
on the subjective preferences of the judge ruling “at pleasure”. By definition
it was not reasoned or principled. It was, in fact, legislation with all the
irrational connotations the word had had for English common lawyers since
the time of Coke. Shaping the law in the perceived interests of the colony
was not, however, necessarily a matter of indulging in “law as it ought to
be”. This exercise could still be principled and reasoned. 70 In this context,
shaping the law to suit colonial circumstances was a legitimate judicial
enterprise. Reason and principle provided the means to accommodate
change in the larger legal universe. There was thus no contradiction in
deferring to law and principle on the one hand while adapting law to suit
colonial circumstances on the other. Adherence to law, in the pre-classical
sense, permitted and sometimes even required such adaptation. The three
sections that follow –
the substantive law of property, the law of commerce,
and the law of transportation –
are intended to illustrate how Robinson
responded to pressures for change which were sometimes imposed on him
as much by his own conception of law as by his understanding of the needs
of his society.
II. The Law of Property
No less than contemporary Britain or America, Upper Canada was a
society established on the principle of private property. Property could of
course take a variety of forms, both corporeal and incorporeal. In the early
nineteenth century, however, the most important form of property was land.
Land was the primary source of social wealth and power. In Upper Canada,
private property in land provided the organizational framework for settle-
ment, for investment, and for exploitation of the colony’s rich natural re-
of false continuities as part of a general attempt to gain intellectual legitimacy for revolutionary
paradigms is a general phenomenon discussed in T.S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Rev-
olutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962).
69Robinson made this distinction explicitly in Hamilton v. Niagara Harbor & Dock Co.,
70See, e.g., Robinson’s judgment in Dean v. McCarty (1846), 2 U.C.Q.B. 448, discussed infra,
supra, note 37 at 398.
Section II.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
sources. At the same time it constituted the basis of social status and the
criterion for the franchise. As a result, protection of private property rights
was generally regarded as central to continued colonial prosperity and po-
litical stability.
Few in Upper Canada appreciated the social significance of property
more than Sir John Beverley Robinson. To permit interference with private
property by others would, he once suggested, “not be consistent with the
interest of individuals, and the peace of society”. 71 On the bench, Robinson
translated this view into a conception ofjudicial responsibility which placed
great emphasis on the protection of property rights. Substantively, this pro-
tection was to be achieved through the raising of what Robinson termed
“an invisible wall” around land, within which the landowners interests were
secured by law. 72 This accorded well with Blackstone, who had defined the
right of property in general as “that sole and despotic dominion which one
man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in total
exclusion of the right of any other individual in the universe”. 73 Procedur-
ally, property rights were to be protected by adhering to English precedent
in a way that made property owners secure in their estates. Robinson ex-
pressed this last approach most forcefully in Simpson v. Smyth (1846):
In questions… relating to the rights of property, and especially real property,
it is always to be held incumbent on the courts to adhere to adjudged cases.
If these seem to lead to inconvenient or even to absurd results, as they have
been sometimes admitted to do, still it is considered right, for the sake of
certainty, to abide by the generally known and understood rule, leaving it to
the legislature, if they shall think fit, to alter it, rather than to shake confidence
in the state of the law, and produce uncertainty in dealing with and advising
upon titles, by departing at pleasure from established decisions… .74
It is in such property cases that the Tory-formalist interpretation of Robin-
son’s legal thought rings most true.
Robinson’s respect for traditional rights of property was manifested
graphically by his reception of the English laws of waste and dower. The
ancient doctrine of waste precluded a tenant from doing permanent damage
to freehold or inherited land by materially altering its nature or by otherwise
diminishing its value. Dower ensured that the widow of a landowner took
one-third of his lands by operation of law on the occasion of his death.
71Ballard v. Ransom, supra, note 31 at 77.
72″The law surrounds every man’s property with an invisible wall.” R. v. Spence (1853), 11
U.C.Q.B. 31 at 38; see also Belford v. Haynes (1850), 7 U.C.Q.B. 464 at 469: “A man is under
no legal necessity to enclose all his land: the law encloses all of it with an invisible boundary
73Blackstone, supra, note 45, vol. 2 at 2.
74(1846) 2 U.C. Jurist 162 at 196.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
Unfortunately, both doctrines tended to inhibit the colony’s agricultural
advancement, the former by placing a legal obstacle in the way of clearing
land for the purposes of cultivation, and the latter by replacing productive
tenant farmers with widows unprepared to till the soil but forced to take
possession to gain the benefit of the dower grant. Robinson incorporated
the English doctrine of waste into Upper Canadian law almost by default.
In three decisions touching on the subject between 1837 and 1853, 75 he
simply seemed to assume that the doctrine was properly applicable to the
colony. This was a somewhat curious conclusion because waste (at least in
its strict English sense) had, by 1853, been repudiated by most American
states, 76 as well as by New Brunswick. 77 In Weller v. Burnham (1853), his
most complete consideration of the waste issue, Robinson went so far as
to reject the defendant’s explicit plea that he had cut down trees “for the
purpose of clearing the said lands, and improving and cultivating the same
… according to the custom of good husbandry, and the custom of the country
in Upper Canada”. 78 This was not good enough:
[S]upposing that it were clearly lawful in this country for a tenant for life to
change the character of the estate wholly or in part, at his discretion, from
woodland to arable land, stripping it of all its timber, yet it is not averred here
that the defendant did actually clear the land and make it fit for cultivation.
It is consistent with all that is stated here that the defendant may have cut
down the trees and left them lying there. He only says that he cut down the
trees for the purpose of clearing the land.79
Robinson’s treatment of dower was somewhat more tentative. While
he did not question the applicability of the doctrine, he nevertheless voiced
reservations about the process. In Robinett v. Lewis (1830), for instance, he
acknowledged that in the absence of a Court of Equity, the common law
procedure for enforcing a dower right might not be “well suited in some of
its principles to the circumstances of this country”,80 although he left it to
the legislature “to make any alteration that may be thought expedient”. 81
A year later, in Phelan v. Phelan (1831), he elaborated:
The proceeding in England for the purpose of obtaining dower, is almost ob-
solete, and the forms seem so little adapted to the present condition of things
75Taylor v. Taylor (1837), 5 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 501; Chestnut v. Day (1843), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.)
637; Weller v. Burnham (1853), 11 U.C.Q.B. 90.
(1818).
76M. Horwitz, supra, note 35 at 54-58. See, however, Conner v. Shephard 15 Mass. 164
77Rector of Hampton v. Titus (1849), 6 N.B.R. 278 (S.C.). Robinson, however, was not alone
in Upper Canada in his application of the doctrine. See, e.g., Lawrence v. Judge (1851), 2 Grant
301 (U.C. Ch. Ct.) per Chancellor Blake.
78Supra, note 75 at 90-91.
79Ibid. at 91.
80(1830), Draper 260 (U.C.K.B.) at 263.
8I1bid.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
in this country, that the court would willingly endeavour to devise a system
more simple, by which the same end might be obtained; but upon mature
consideration, we apprehend that such an improvement must be left to the
care of the legislature … [W]e will not attempt to interfere with the freehold
of the subject by any process not expressly sanctioned by the common law or
statute.
82
These cases are not cited to suggest that in enforcing such traditional
doctrines as waste and dower Robinson necessarily disregarded the interests
of the colonial community. Rather, he appears to have conceived of these
interests in a manner which put a premium on the rights of landowners.
The importance of those rights could not be absolutely denied, even by the
sternest of critics. Without recourse to the law of waste, for instance, a tenant
could arbitrarily change the very nature of an estate, stripping it of valuable
timber and in the process even diminishing its worth as an investment.
This was a particularly important consideration while speculators –
in some
cases colonial officials and judges –
held most of the colony’s undeveloped
lands.8 3 Without dower rights, the widow of a landowner could easily be
rendered destitute. Guaranteeing such rights might harm tenant farmers and
restrict the alienability of land, but Robinson regarded certainty and security
in estates as more important to a civilized community. His failure to com-
ment on the merit of waste and dower suggests that he thought their intrinsic
worth was obvious.
Other judgments by the Chief Justice support the proposition that his
rulings in the area of property law were founded as much on a particular
conception of the community interest as on dedication to entrenched doc-
trine. In McKinnon v. Burrows (1834), for instance, Robinson was asked to
award damages for breach of covenant of title representing the value of
improvements made to land by the vendee. By analogy to the law on the
sale of goods, Robinson reasoned that the defendant vendor was not liable
to this extent. Nevertheless, he continued:
[E]very argument ab inconvenienti is against giving a greater effect to the cov-
enant here, from the peculiar state of things in a country which like this is in
the progress of rapid settlement. A lot of land which ten years ago was sold as
the ordinary farm of a settler, for one or two hundred pounds, has become
perhaps in the meantime the site of a village, and if damages in case of default
of title could be claimed upon a computation of its present worth, founded
82(1831), Draper 386 (U.C.K.B.) at 393-94.
83As Parker C.J. wrote in Connor v. Shephard, supra, note 76 at 167: “Lands actually in a
state of nature may, in a country fast increasing in population, be more valuable than the same
land would be with cultivation.” On policy considerations behind the law of waste, see Horwitz,
supra, note 32 at 54-58, 286 n. 128. See also M. Salmon, Women and the Law of Property in
Early America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1986) at 175-83. There exists evi-
dence that Robinson himself may have been involved in land speculation. By 1820, Robinson
had acquired considerable property around York. See Brode, supra, note 14 at 69.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
upon the rise in value and the buildings erected on it, without regard to the
consideration received by the person who entered into the covenant, the con-
sequences to the vendor must be utterly ruinous … [It] would be monstrous
indeed if the responsibility for the title must fall under such circumstances
without limit on the first vendor. And more especially in this country, where
provision is made for the registry of all titles, thereby generally affording to all
persons equal means of information in respect to their validity.84
In practice, this decision was consistent with those on waste and dower.
McKinnon favoured original landowners, in particular the speculators who
together with the government held most of the province’s undeveloped prop-
erty. 5 The judgment in effect protected them from their own mistakes in a
rising market.
Another instance where Robinson emphasized colonial circumstances
in applying traditional doctrine to protect landowner interests was Matthews
v. Holmes (1853).86 In that case Robinson ruled that parol evidence con-
tradicting a deed was inadmissible. A grantor’s assignee in bankruptcy had
claimed that what appeared to be an absolute conveyance of land by the
grantor to a third party was in fact only a mortgage, leaving in the assignee
an equity of redemption. In rejecting evidence of conversations and the
circumstances surrounding the deed (which allegedly supported the plaintiff
assignee’s contention), Robinson declared that he was bound by English
authority, in particular the Statute of Frauds. Again, however, that was not
all. Robinson continued, explaining the particular relevance of the English
rule to existing conditions in Upper Canada:
We know that for many years past it has been common as between English
and Lower Canadian merchants and their debtors in Upper Canada, and as
between the merchants in our large towns and their customers in the country,
to accept lands at a valuation in payment of debts when there was no hope in
payment in money. In many cases the grantors in such deeds have been well
pleased to make such arrangements, and free themselves from liabilities ….
Now within the last year or two, in many cases, lands in this country which
have been made over by debtors to their creditors in satisfaction or part dis-
charge of their debts, and not in security merely, have risen immensely in
value, from the operation of causes unlooked for, and tending to enhance their
price to a degree greatly beyond what could have been anticipated. I allude to
the many great railway projects which are at present being actively proceeded
in, and in the way of being certainly accomplished by the aid of English capital,
which has been freely embarked in them to the amount of some millions
sterling. This has had the effect of suddenly raising the value of lands so as in
many cases to double or treble it, and in some cases to raise it ten or twenty
84Supra, note 39 at 594.
85For a similar approach in the American context, see Horwitz, supra, note 32 at 58-62.
86(1853), 5 Grant 1 (U.C. Ch. Ct.).
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
fold. What a temptation such a state of things affords to just such fraud and
perjury as the Statute of Frauds was meant to protect people against!8 7
At one level, Matthews v. Holmes had to do with the rights of merchant-
creditors and even appeared to be contrary to the interest of landowners
because it deprived them of potential defences to claims. More generally,
however, the decision protected the certainty of transactions –
an issue of
concern to all landowners and speculators. To have admitted parol evidence
in contradiction to written terms would, as Robinson intimated, have cre-
ated nothing less than chaos in the land market. The Chief Justice believed
that this was by no means good for the community.
Robinson’s sensitivity to local conditions and his awareness of the con-
sequences of his decisions occasionally led him to depart from English com-
mon law in the same spirit which encouraged him to enforce it in other
situations. Again, this interest seemed to address the concerns of landowners
rather than tenants or occupiers, who coincidentally were not favoured by
any of the changes. This was apparent in cases ranging from matters of
property acquisition to property use.
Matthews v. Holmes was an instance of strict enforcement of the Statute
of Frauds for what Robinson regarded as the good of the colony. Never-
theless, Robinson recognized that a consistently strict enforcement of the
statute would have grave consequences for the purchase and sale of land in
Upper Canada. In Kilborn v. Forester (1831), the Chief Justice observed:
[fln this province, [because of] the low price of real estate [and] the frequent
transfers that are in consequence made … the bargains to which that kind of
traffic gives rise, are not accompanied with the same cautious circumspection
that attends such transactions in older countries. 88
In this context, Robinson was willing to treat certain acts (e.g. acceptance
of a bond) as equivalent to a signed contract. He did this to prevent fraud,
paradoxically suggesting that Upper Canada might otherwise “be much bet-
ter without a Statute of Frauds”. 89
Once acquired, land could be held for speculation, or it could be de-
veloped. As has already been suggested, speculation was more the rule than
the exception in early Upper Canada. The potential profit to be made was
great, but, at the same time, speculators ran risks that ‘were not simply
economic. Absentee landowners, for example, had to beware of “squatters”
– persons settling on land without the permission of the owner and who
often claimed title by adverse possession. By 1841, most of the land in what
87Ibid. at 27-28.
88(1831), Draper 332 (U.C.K.B.) at 133.
89Ibid. at 341.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
is now southern Ontario had been allocated. 90 Little, however, had been
settled –
two sevenths had basically been excluded from settlement because
of its nature as Crown and clergy reserve. This situation tempted landless
labourers and new settlers unable to acquire patent rights; by the hundreds,
if not thousands, they moved into the unoccupied areas of the province.
Robinson took a dim view of this process, especially since it stood in
the way of persons who had been granted lands originally reserved. 91 As he
said in Henderson v. Seymour (1852), “[iut has the appearance I confess of
being a perversion of sound principle, and detrimental to morality, to afford
to wilful trespassers the privilege of a pre-emption right by reason of their
illegal occupation”. 92 His resolution to deal with such trespassers as strictly
as the law permitted was, however, as much a function of colonial circum-
stances and conditions as of abstract principle or morality. This was made
particularly clear in the 1844 case of Fitzgerald v. Finn.93 Here, a Crown
grantee had brought an action of ejectment against a squatter who claimed
actual occupation of the land granted since 1816, well over the twenty-year
requirement of adverse possession set down in the Statute of Limitations.
Robinson held that adverse possession could not run against the Crown,
since it was deemed in law to always be in possession of its lands. The
contrary rule might work in England, where settlement was-dense and squat-
ting was easily prevented, but in a great and unpopulated colony like Upper
Canada such a policy would soon prove disastrous for the public interest.
Besides, Robinson noted, changing the colonial law at this point –
even
to bring it in line with what appeared to be the tendency in English decisions
– would undermine thousands of titles granted on the basis of the previous
understanding. 94
Land that was not bought for speculation was bought for development.
Traditional English property law imposed significant limits on how rural or
urban landowners could use their land. These limits were essentially good-
neighbour obligations designed to protect the quiet enjoyment of estates.
They were, however, the product of an earlier time and a different social
context. Recognizing this, Robinson attempted to reconceive the law in light
of colonial needs. Dean v. McCarty (1846) 95 was perhaps the most famous
90R.C.B. Risk, “The Last Golden Age: Property and the Allocation of Losses in Ontario in
the Nineteenth Century” (1977) 27 U.T.L.J. 199 at 201.
91In 1852, in a letter to John Macauley, Upper Canada’s Chief Justice of Common Pleas,
Robinson admitted that “I have no sympathy for the genus squatter … If I were Louis Napolean
legislating for a country I would allow no prescriptive right to be given those who have gone
upon land to which they well knew they had no claim.” See Brode, supra, note 14 at 260.
92(1852), 9 U.C.Q.B. 47 at 53.
93(1844), 1 U.C.Q.B. 70.
941bid. at 80.
95Supra, note 70.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
example of this in the area of negligence law. The plaintiff Dean sued the
defandant McCarty for damages caused when a fire, intentionally lit by
McCarty to clear his land, got out of control and spread to Dean’s property.
Robinson instantly appreciated the significance of the case, stating that “in
a country like this, it is of very great importance that the rights and liabilities
of the parties in this particular, should be known … “96 Existing English law
suggested that McCarty was liable under the sic utere principle. The Chief
Justice, however, refused to adopt that approach:
It is not very long since this country was altogether a wilderness, as by far the
greater part is still. Till the land is cleared, it can produce nothing, and the
burning of wood upon the ground is a necessary part of the operation of clear-
ing. To hold that what is so indispensable, not merely to individual interest,
but to the public good, must be done wholly at the risk of the party doing it,
without allowance for any casualties which the act of God may occasion, and
which no human care could certainly prevent, would be to depart from a
principle which, in other necessary business of mankind, is plainly settled, and
always upheld. 97
A similar consideration of the realities of modem life probably ani-
mated Robinson’s refusal to apply the classic law of nuisance in a series of
cases involving mill-dams and the problem of overflow. Under traditional
English law, the right of a mill-owner to pen-back water and overflow the
land of an upstream proprietor was an easement which could only be created
by deed. In three decisions handed down in 1852 and 1853, however, Ro-
binson argued that although a deed was required before a licencee-overflower
could bring an action himself to enforce his right, he could resist a claim
against him without an actual sealed instrument.98 This was especially true
where, on the strength of a licence without seal, a licencee had incurred
expense, such as in the construction of a mill and dam. Robinson discussed
the point at length in Beaver v. Reed (1852). 99 Here, the plaintiff had granted
a right to overflow to one Graham under a parole licence. On the strength
of the licence Graham erected a mill and dam on his own land. Graham
subsequently sold his land, with the mill and dam, to the defendant Reed.
The plaintiff sought damages from Reed for continuing to allow the dam
to overflow onto his land. The Court of Queen’s Bench held that, in relying
on the licence of the previous owner, Reed was in fact claiming an easement
which could only have been created by deed. Since there had been no deed,
the defendant had no right.
961bid.
97Ibid. at 450.
98Robinson v. Fetterly (1852), 8 U.C.Q.B. 340; Beaver v. Reed (1852), 9 U.C.Q.B. 152; Canada
Company v. Pettis (1852), 9 U.C.Q.B. 669.
99(1852), 9 U.C.Q.B. 152.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
Robinson dissented. He held, first, that the parol licence was sufficient
to set up a defence in the abstract because it had led the original licencee
to incur expense; this made the licence irrevocable. Second, and even more
remarkably, he held that the original licence was sufficient to serve as a
defence on the part of the defendant as assignee of the original licencee. In
coming to this conclusion he relied not only on English precedent, but also
on Kent’s Commentaries and an American note on the famous English
licence case of Wood v. Leadbitter.l00 In his view, the defendant gained a
virtual easement over the plaintiff’s land without any deed or any privity
between him and the plaintiff. The investment represented by the mill was
preserved.
In another nuisance case, Lawrason v. Paul (1854), Robinson refused
to award damages for nuisance to a party owning a dwelling-house next to
a stable. He seemed to recognize the impracticability of such an approach
in a developing society:
I confess I think it not very clear that what was proved in this case amounted
to a nuisance, though unquestionably no one would like to have his neighbour’s
stable so near to him. If we consider for a moment what we have always
observed to be the case in regard to livery stables even, not to speak of other
stables which are to be found in all parts of towns and cities, I do not see the
ground clear for holding the defendant’s stable to be a nuisance …. We all
know to how much greater annoyance people are frequently exposed from the
smell of manure being spread upon gardens and used in hotbeds, and yet I
have never known this complained of as a nuisance. No doubt what is com-
plained of in this case would make a residence in the plaintiff’s house much
less eligible than if a quiet respectable family lived in a good house upon the
spot where the stable now stands. But we might say the same if a low tavern,
or a tinsmith’s shop, or a smithy had been kept there by the defendant. 0 1
Even with such liberalizing rules, not all landowners were able to make
profitable use of their property, with the result that many of them went into
debt. Matthews v. Holmes was one reflection of this problem; in other cases
it arose more directly. In Gardiner v. Gardiner (1832),102 Robinson was
called on to decide whether, under the statute 5 Geo. 2, c. 7, lands of a
deceased debtor could be seized in execution for debt pursuant to an action
against the executors/administrators of the estate apart from the heir. The
statute itself provided for the seizure of lands in execution, but left the
position of the heir unclear. The principles of the common law suggested
that the heir had a protected interest in the land which vested immediately
upon the debtor’s death, and that he therefore had a right to be involved
100(1845), 13 M & W 838 (Ex. Ct.).
U.C.Q.B. 285.
101(1854), 11 U.C.Q.B. 534 at 537.
102Supra, note 23.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
in any proceedings against the land insofar as the statute exposed it to
execution.
This approach was consistent with Blackstone’s conception of private
property rights, but Robinson rejected it. Instead, he focused on the fact
that the statute had been passed to “secure creditors in the colonies and to
advance trade”‘ 03 and therefore necessarily assimilated real and personal
estates by eliminating the heir and his interest. He acknowledged that since
the statute had this effect it was a “block thrown … at random”‘ 04 into the
usual workings of the common law. Furthermore, the effective disinheritance
of the heir was problematic “in a colony whose laws respect, as ours do in
general, the right of the heir to the full extent of the common law of Eng-
land”.l0 5 He insisted all the same that his interpretation was consistent with
both common sense and colonial practice. In the first place, he seemed to
agree with the argument made successfully before the Privy Council in an
earlier case, that
[t]he opposite rule of the English law derived from the feudal system, which
had never had place in America, is upheld by political considerations wholly
inapplicable to the colonies, and would, if admitted there, be destructive of
that commercial credit by means of which their lands are in general purchased,
as well as cleared and brought into cultivation; it would not be less injurious
therefore to the landlord than to the merchant. 0 6
By 1833, fewer British merchants were direct creditors of colonial debtors
than when the statute was passed, but Robinson nevertheless believed that
to include the heir in a proceeding against land in the colonial courts would
still “be in many cases impossible, and in others … [would] tend to ruinous
delays”‘ 0 7 for remaining creditors. Heirs were often infants, or persons ab-
sent from the jurisdiction. Thus, Robinson commented:
When this statute was passed, it was very notorious that in many of the colonies
… the planters were in the habit of retiring to England with the fortunes they
had acquired, their children were sent there to be educated, and of those who
from family connection were most likely to be devisees of a resident planter,
a greater number, I imagine, would generally be found resident in England or
Scotland than in the [colony] which contained the estate. 08
Robinson took great pains to point out that in recognition of these consid-
erations almost all of the British colonies in American and the West Indies,
as well as all the former American colonies, had adopted the same rule prior
03Ibid, at 569.
104Ibid. at 602.
105Ibid. at 585.
106Ibid. at 571-572.
107Ibid. at 579.
108Ibid. at 587-88.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
to the passing of the Imperial statute. He appreciated “that in a province
which must be chiefly agricultural, the proprietors of estates should be en-
couraged to set a just value and feel a secure confidence in their posses-
sions”. 109 Nevertheless, he could not ultimately persuade himself that “all
the colonies to which this statute applied acted erroneously at the time and
persevered in that error ever afterwards, and that such error, affecting the
titles of numerous heirs and valuable estates, could have gone on without
question or remedy for a century.” 110 In the end, private property rights
had to yield to a legislative act passed primarily for commercial purposes.
In many ways Gardiner v. Gardiner represented the wave of the future
in property law –
a future in which the prevailing conception of land would
not be so much static as dynamic, where rights of quiet enjoyment would
take second place to rights of use, and where the land itself would be con-
sidered simply as one commodity among many. In Upper Canada, as in
the United States and England, legislation and commercial pressures would
combine during the nineteenth century to complete this transformation. In
yielding to these pressures in the Gardiner case, Robinson demonstrated
that, despite some reservations, he was capable of progressive thinking.
Certainty and security in estates were still important, but so were trade and
commercial enterprise. The ultimate interests of the colony, and even of the
landowners themselves, demanded change.
That change was fundamental. In assimilating realty to personalty under
the statute, Robinson had taken a revolutionary step. Traditional common
law had regarded land as constitutive of wealth and status, and as the pa-
trimony of future generations. Treating it in the same fashion as personalty
was, in Robinson’s own words, “subversive”.”
Indeed, the very idea of
equating the two kinds of property was not just the old law; it was also a
renunciation of the old and established order underlying it. Under the new
approach, property was still important and worthy of some measure of
judicial protection, but its nature, utility and comparative social value were
109Ibid. at.598.
llOIbid. The fallout from Gardiner v. Gardiner, supra, note 23, was felt for many years. As
late as 1859, a series of articles appeared in the Upper Canada Law Journal debating the
decision. One editorial declared: “Making all proper allowance for the necessities of a new
country, and admitting the propriety of facilitating the transfer of real estate by all the methods
known to the law, we yet think that real and personal property should not be placed on the
same footing, and, looking to the future of Canada, confess to a feeling – perhaps our readers
may call it a prejudice –
against the complete abandonment of all the protections which
surround land at home (i.e. England); and we are of the opinion that ‘this Canada of ours’
would not add to her material interests by an authoritative recognition of any principle that
would allow a homestead and a hoggerel to be dealt with in the same way, or by any extension
of the doctrine in Gardiner v. Gardiner.” (1859) 5 U.C.L.J. 169 at 170.
1’Gardiner v. Gardiner, supra, note 23 at 562.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
different. In Gardiner itself Robinson may have felt his hand forced by
statute, but his decision was nonetheless significant, especially since other
judges on the Queen’s Bench could easily offer a competing interpretation.
In the same spirit, the Chief Justice eventually modified other property rights
for the purpose of accommodating canal and railway construction (see Sec-
tion IV infra).
Even where he affirmed the traditional law and seemed to eschew in-
novation, it was clear that Robinson’s respect for rights of private property
did not rest on blind adherence to established doctrine. Like Dean v.
McCarty, cases such as Matthews v. Holmes and Fitzgerald v. Finn dem-
onstrated that context and consequence mattered –
that rules and doctrines
had to conform with what Robinson perceived to be the community good.
Even waste and dower had a purpose, albeit more from the perspective of
the landowner and speculator than from that of the tenant or occupier.
Ultimately, Upper Canada’s Chief Justice realized that quite apart from their
effect on individual litigants, his decisions were shaping society.
III. The Law of Commerce
Robinson served as Chief Justice of Upper Canada during a period of
unparalleled commercial expansion in the colony. He was well aware of the
economic transformation in progress; equally, he recognized the challenge
that commerce posed for the common law. Writing in 1854, Robinson ob-
served that “[b]anks, insurance companies, railway companies and corpo-
rations of all kinds have sprung up, giving rise to new interests, and to a
great variety of new legal questions … “. 112 The Chief Justice responded to
the rise of commerce by generally shaping his decisions –
to the extent he
considered it possible within the existing constitutional matrix of English
law –
in the interests of colonial development. In part, this was a matter
of process: setting down rules and precedents in a clear and forthright fashion
so that businessmen would be able to plan on their strength and predicta-
bility. Thus, in Hamilton v. Niagara Dock & Harbor Company (1842), a
decision on the law of corporations, Robinson commented:
[T]here are many corporate bodies now in the province, created as this has
been for promoting specific objects, and it is important thay they should know
by what rules the operations must be limited.” 3
In another instance, Harnden v. Proctor (1852), Robinson justified his de-
tailed exposition of the facts in these terms:
“2See Robinson, supra, note 3 at 322-323.
” 3Supra, note 37 at 386.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
I have stated the facts minutely, because these cases present questions of much
interest in a commercial country, such as this is; and if what is decided in one
case is to form in any degree a precedent to be acted upon in others, it is
essential that all the circumstances which could have influenced the decision
should be known.” 4
More importantly, Robinson believed that he had a judicial responsi-
bility to facilitate commerce in matters of substance. He attempted to dis-
charge this responsibility in a variety of ways. First, he attempted to enforce
the intent of contracting parties, as opposed to some abstract concept of
“just” price or practice; he preferred to regard contracts in terms of bargain
rather than exchange. Second, he sought to preserve confidence in bills and
notes as media of commercial transaction. Third, he encouraged enterprise
by protecting exclusive franchises and enhancing the powers of corporations.
Finally, if all else failed, he attempted to strike a commercially intelligent
balance between protecting assets for the benefit of creditors and saving
debtors from ruin so that they could once again become productive members
of society.
At the root of Robinson’s approach to contractual interpretation lay
what has often been termed the “will theory”. 15 This theory holds that
contracts are to be construed by “internal” standards (i.e. the intentions of
the parties to the bargain) rather than “external” standards such as com-
munity morality or the judge’s understanding of what constitutes a fair
exchange. In the early 1800s, the approach was still new in Anglo-American
jurisprudence, having only become popular at the turn of the century. It
was very much the product of the commercial age. It protected existing
bargains regardless of moral merit and at the same time made the enforce-
ment and interpretation of contracts more certain for the parties themselves
by emphasizing their own wishes and expectations. In adopting this ap-
proach, Robinson placed himself-at the forefront of doctrinal development.
Robinson invoked the will theory repeatedly. In Miller v. Dixon (1835),
for instance, he was called on to construe a contract for the sale of land
which on its face passed “one-half’ of a saw-mill. Relying on the words of
114(1852), 9 U.C.Q.B. 592 at 599-600. See also Silverthorne v. Gillespie (1852), 9 U.C.Q.B.
414 at 424: “This case of much consequence, because it involves principles necessary to be
well settled and understood, inasmuch as they apply to a branch of business [i.e. shipping]
very extensively carried on in this province, and to transactions which are necessarily of daily
occurrence… :”
I sOn the development of “will theory” in American contract law, see Horwitz, supra, note
35 at 160-88. For a history of the theory in England, see P.S. Atiyah, The Rise and Fall of
Freedom of Contract (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979) at 398-408. A critical analysis of Horwitz’s
work is A.W.B. Simpson, “The Horwitz Thesis and the History of Contracts” (1979) U. Chi.
L. Rev. 533.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
the contract, Robinson rejected the contention that the contract was in fact
meant to convey all the mill to the vendee defendant:
We think the plaintiff is entitled to recover, there being no doubt that the intent
of the parties, apparent upon the deed, was that half the mill only should pass,
and there being no reason in law why such an intent shall not prevail. The
principle that the intention shall govern is just in itself, and is sustained to the
fullest extent by adjudged cases.” 6
Intent, however, was not just a question of words; rather, words were
mere evidence of intent, and such evidence could be modified by the general
usages of trade which made up the context of the agreement.1 17 Moreover,
as Robinson said in Brown v. Browne (1851), “when we know what the
general usage of trade is in regard to any branch of business, we are to look
on the parties as intending to contract with reference to it, unless we have
proof that they mean to deviate from it. ” 118 In the end, contracts were
interpreted in a manner which facilitated commercial transactions; they were
not construed literally.” 9
Yet usages were not constitutive of law. That view had been on the
wane since the late 1700s; in the United States it had proved particularly
unworkable because the practices of the merchant community in that coun-
try had not only diverged from the English standard but had also become
increasingly heterogeneous. 12 0 Similar developments in early nineteenth
century Upper Canada encouraged Robinson to adopt the same attitude.
In some instances, this approach protected parties from having the practices
of others unwillingly imposed on them, emphasizing once again the legal
primacy of intent.121 In other instances, it helped to ensure certainty in the
law, which was itself of significant commercial benefit. Thus, as the Chief
Justice was quick to point out in Ballard v. Ransom:
[W]hen we come to apply it [i.e. a usage], it is certain that we are not to allow
it to control general maxims and principles of law bearing equally upon all
modes of trade and dealing; it can be allowed only to have weight for certain
purposes, and to a certain extent; it cannot contravene the general and well-
10 U.C.Q.B. 222; Tilt v. Silverthorne (1854), 11 U.C.Q.B. 619.
116(1835), 4 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 101 at 102; see also Belcher v. Cook, supra, note 28 at 426.
“7See, e.g., Ballard v. Ransom, supra, note 31.
118(1851), 9 U.C.Q.B. 312 at 314.
190n usages, see also Reynolds v. Shuter(1846), 3 U.C.Q.B. 377; Higbyv. Cummings (1853),
200n the American rejection of usages as law in the early nineteenth century, see Horwitz,
1
’21See, e.g., Wisconsin Marine & Fire Insurance Company v. Bank of British North America
(1861), 21 U.C.Q.B. 284, where Robinson rejected evidence of American commercial practice
as a standard by which to measure the rights of the parties under a bill of lading drawn up in
Upper Canada.
supra, note 32 at 190-96.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
established law of the land in a point bearing upon the very justice of the
case.,2
Limitations on freedom of contract were few in Robinson’s Upper Ca-
nada, but there were enough to remind one that the colony, together with
the rest of the English common law world, was still in the process of re-
conciling the contractual restrictions of an earlier, more communitarian age
with the new emphasis on free will and intention. The usury laws survived,
and the Chief Justice was willing to enforce them so long as they were on
the books. In Fraser Qui Tam v. Thompson (1845), he even went so far as
to say that “in my private judgement … I am not inclined to look upon
them either as oppressive or impolitic”. 123 At the same time, however, Ro-
binson was enough of a modernist to dislike having the usury laws abused
by any party who entered into a contract voluntarily and then simply
changed his mind, especially since the legislature was extending the scope
and terms of legal money-lending.
A similar ambivalence was evident in Robinson’s treatment of the law
of warranty. The will theory of contract represented a departure from tra-
ditional idea of implied warranty in the sale of goods. It denied that any
warranty could exist barring an express undertaking. The departure made
sense in an expanding marketplace where many transactions were imper-
sonal and therefore dependent upon strict written terms. In instances of sale
where the vendor of goods was not the manufacturer, Robinson accepted
modem doctrine; he preferred to rely on express agreements to establish
warranties. 124 He seemed to feel that merchants dealing with products at
arms length could assume the risks. On the other hand, when the vendor
of an item was at the same time its manufacturer, Robinson was willing to
imply a warranty insofar as the quality of the article was under the man-
ufacturer’s control. 125 Even on these occasions, however, the Chief Justice
was anxious to establish some sort of express engagement in keeping with
the doctrinal thrust of the time.126
Robinson demonstrated further sensitivity to the needs of commerce
in his consideration of the law of bills and notes. In a colony which had
little hard currency in circulation, it was extremely important that negoti-
ability of both bills of exchange and promissory notes be encouraged to
facilitate commercial transactions. In developing the colonial law in this
area, Robinson was much less constrained by English precedent than he
was, for example, in the realm of property law. To be sure, England had
’22Supra, note 71 at 75.
123Supra, note 58 at 524.
124Bunnel v. Whitlaw (1856), 14 U.C.Q.B. 241 at 248.
n2lbid.
126Ibid.; see also Chisolm v. Proudfoot (1857), 15 U.C.Q.B. 203.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
developed a law of bills and notes, but in its more developed economy such
instruments were less important than in the colonies. Consequently, many
of the finer legal points (and even some basic ones) concerning their transfer
and negotiability remained unresolved in English law. By contrast, bills and
notes in Upper Canada enjoyed an economic significance analagous to that
which they had in the United States. Not only was the case law on such
instruments more developed there, but during Robinson’s tenure on Queen’s
Bench it became available in systematized form from the texts of United
States Supreme Court Justice, Joseph Story. Robinson drew heavily from
these texts, and in the process imported progressive and “instrumental”
elements of American law.127
First of all, Robinson insisted on a clear literal standard as regards the
terms and parties to notes. Where a note changed hands, it was important
that its meaning be clear on its face, so it could be conveniently served and
enforced. Verbal understandings not apparent on the face of the instrument
were inimical to negotiability. Thus, Robinson held in Davidson v. Bartlett
(1844)128 that a person who signed a note as a joint maker was deemed in
law to be a joint maker, even if he testified after the fact that he only meant
to sign as surety for the other. The law on the point was not entirely clear
in England, but Robinson cited Story to the effect that the writing was clearly
determinative in the United States. Robinson adopted a similar approach
in Eward v. Weller (1849),129 where he rejected evidence of a verbal un-
dertaking between the note-maker and the note-holder concerning the for-
mer’s liability, an issue which was explicitly contradicted by the maker’s
signature on the note itself. In an action by the endorsee of the note, Ro-
binson enforced its literal meaning, commenting that “such verbal under-
standing is inadmissible, otherwise there would be no safety in taking the
notes or bonds of parties.”‘ 30
This focus on literal meaning did not reflect judicial rigidity. On the
contrary, Robinson was willing to tolerate procedural irregularity in making
out notes in the name of commercial convenience. Thus, in Rossin v.
McCarty (1850), Robinson held that it was no objection to the validity of
a note, if at the time of its endorsement it had not in fact been signed by
the maker:
127See, e.g., Davidson v. Bartlett, supra, note 35; Beckett v. Cornish, supra, note 35; Bank of
Upper Canada v. Smith, supra, note 35; Bank ofMontrealv. DeLatre, supra, note 35; McCuniffe
v. Allen, supra, note 35; Wilcocks v. Tinning, supra, note 35; Sinclair v. Robson, supra, note
35.
128Davidson v. Bartlett, ibid.
129(1849), 5 U.C.Q.B. 610.
13Obid, at 612.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
For the convenience of commerce, it is allowed that notes may be made and
indorsed in this irregular manner, and that a man may indorse or may accept
an imperfect paper which may afterwards be filled up with any amount, and
may have parties names inserted as payees or signed as maker of the note, and
such filling up and signature will be treated as if made before the acceptance
or indorsement, which, in fact, preceded them … [w]e know [this] to be every
day’s practice amongst commercial men. 131
In Mathewson v. Carman (1843), Robinson went even further. For notes
drawn and endorsed in Upper Canada (Canada West) but payable in Lower
Canada (Canada East), he refrained from applying the strict English com-
mon law. This was done to achieve consistency of practice in the united
Canadas:
The very intimate connexion between the eastern and western parts of Canada,
in commercial dealings, renders it a matter, as I conceive, of pressing impor-
tance, that but one law should prevail throughout the province in regard to
protests and notices upon bills and notes … The greatest inconvenience will
be felt, and often, I am persuaded, heavy losses be sustained by the holders of
paper in Lower Canada, if the notary in Lower Canada, acting as I fear he will
generally do, in accordance with the law there, shall make a presentment, or
send a notice which, though good by the law, will be unavailing here, where
the rigid English rule as to time is presently binding upon our courts. 32
Ultimately, Robinson circumvented the problem by applying the more flex-
ible law of Lower Canada to notes made payable there.
Upper Canada’s commercial problems were not restricted to the rules
governing instruments of exchange. Forms and structures of enterprise were
also at issue. The early nineteenth century commercial revolution did not
fundamentally affect the institutional nature of privately-owned businesses
or partnerships. The competition it encouraged, however, presented a chal-
lenge to the traditional exclusive franchise as a framework for economic
organization. At the same time, economic expansion stimulated the devel-
opment of a new potentially very powerful form –
the business corporation.
In English law the franchise had existed for centuries as a royal pre-
rogative granted to individuals for the purpose of carrying on some signif-
icant public function, such as the control of a market, care of the forest, or
operation of a ferry. Once issued, these grants were generally understood to
be exclusive; a party holding a franchise from the Crown had a right of
action against others for “disturbance”. The grantee’s right of property in
the franchise, however, could not prevent revocation by the Crown in the
name of the public interest. Abuses of monopolistic privilege were thus
restrained by a loose form of official regulation.
131(1850), 7 U.C.Q.B. 100 at 103.
132(1843), 1 U.C.Q.B. 259 at 260.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
Franchises were used in early nineteenth century Upper Canada to
encourage investment in a variety of enterprises which today would be
classified as public utilities –
turnpikes, mills, canals, ferries, and railways.
The state employed this device to attract much-needed capital investment
to these projects, holding out the benefit of exclusive enjoyment in return
for rent and submission to state supervision.
Chief Justice Robinson understood the importance of franchises to the
colony and fought to preserve them even at the price of overturning jury
verdicts in the process. This is precisely what happened in Kerby v. Lewis
(1841).133 Kerby was the grantee of a Crown franchise to operate a ferry
across the Niagara River between Fort Erie Rapids, Upper Canada, to Black
Rock, Michigan in the United States. In defiance of the grant, the defendant
Lewis started to run his own ferry over a nearby route, causing a loss in
profits to Kerby. Kerby sued for disturbance of his franchise right. Lewis
demurred, holding that the Crown could not in fact grant a ferry right over
a waterway separating the province from a foreign country, and that in-
fringement of such “right” gave rise to no cause of action. Robinson rejected
the argument:
[C]ommon sense and common law point out where the government can rea-
sonably grant a franchise, and where they cannot …. The convenience and
safety of the public, and various objects of good policy, demand that the passage
across narrow waters should be placed under regulation, such as can only be
effectually done by means of establishing public ferries; and all these reasons
apply with equal force where the river separates us from a foreign shore ….
The enforcement of our revenue law, the apprehension of fugitive offenders
and deserters from the military service, and the regular and safe transmission
of the mails, are all objects of public interest, to which the regulation of ferries
is made subservient; and, besides these, is the object of ensuring to travellers
the means of crossing the water without delay in safe boats, managed by ex-
perienced persons, and paying reasonable fares …. 134
In these circumstances, an exclusive Crown franchise was the only means
of protecting the public interest. This was not just a formalistic conclusion
based on the state of the existing doctrine. Rather, it was a realization that
free competition would lead to disaster:
[I]f all were left to chance, and no one could be protected in an inclusive right,
it would not be worth the while of any person to make and maintain such
provision for the public accommodation as would enforce dispatch and safety;
competition would at one time reduce the charge of ferrying so low, that no
one would find it for his advantage to keep a sufficient establishment for that
purpose, and when this competition had driven all but one or two from the
133(1841), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 207; (1843), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 489; (1843), 1 U.C.Q.B. 66; (1843),
1 U.C.Q.B. 285.
‘-(1841), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 207 at 209-10.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
employment, then the power to extort would succeed, and there would never
be certainty if the thing were to regulate itself.135
Robinson defended exclusivity in a different way in R. v. Davenport
(1858).136 The Crown had granted a ferry franchise to the defendant Dav-
enport in return for rent. The franchise itself was “at pleasure”. The de-
fendant operated the ferry service from 1838 until 1842, at which time the
Crown granted a lease of the same ferry to one Baby. Baby set up his ferry
close to the defendant’s, running first with a scow for teams, then a small
boat for passengers, and afterwards a steamer. Baby’s service almost ruined
the original franchisee. For a time, Davenport’s ferry could not even cover
his expenses. The situation was temporarily resolved when Baby and Dav-
enport agreed to charge a uniform and higher fare. Soon after that, the Crown
entered a claim against Davenport for unpaid rent. Davenport countered
that he owed none after 1842, the grant of the ferry lease to Baby being in
effect a revocation of his own right. Robinson agreed. He could not conceive
of a franchise existing in two parties competitively –
such a thing would,
to say the least, be “strangely inconsistent”. 37
The commercial revolution did not simply put pressure on traditional
forms of economic organization; it also encouraged their transformation.
Such was the case with the corporation, a legal device which had been
developed in medieval England to distinguish collectivities from their mem-
bers. Early corporations were generally not economic in nature, being prin-
cipally boroughs, universities, and ecclesiastical orders. Business enterprises
were only organized as corporations in the late sixteenth century; it took
the better part of the following 250 years for the practice to become common.
In Upper Canada, the colonial legislature chartered some sixty business
corporations prior to 1841; the dimensions of the commercial boom were
reflected in the fact that forty-two of these were brought into existence
between 1831 and 1838.138 In this context, and given the relative novelty
of the corporate form in the colony, it is hardly surprising that significant
questions concerning its precise nature and powers soon came before the
courts. These were among the most important questions that the Upper
Canadian judiciary considered in the early nineteenth century. Corporations,
particularly in the form of banks, roads and railway companies, were at the
forefront of the colony’s economic development. Insensitive handling of
their legal difficulties stood to harm not just the enterprises themselves, but
Upper Canada as a whole.
135Ibid. at 210.
136(1858), 16 U.C.Q.B. 411.
137Ibid. at 414.
138R.C.B. Risk, “The Nineteenth-Century Foundations of the Business Corporation in On-
tario” (1973) 23 U.T.L.J. 270 at 271.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
Chief Justice Robinson was generally sympathetic to the new enter-
prises. In an early challenge to the legality of corporations in the colony, he
declined to apply the Bubble Act, which had inhibited the development of
company law in England prior to its repeal there in 1825. In Bank of Upper
Canada v. Bethune (1835), he pointed out that the Act, which had been
passed in 1729 in the panic following the bursting of the so-called “South
Sea Bubble” investment scheme, had been levelled solely at fraudulent com-
binations of persons pretending to create transferable stock. 139 By definition
the Act was not applicable to colonial corporations created by provincial
statute for the public good, such as the Bank of Upper Canada. In any event,
the Act at issue was by this point no longer in force even in England. The
Chief Justice concluded:
[W]hen the parliament of the mother country repealed the original and prin-
cipal act of 6 Geo. I, declaring that it was expedient to leave such practices
and schemes to be dealt with according to the common law, they did, in my
opinion, undo all that they had done by that statute, and they neither meant
to leave it in force nor did leave it in force, in any one part of the British
dominions more than in any other.140
Robinson’s comments in Bank of Upper Canada v. Bethune reflected
what has since come to be known as the “grant” theory of the corporation
the idea that the corporation was not, in law, a natural person, but rather
–
an entity created by the legislature for the execution of a specified public
purpose. The Chief Justice put the point expressly in Bank of Montreal v.
Bethune (1835): “Corporations have no natural existence –
they are the
mere creations of positive law, and are established for the maintenance and
regulations [sic] of some particular objects of public policy.’ 14 1 As such,
they were creatures of limited power: “[T]hey exist only by virtue of their
charter, and have no other capacity than such as is necessary for carrying
into effect the purposes for which they were established.’ ‘ 142 The approach
was conventional, but within its confines Robinson demonstrated an ap-
preciation of the contingencies of trade, recognizing that the business cor-
poration was a new phenomenon requiring laws and rules which were more
relaxed than previous corporate law. In Bank of Upper Canada v. Widmer
(1832), for instance, he focused on the commercial nature of the bank and
139(1835), 4 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 165 at 173-74.
14Ibid. at 172.
141 (1836), 4 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 341 at 352. See also McDonell v. Bank of Upper Canada, supra,
note 24 at 279: “[Corporations are mere creations of law; the intention of charters granted to
trading corporations especially, is to confer certian facilities, privileges, and exemptions, which
though this … is
may encourage and enable them to prosecute their objects effectually …
generally done more for the sake of the public, who are to be benefited by their operations,
than for the sake of the corporations …
142Bank of Montreal v. Bethune, ibid.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
concluded that it warranted a broader interpretation of directors’ discretion
than was appropriate for non-commercial corporate bodies:
[W]hen we consider the objects of this trading corporation, established merely
for transactions of a mercantile nature, it is evident that for the preservation
of good faith in their dealings, to give confidence in them, and to facilitate
their daily business, it is indispensable that the directors should fully represent,
and be able to bind, the stockholders … [I]t is impossible not to admit that
they are acting under different circumstances from the committees of charitable
institutions, or the managers … of many other corporations. 43
Robinson nevertheless understood that there were situations in which
corporate powers had to be limited in the interests of stockholders, mer-
chants not favoured with public privileges, and the colony as a whole. As
Robinson emphasized in McDonell v. Bank of Upper Canada (1850):
[T]he legislature has in each case to take care that they set just bounds to the
facilities and privileges granted, in order that such corporation may not inter-
fere prejudicially with private individual enterprise, and may not, so far as
depends on the solvency of the corporation, endanger the public interest by
engaging in imprudent transactions which may involve it in ruin.'”
Robinson was particularly cautious about extending the power of banks,
which in the years before the railways were the most important corporations
in the colony. Set up to provide capital funds for investment, banks also
issued vast sums in notes intended for general circulation. As a result, the
143Supra, note 28 at 275-76. See also Kingston Marine Railway v. Gunn (1846), 3 U.C.Q.B.
368 at 370. Robinson’s recognition of the unique nature of the business corporation led him
to protect it from certain public intrusions into its affairs, the grant theory notwithstanding.
For instance, he denied that the election of company directors could be reviewed by a quo
warranto proceeding. Thus, in R. v. Hespeler (1854), 11 U.C.Q.B. 222 at 228: “This railway
company is established by statute, it is true … so are all our banks and insurance companies,
and a great number of corporations of less general interest. The preamble [of the charter in
this case] shews that it was not merely for the private gain of the petitioners that this railway
company was incorporated, but because it was also thought desirable on public grounds. But
the same thing may be said of almost every statute incorporating any of our trading corpo-
rations; no doubt they all have the public good in a measure in view. We have not omitted
either to consider, that this statute requires that the line of railway shall be approved of by the
Governor in Council, which is another argument that the legislature regarded it as a matter
affecting the public welfare. We think that these, which are scarcely peculiarities in this act,
are not sufficient to give the jurisdiction in question.” The inspiration behind this decision
was probably similar to that which had seized Joseph Story and the Supreme Court of the
United States in Dartmouth College v. Woodward, 17 U.S. (1 Wheat.) 518 (1819).
144Supra, note 24 at 279. See also Kinloss (Municipality o) v. Stauffer (1858), 15 U.C.Q.B.
414 at 417: “[I]t should be the endeavour of courts of justice to restrain … corporations …
to transactions such as the charter contemplates, for otherwise the corporate privileges, and
the immunities given to them for other purposes, might be unfairly extended and abused, to
the prejudice of those who have no such privileges granted to them; and the public funds and
interests, which they are entrusted to manage, might be sacrificed and ruined by their embarking
in business which the legislature never contemplated.”
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
financial welfare of the colony came to depend on their solvency. In
McDonell, Robinson denied that the Bank of Upper Canada had any power
to hold ships, vessels or capital stock of a corporation as security for debt
or a mortgage. Such holdings were expressly prohibited by the bank’s charter,
which restricted it to land. The Chief Justice was clearly concerned that
taking lesser kinds of security might “involve the bank in business of a very
precarious and hazardous nature”. 145 In the context of a similar problem
in Lyman v. Bank of Upper Canada (1852), he elaborated:
The Legislature incorporated the Bank with particular powers and privileges
necessary for carrying on a certain description of business, quite distinct from
the business of shipowners, and those who deal with them, may know, and are
bound at their peril to take notice, what it is that their charter enables them
to do; otherwise all the funds which have been contributed by a body of share-
holders for one purpose might be squandered in an application to other pur-
poses, to the injury of all embarked in the undertaking; and in the case of a
bank which it is intended shall have power to issue bills to circulate as money,
the whole public have an interest in their being confined to the business for
which they were incorporated; for, in case of their becoming insolvent by en-
gaging in affairs foreign to their charter, thousands are involved in the loss, as
being holders of their bills.’ 46
The vires problem was intimately related to another great issue in early
nineteenth century corporate law: the problem of contractual capacity. Tra-
ditional doctrine dictated that in order to protect shareholders, corporations
could not enter into or be bound by contracts not under seal. Obviously,
this formal requirement was a considerable impediment to business in a
commercial age. Robinson recognized this, and in general sought to fit cor-
porate contracts into the contemporary exceptions which had been built
into the rule. “We have,” he commented in Dempsey v. Toronto (City o)
(1849), “gladly availed ourselves of whatever can be found in English de-
cisions, having a tendency to remove a technical difficulty that would in
general be found to militate against the claims of justice.”‘ 147 The Chief
Justice traced the development of the law in Bank of Upper Canada v.
Widmer
[W]hen we look into the early authorities on the powers of corporations, and
the manner of exercising them, we find it very strictly laid down that they can
only act by deed under their seal; when we look a little further we find excep-
tions gaining ground, at first very trifling, and afterwards more important, all
proceeding from a gradual extension of the principles of the common law, as
145McDonell v. Bank of Upper Canada, ibid. at 289.
146(1852), 8 U.C.Q.B. 354 at 358.
147(1849), 6 U.C.Q.B. 1 at 7.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
new subjects arose for their application
otherwise …. 148
It is impossible that it could be
Some of the more modem exceptions included executed contracts where a
benefit had already been transferred, common minor agreements where the
formality of a seal would be absurd, and those others “founded either on
necessity or on grounds of convenience, so obvious as to seem irresisti-
ble.” 149 By virtue of this last category, Robinson noted,
corporations of a mercantile character … have been allowed to become parties
to bills and notes, as makers, indorsers, or acceptors, without the use of their
seal, from a conviction that their business could not otherwise be conducted
without very great difficulty, and that the dealing in such negotiable securities
is, in the present day, and in commercial countries, a matter almost of necessity
in conducting mercantile business. 150
The exceptions had in fact grown so broad that Robinson at one point
confessed himself “at a loss to say what are the acts which a corporation
like this can not do without deed under seal, unless it be the divesting
themselves of some interest … or the binding themselves by an executory
agreement.”‘ 51 Here, however, the Chief Justice drew the line. To extend
the exceptions any further would permit them to swallow the rule. Robinson
insisted on the importance of the executed/executory distinction in partic-
ular, characterizing it as “highly reasonable … and founded on good
sense”.152 Without the distinction, he believed that corporations might be
defrauded of vast sums without proof that any contract had ever been made.
He rejected the opportunity for judicial reform provided to him by English
and American decisions tending to eliminate the difference. Robinson pre-
ferred instead to invoke long-standing precedent. He said:
If I were thus to set entirely aside one principle so well known, and so long
and consistently acted upon, I know not why I might not as well feel at liberty
to disregard every other principle of which I do not approve, and deliver the
law, not as I find it to be, but as I think it ought to be.’ 53
148Supra, note 28 at 284. In the specific context of the case, Robinson continued: “The
corporations that existed in very modem times, were for the most part of a nature and for
purposes wholly different from those which belong to banking institutions. A Dean and Chapter,
or a Mayor and Burgess, might answer all the objects of their charter without feeling incon-
venience from the application of rules and principles, under which a bank would find it im-
practicable to move.” Ibid. at 285.
149Supra, note 43 at 387.
15JObid.
151Bank of Upper Canada v. Widmer, supra, note 28 at 288.
152Blue v. Gas & Water Company (1849), 6 U.C.Q.B. 174 at 175.
’53Hamilton v. Niagara Harbor & Dock Co., supra, note 37 at 398.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
In such a judicial muddle, the resolution of uncertainty lay not with the
courts, but with the legislature. 154
The courts, however, were rarely asked to enforce executory contracts.
More often than not the Chief Justice found himself dealing with partly
executed contracts or transactions which clearly fell under the established
exceptions to the seal requirement. Robinson was clearly committed to
maintaining these exceptions, and was in this respect more progressive than
his more traditionally-minded colleagues on the Upper Canadian Court of
Common Pleas. Indeed, when the English Court of Exchequer attempted
on one point to reconcile the seal requirement with decisions assimilating
executed and executory contracts, in effect holding that henceforth all cor-
porate contracts had to be under seal, Robinson balked:
I think this change in our law, attempted to be introduced without legislative
authority, is by no means yet established in England, but that the weight of
authority, if we look at the decisions of all the courts, is very much against it
down to the present moment; and before I could bring myself to concur in
holding against the decisions of courts for a series of five hundred years … that
a corporate body can avail themselves of the property and labour of others,
and accept and apply it to their own legitimate purposes, within the scope of
their charter, and yet refuse to pay for what they are enjoying because they
never bound themselves under their seal to pay for it, I must see either an act
of parliament abolishing what certainly till lately was undisputed law, or must
feel myself bound by a decision to that effect by some higher tribunal, whose
judgements have by the constitution a direct authority overruling us.155
In this context, it would be misleading to construe Robinson’s disinclination
to enforce executory corporate contracts not under seal as indicative of
general insensitivity to the needs of commerce. The Chief Justice went a
considerable distance to accommodate those needs; at the end of the day,
however, his sense of commercial caution and judicial duty to established
principle prevailed. This was not as remarkable as some writers have sug-
gested. Given the constitutional confines of the colonial legal system, Ro-
binson had to acknowledge limitations.
The legal challenge Robinson faced in the rise of the business corpo-
ration was only complicated when the Chief Justice was forced to deal with
“foreign” enterprises operating in Upper Canadian jurisdiction. The prob-
lem was relatively novel in the English common law; in Genesee Mutual
Insurance Co. v. Westman (1852), Robinson commented that it was “a little
surprising” how silent English text writers and English cases had been on
the point of a foreign corporation’s competency to carry on business in
154Ibid. at 395.
55Clark v. Hamilton and Gore Mechanics’Institute, supra, note 46 at 181.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
England. 156 In this situation, Robinson went back to the initial principles
of the grant theory. First, he considered that corporations were creations of
positive law with limited powers. In the eyes of local courts, foreign cor-
porations acting within Upper Canada without the approval of the legis-
lature were therefore acting ultra vires just as Upper Canadian corporations
were when they operated outside the strict bounds of their locally-granted
charters. Second, Robinson recalled the public dimension of corporate chart-
ers. In some instances, the public purpose of a corporation could be defeated
if a foreign enterprise was permitted to operate in direct competition with
it. Robinson was clearly concerned about this possibility, probably for the
same reasons he offered in protecting exclusive franchises. Thus, in Genesee
Mutual, he declared:
All reasoning is against the right of transferring the exercise of corporate powers
from one country to another. The creation of corporate bodies for banking,
insurance, manufactures and other business of that kind involves the conces-
sion of privileges, which used to be dealt out sparingly, though much more so
in former times than at present; but, generally when an association of this kind
is first sanctioned for some particular purpose, it is gravely, and sometimes
anxiously discussed, whether another shall be created or permitted to interfere
with it, or whether there may or may not be a limited number of other such
corporations …. 157
In Bank of Montreal v. Bethune, where he forbade the Bank from operating
in Upper Canada, Robinson considered the possibility that the presence of
the Lower Canadian institution in the colony might “diminish the business
and profits of our own chartered banks”. 158 Note the political angle here.
Robinson was concerned that the introduction of foreign corporations would
result in a loss of local control and decision-making power:
These are questions, too, in which the population of a country usually takes
a lively interest … but it would be idle to be discussing such matters in the
legislature here, if it were competent for every foreign corporation to transfer
their business to this country, and to do in a corporate capacity in this country
whatever their foreign charter contemplates their doing in their proper country.
These foreign corporations, too, would be … subject to none of those conditions
or restrictions which our legislature might think it indispensable to enforce
upon such corporations, as they might consent to create, and we should have
no check upon them for any abuse of their charters which they might commit
in their transactions conducted here. 159
While it encouraged the development of new forms of enterprise, the
commercial boom of the early nineteenth century brought increased com-
mercial risks. There was much to gain, but also much to lose. Unfortunately,
156Supra, note 27 at 493.
157Ibid.
158Supra, note 141 at 349.
159Genesee Mutual Insurance Co. v. Westman, supra, note 27 at 493-94.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
many small businessmen and farmers in Upper Canada found that they
could not survive in the new age. Some simply refused to honour their
financial obligations and submitted themselves to the legal process; others
attempted to flee the jurisdiction. In company with the other members of
the Upper Canadian judiciary, Chief Justice Robinson was left to balance
the desire among creditors to protect their investments against the desire
among debtors to re-establish themselves as productive members of
society. 60
Robinson preferred not to deprive creditors of reasonable remedies.
For example, he insisted that a creditor had grounds for arrest as soon as
rumours of his debtor’s flight began to circulate. It was not necessary, as
Robinson put it in Wanless v. Matheson (1857), that “the creditor … wait
till his debtor has not only completed his arrangements for a flight, but has
… actually fled from his house, and is making his way with all speed to a
foreign country … .161 Under the same rationale, creditors deserved to have
provincial statute provisions respecting the granting of “gaol limits” for
arrested debtors strictly enforced, because actual practice had “a tendency
to diminish the creditor’s chance of obtaining payment of his debt.’ 1 62
On the other hand, the Chief Justice was solicitous towards honest
debtors. He disapproved of imprisonment for debt, which he characterized
as “detrimental to both parties, and contrary to humanity and christian
feeling ….*”163 Robinson realized that close confinement of a debtor could
“ruin his health and irreparably injure his interests.’ 64 So long as such an
extreme penalty existed, however, he sought to guard debtors against abuse
of process. Thus, in Tannahill v. Mosier (1832), he permitted an arrested
debtor to introduce into evidence a counter-affidavit contradicting a claim
of dubious legitimacy, acknowledging that, although this had never been
done before in the Upper Canadian courts, he could not allow people to
“lose their liberty, and perhaps in consequence their lives” through the
actions of less than honest creditors. 65
An eighteenth century formalist would not have reasoned in this man-
ner. In that age, dishonour of debt was considered a moral failing to be
60Problems of debtor-creditor law bedevilled the Upper Canadian legal community in the
mid-nineteenth century. For some contemporary comments, see “Imprisonment for Debt”
(1844) 1 U.C. Jurist 1; “The Insolvent Law” (1844) 1 U.C. Jurist 385; “Shall We Have a
Bankruptcy Law?” (1858) 4 U.C.L.J. 2; “Imprisonment for Debt” (1858) 4 U.C.L.J. 51; “Im-
prisonment for Debt, ‘The 91st Clause’
(1859) 5 U.C.L.J. 121.
161(1857), 15 U.C.Q.B. 278 at 279.
162Evans v. Shaw (1829), Draper 14 at 21 (U.C.K.B.).
163Bell v. Ley, supra, note 33 at 10. Robinson realized that close confinement of a debtor
could “ruin his health and irreparably injure his interests.”
164Tannahill v. Mosier (1832), 2 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 483 at 490.
165Ibid. at 489.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
punished.1 66 Robinson, however, had no interest in ruining debtors in the
name of “justice”. In his mind, the law of Upper Canada existed to protect
creditors and debtors alike for the good of the community.
Robinson’s generally sympathetic approach to the legal problems of the
colonial merchant community upsets not only the prevailing Tory-formalist
thesis concerning his legal thought, but it also challenges the more general
notion that Robinson “relegated commercial values to a secondary role in
society”.’ 67 On the contrary, the Chief Justice’s decisions on commercial
questions reflect his deep commitment to the colony’s commercial prosperity
and development. 168 In the words of one Upper Canadian barrister who
appeared before him many times, Robinson was “ever for a liberal inter-
pretation of the laws affecting banking and commerce, regarding these mat-
ters as of the utmost importance to the advancement of the Province.”‘ 169
His heroes were commercially progressive jurists such as Lord Mansfield.
In one 1849 case, Robinson spoke admiringly of this famous jurist:
[H~ow great was the advantage to jurisprudence, when any occasion arose for
an exposition from [him], of the principles which should govern commercial
transactions and the application of them. 70
Admittedly, Robinson was not as innovative as some of his American
contemporaries, but, as he pointed out several times, he was legally and
constitutionally constrained where they were not. The situations in which
he sought refuge in precedent for a traditional and ostensibly anti-
commercial position were, for the most part, exceptional. Moreover, it is
even possible to regard the exceptions as instances where Robinson acted
less out of blind attachment to precedent than out of genuine concern for
the economic future of the colony. Robinson preferred an approach to de-
velopment which placed a higher premium on the protection of investment
than on rapid high-risk growth. Yet, considering the peculiar economic cir-
cumstances of the colony, its narrow capital base, and the comparative
vulnerability of its enterprises, his caution was defensible. The challenge in
interpreting Robinson’s decisions in the commercial law area is not to mis-
take his caution for a precedent-bound disregard for progress and prosperity.
660n attitudes towards debt in Massachusetts in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth
1
centuries, see W.E. Nelson, Americanization of the Common Law (Cambridge, Harvard Uni-
versity Press, 1975) at 41-45, 147-154.
167Cook, supra, note 12 at 89.
168Robinson’s judicial enthusiasm for Upper Canadian commerce and development was
reflected in his personal views in his book, Canada and the Canada Bill (London: J. Hatchard
& Son, 1840).
169Read, supra, note 9 at 136.
170Kerr v. Coleman (1849), 6 U.C.Q.B. 218 at 223.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
IV. The Law of Transportation
In the early nineteenth century, Upper Canadian prosperity came to
depend on the development of an extensive domestic transportation net-
work. The raw materials and surplus foodstuffs constituting the colony’s
bounty had to have some means of reaching the towns where they could
be consumed, or, in some cases, transhipped abroad. Imported or domest-
ically manufactured goods had to be distributed to the hinterlands. In this
context, the survival and success of Upper Canada’s shipping, canal, road,
and railway companies became a pre-requisite to progress.
Robinson’s rulings on legal questions involving the colony’s transpor-
tation interests demonstrated the same sensitivity to colonial circumstances
that is evident in many of his decisions involving matters of property and
commerce. The law of transportation necessarily cut across both areas. Its
commercial aspect was obvious: the waterways, roads and railways were
lifelines of trade. At the same time, however, the development of an exten-
sive transportation network required interference with previously bestowed
property rights. The problem here was how to reconcile such rights with
the newer needs of the community. Robinson believed in private property,
but he was never so doctrinaire as to allow it to stand in the way of great
public improvements.
Long before such improvements were necessary or even possible, how-
ever, Upper Canada’s principal trade routes were the rivers. Navigation
permitting, shipping companies carried goods across the colony, into the
interior, and then through Lower Canada to the United States and even
England. As Chief Justice, Robinson made every effort to facilitate shipping
by interpreting the traditionally onerous law of common carriers in a way
that saved shipping companies from its burdens; at the same time, he sought
to shift liability for loss from carriers to insurers.
The law of common carriers dictated that any “carrier” –
any party
that operated or held itself out as a carrier of goods for hire – was absolutely
liable for any loss of goods carried, except for losses caused by acts of God
or the king’s enemies. This scheme was obviously severe because it rendered
due diligence in the transport of goods irrelevant to the issue of liability. In
the early nineteenth century, English and American courts, operating under
the pressures of commerce and modem contractarian ideology, began to
develop ways to get around the strict terms of the law.171 In Upper Canada,
Robinson took full advantage of the new methods of avoidance. In the first
place, he tended to give ambiguous interpretations to traditional exceptions.
Thus, in Smith v. Whiting (1834), he declined to “attempt too great refine-
171See Horwitz, supra, note 32 at 204-07.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
ment in drawing the line” between excepted “acts of God” on the one hand
and unexcepted “dangers of navigation” on the other. He hoped thereby to
discourage litigation and at the same time save carriers from losses which
could be more conveniently borne by insurers. 172 In the second place, he
was willing to grant carriers the full benefit of liability exemption clauses.
In Harnden v. Proctor (1852), for instance, he gave a broad interpretation
to an exemption clause relating to dangers of navigation in order to protect
the carrier from a negligence claim. 173
Where the generally recognized exceptions to common carriers’ liability
did not apply, or where there was nothing in the contract between the shipper
and the shipping company, Robinson tended to avoid the “common carrier”
classification altogether. In Ham v. McPherson (1842), for example, 174 the
plaintiffs were the owners of flour consigned to the defendants for shipment
downriver from Kingston to Montreal. Because of ice build-up, navigation
on that route was impossible; the plaintiffs therefore requested that the
defendants put the flour into storage until the river cleared. The defendants
did so, but during the winter an accidental fire broke out and destroyed the.
flour. The plaintiffs commenced an action against the defendants as common
carriers. Robinson knew he faced a dilemma. His ultimate sympathies, how-
ever, lay with the defendants. Although he denied “any feeling which should
incline us to strain the law in this case in favour of either party”,’175 his
analysis was remarkable for its repeated references to the “rigid”, “rigour-
ous” and “inflexible” nature of the law of common carriers. This perspec-
tive, combined with his obvious doubts about the fairness of applying
traditional carrier law, encouraged him to question whether the defendants
held the goods in their capacity as common carriers or as “warehousemen”.
If the latter, they could escape liability merely by showing that reasonable
care had been taken. Robinson left the final determination to the jury, being
careful to add, however, that he thought that the defendants were ware-
housemen at the time of the fire, and, further, that
it would be contrary to natural justice to hold that the defendants undertook
to insure the flour against accidents which no care of theirs could prevent, or
that they were more liable than any other person who might have agreed to
store the flour for the convenience of the plaintiff.176
In addition to considering the legal difficulties facing common carriers,
cases like Ham v. McPherson underscored the problems which plagued the
waterways of the colony. The ice which gripped the Kingston-Montreal route
172(1834), 3 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 597 at 600.
173Supra, note 114 at 600.
‘1-(1842), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 360.
175Ibid. at 365.
176Ibid. at 376.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
for five months of every year was one obvious problem; another was the
treacherous rapids and falls of the St. Lawrence. If these perils could be
overcome, the grain-producing western parts of the province could be better
connected to the overseas market and Upper Canadian farmers could begin
to compete with their American counterparts on an equal footing. Such
considerations, together with security concerns which dominated the dec-
ades immediately following the end of the War of 1812, encouraged the
construction of the Upper Canada’s first great public project –
the canals.
The first of these, the Welland Canal, was chartered by the Upper Ca-
nadian legislature in 1824. The second, the Rideau, was authorized by statute
a few years later. The colonial government invested directly in the former
with private entrepreneurs; because of the military significance of the link
between Lake Ontario and the Ottawa River, the latter was financed almost
exclusively by London. 177 The construction of the canals was no easy task,
physically or legally. The challenge to early nineteenth century technology
was obviously great. At the same time, the canals presented the Upper
Canadian government, and subsequently the courts, with legal problems
because private lands had to be expropriated to permit construction. The
legislature had taken care to provide compensation to landowners in this
instance, but difficulties inevitably arose in dealing with both displaced and
neighbouring proprietors.
In considering the legal problems arising out of canal construction,
Robinson consistently showed concern for the viability of the projects, and
a determination that their success would not be jeopardized by a narrow
insistence on private rights. 178 The choices he made were fundamentally
reflective of his judicial thought. In this context, private landed property
represented tradition and the values of a pre-industrial economy. It was
static capital; that is, its value laid more in itself than in the wealth it could
generate. By contrast, the canals represented change and the promise of
prosperity. They were dynamic growth capital designed to facilitate indus-
trial development. In tending to favour the canals over private property,
Robinson therefore opted for a progressive rather than a conservative vision
of Upper Canadian society. 79
‘”gSee Brode, supra, note 14 at 120.
178Robinson took exceptional pride in the canal system of the colony. In 1840, in an effort
to dissuade the British Government from adopting the recommendation of the Durham Report
to unite the Canadas, he characteristically praised the Rideau Canal as “a splendid monument,
not of a nation’s liberality merely, but of her forecast. In point of design, material and work-
manship, it is second to no work on the American continent…
.” Robinson, supra, note 168
at 53.
179In making his choice, the Chief Justice was not entirely disinterested as he was one of the
early backers of the Welland Canal Company. See Brode, supra, note 14 at 120.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
In Phillips v. Redpath (1830), for instance, Robinson was called upon
to decide whether the defendant Redpath, employed in the construction of
the Rideau Canal, had committed a trespass against the plaintiff by tearing
down a frame building he had erected on land supposedly required for the
Canal. In the case itself, it appeared that the defendants were not protected
by statutory authority, since the only reason for their intrusion was that the
plaintiff “was a Yankee, and should keep no tavern there”. 180 At a more
general level, however, Robinson declared:
The Rideau Canal is a public work of great importance to the province in
several points of view, and that its accomplishment will confer immense ad-
vantages upon this country there can be no doubt. Like other great and general
benefits, however, it cannot be attained but with some partial sacrifices –
and
of necessity private interests and convenience must for the sake of such objects
be made to yield to the public welfare.181
Robinson adopted a similar approach in a second case involving the
Rideau Canal, Malloch v. Principal Officers of Her Majesty’s Ordinance
(1846). Here the plaintiff Malloch brought an action of ejectment against
the defendant officers for having expropriated the canal land which had
been granted to him after the passage of the Rideau Canal Act. In light of
the importance of the project, Robinson was prepared to interpret the de-
fendants’ power of seizure broadly:
The legislature passed in 1827 the Act … for granting certain facilities to the
government for the construction of the the Rideau Canal. They recite in it that
“the work would tend most essentially to the security of the Province by fa-
cilitating measures for its defence, as well as promote greatly its agricultural
and commercial interests;” and when this double public advantage is consid-
ered, we cannot doubt that the legislature intended, that the discretionary pow-
ers which they were about conferring upon the military officers, to be intrusted
by His Majesty with the superintendence and charge of the canal, should be
such as would enable them to carry out the design on what they might consider
an efficient and proper scale…. [T]he question of the land being necessary or
not necessary, must be governed by their judgement and not by the judgement
of any court, or the opinion of any person public or private, and this appears
to me to be not only legal but highly reasonable, when we consider the great
public interests involved on the one hand, and, on the other the care taken to
180Supra, note 24 at 79.
I8’Ibid. at 71-72.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
secure to every individual whose property may be taken possession of, a just
compensation for its value.1 82
Even when statutes provided compensation, however, Robinson was
willing to read the relevant clause to prevent an undue drain on public funds
and the defeat of the project at issue. This willingness reflected the extent
to which he was prepared to let developmental concerns trump private rights
and interests. In Commissioners ofPublic Works v. Daly (1849), for instance,
Robinson had to consider legislation permitting compensation for damage
“to property, arising from the construction, or connected with the execution
of’ the Cornwall canal. 83 He declined to apply it in favour of a village
landowner who claimed compensation for depreciation in the value of his
property because the canal had dispensed with the need for land carriage
through the village, “thereby depriving the people of the village of a great
source of employment in transporting … merchandize.”‘ 84 Robinson ad-
mitted that the words of the statute seemed designed to include all damage
to property that could conceivably be traced to the canal. At the same time,
however, he maintained that it was
unreasonable to imagine that the legislature really intended that compensation
should be made from the public funds for the kind of damage alluded to,
proceeding from a valuable public improvement, for there is no end to the
extent to which such claims might be carried, and on very plausible grounds.
In point of fact such injuries, we know, are not in general compensated, though
they must follow more or less from almost every great improvement. 8 5
The early nineteenth century canal boom in Upper Canada was par-
alleled by developments in overland transportation. Special companies were
chartered to lay down modern “macadamized”, planked, or gravelled roads
to replace many of the original mud tracks cut through the colonial wil-
182(1846), 3 U.C.Q.B. 387 at 388-89. Robinson was not alone in either his broad interpretation
of the seizing powers of Crown officers, or in his approval of the canal enterprise. Note, e.g.,
Sherwood J., in Mittlebergerv. By (1832), 2 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 379 at 381: “The powers conferred
on the agents of the government, for the purpose of constructing the Rideau Canal, are certainly
very great, for they may take the property of private persons without their consent, to advance
the public service. Many consider this law unjust, because they asset it deprives the owner of
a part of his property without any compensation. I cannot say I am of this opinion; I think
the canal, when completed, will give general satisfaction, and no public work based on such
an extensive plan could ever be accomplished without vesting the servants of the government
with powers in some degree proportionate to the difficulty of its execution, and the importance
of its objects.” The Rideau Canal Act, (1827) 8 Geo. 4, c. I, section II, however, provided
compensation for “damage which [a landowner] may reasonably claim in consequence of the
… Canal … being cut and constructed in and upon [his] … lands”. In the event of no
agreement between the Crown and the landowner, section IV made compensation claims subject
to arbitration. Sections V-VIII provided for further appeal to a special jury.
‘ 83Supra, note 24 at 44.
184Ibid. at 46.
185Ibid at 47.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
derness. In many instances, these routes became toll roads with the road
company leasing toll-gates to individuals. As he had done in the case of
canals, Robinson tended to protect these enterprises by limiting their legal
obligations and shielding them from the nuisance and expense of litigation.
He expressed this point clearly in Nichols v. King (1849):
This kind of enterprise, by public companies undertaking, at their own charge,
the improvement of roads in different parts of the country, is beneficial to the
community…. [I]t would tend to discourage such undertakings, if groundless
actions against them are encouraged …. 186
Thus, in Stewart v. Woodstock and Huron Plank and Gravel Road Company
(1858), Robinson declined to find that the lessor road company had a duty
to protect the value of the plaintiff lessee’s toll-gate by clearing snow off its
road. He said:
The defendants cannot be held to have undertaken to insure against snow-
storms. The person who leased the road, whether by bidding at a public auction
or otherwise, must be supposed to know that we have snow-storms in winter,
as well as other impediments at other times, which make travelling inconven-
ient, and keep people in a great measure from using the road for a time; and
they may be supposed fairly, we think, to make their engagement under a sense
that it will be prudent to make allowance for those casualities. Letting snow
lie on a macadamised road does not, in our opinion, come under the notion
of suffering the road to go out of repair.187
Similarly, Robinson was prepared to interpret statutory obligations narrowly
to limit the responsibility of road companies which had made existing junc-
tions impassable by the construction of their roads. In R. v. Woodstock and
Dereham Plank and Gravel Road Company (1859), for instance, he declined
to make a finding of nuisance against the road company for failing to grade
their road to match the grade of a cross-road. The Chief Justice held that
parliament had required the company to make the road a certain grade, and
there was nothing in the statute requiring them to do more. The decision,
however, seemed to rest as much on the significance of the road to the
colony as on the words of the statute calling for the construction of the
road:
[W]e cannot hold that a leading road through the country, such as that of the
plaintiffs could not receive such necessary improvement, if it would render a
crossroad or street of a village which led into it, and not beyond it, no longer
practicable at the junction ….18
Important though they were, the economic significance of the canals
and roads of the colony paled when compared to the nineteenth century’s
186(1849), 5 U.C.Q.B. 324 at 325.
187(1858), 15 U.C.Q.B. 427 at 429.
188(1859), 18 U.C.Q.B. 49 at 50-51.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
greatest innovation in transportation technology: the railway. An experiment
which began in the late 1830s with small local lines expanded in the 1840s
and 1850s into a full-scale railway boom which gripped the province in a
fit of charter-granting, land speculation, and, ultimately, railroad construc-
tion. Here, it seemed, was the secret to the colony’s success.
The very existence of the lines raised a plethora of legal questions
relating to their status, powers and obligations. In this context, Robinson
desired to establish the duties and responsibilities of the railways “as early
as possible”. 89 This was hardly an arbitrary exercise unbounded by prec-
edent or statute: in addition to various company charters, and, after 1851,
the Railway Clauses Consolidation Act (a general incorporation act for rail-
ways), there already existed precedents from the English railway experience,
not to mention case law that was emerging in the United States. Robinson,
however, relied on the precedents infrequently. Indeed, many of his railway
decisions involved no precedents at all. This was perhaps because the Upper
Canadian statutes on which the local law was based differed in significant
respects from their English counterparts. In particular, Robinson seems to
have recognized that the English statutes were more burdensome on the
companies. As a result, he probably felt that in the interest of the colony
and its development it was best not to attempt to follow the English example
too closely.’ 90
There can be little doubt that Robinson was a great supporter of the
roads. In virtually every area of law related to railways and their operations
he showed considerable sensitivity to their position and needs. This was
true even at the level of investment. In Bowes v. Toronto (City o) (1856),
for instance, the question arose whether the Mayor of the City of Toronto
was guilty of conflict of interest in investing 50,000 worth of city debentures
in stock of the Ontario, Simcoe & Huron Union Railway, and in taking
personal profits from those shares. Remarkably, Robinson refused to lay
down a general rule that public officials could not take advantage of their
positions in this way, or that they had to keep their public responsibilities
and private interests separate. He noted that
[r]ailways and canals have not been promoted in England or this country wholly
by the votes of persons who could have no private interests which might conflict
189Renaud v. Great Western Railway Company (1854), 12 U.C.Q.B. 408 at 422.
19OFor insight into Robinson’s appreciation of both English and American authorities on
railway law, see Campbell v. Great Western Railway Co. (1858), 15 U.C.Q.B. 498. On. liability
for injury or death to livestock, Robinson wrote at 503: “You will find that the American
decisions on the subject are not uniform, but that many of them take ground more in favour
of the railway companies than is upheld in England, holding that they are entitled to their
track, and may use it regardless of anyone; and our own act of last session seems to have nearly
that effect.”
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
with their public duty, or who had not acquired rights and interests with the
express view of being benefitted by those improvements which they have been
publicly advocating …. It would be a very slow progressing country, I appre-
hend, in which all public enterprises and improvements should be left to be
suggested and advanced by those who neither had, nor believed they had, any
personal pecuniary interest in pushing them forward, or who, while they were
intrusted with the public duty, acquired no interest which could be affected by
the course which they might publicly take. Doubtless wherever there is a conflict
of interest and duty, there is much danger of abuse … but this cannot be avoided,
I fear, without confining men in their transactions within a narrower field than
has been found practicable. 191
Once the money to build a railway became available, a railway company
had to obtain the land through which it would eventually build. The railway
charters of early nineteenth century Upper Canada generally provided for
a system of private expropriation by the companies, with compensation
being determined by compulsory arbitration in the event of disagreement.
This avoided the inconvenience of particular landowners holding out for
exorbitant sums. At the same time, it offered individuals some protection
from the overwhelming economic power of the companies.
Robinson’s attitude toward compulsory arbitration was noticeably crit-
ical. He was especially concerned that third-party arbitrators might over-
value property to the detriment of the lines. The Chief Justice emphasized
the peculiarity of the statutory process in Great Western Railroad Company
v. Baby (1854), where the company sought judicial relief from a high award:
In considering in any cases of this description how far it may be proper for us
to interpose upon the merits, on a complaint that the award is outrageously
excessive, it seems to me to be a material consideration that the submission
to arbitrate under this and similar statutes can hardly be said to be the voluntary
act of the parties. It is in a manner compulsory; either party has it in his power
to drive the other to arbitration. The force therefore of the remark, that the
arbitrators are judges of the parties’ own choosing, is in such cases very much
diminished … [W]herever we would hesitate on a submission between parties,
about setting aside an award upon the ground of its being manifestly outrageous
in amount, or unjust otherwise … the consideration that the submission was
in a measure compulsory should have a strong influence in turning the scale. 192
In Great Western v. Baby, Robinson rejected a 10,000 valuation of
two lots of one and one-third acres along a proposed rail line, holding that
such an award did not reflect the fact that the line would add “immensely”
to the value of the owner’s adjacent non-expropriated property.193 To uphold
191(1856), 6 Grant 1 (U.C. Ch. Ct.) at 16. On this case and the controversy surrounding it,
see Romney, supra, note 76 at 143. See also P. Baskerville, “Entrepreneurship and the Family
Compact: York-Toronto, 1822-1855” (1981) 9:3 Urban Hist. Rev. 15.
192(1854), 12 U.C.Q.B. 106 at 117-18.
193Ibid. at 119.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
the award in this context would be to “make the company pay a ruinous
price to the proprietors, in consequence of the very advantages which the
company has at its own expense created.”‘ 94 In another case involving the
same company, Great Western Railroad Company v. Dodds (1854), Robin-
son applied a similarly restrictive approach to land valuation where the
landowner held no adjacent property; in such cases, the arbitrators were
only to award the value of the land without the improvement. Thus, the
landowner would be “at least as well off as if the company had not brought
the railway there, and had not required any of their land.”‘195
When compensation for the land had been agreed upon and paid, con-
struction of the actual line could begin. At this stage, Robinson recognized
the importance of protecting contractors and the contracting process. This
would ensure that construction did not get bogged down in uncertainty and
dispute. In this spirit, in Jarvis v. Dalrymple (1853), he enforced the strict
terms of a construction contract against a sub-contractor:
It is of consequence that parties should be held to the terms of their contract,
or no one would be able to proceed with confidence in executing the works
which are now in progress, and which are so important to the community. It
would encourage litigation of a very harassing kind, and probably to a great
extent, if parties were allowed thus to escape from their own agreements … .196
Similarly, in Nelson v. Cook (1854), Robinson refused to hold a contractor
liable for trespassing on lands which he knew had been deeded to the railway
company:
The hardship and inconvenience would be great of holding contractors and
labourers liable in such cases as trespassers, for they could never think it nec-
essary to inquire whether the Company had or had not acquired their right of
way in each individual case. 97
Successful completion of the construction process, however, did not
mean that a railway’s problems were at an end. On the contrary, while
completion brought rewards it also brought new challenges. A rail line was
not merely a project, but also a business. Bulk goods had to be shipped at
a profit to the towns and ports of the colony. At the same time, passengers
had to be carried safely and punctually to numerous destinations. Chief
Justice Robinson appreciated these things; his decisions on commercial and
passenger traffic demonstrated sensitivity to business realities and a con-
comitant desire for a practical and workable rail transport system.
1941bid. at 120.
195(1854), 12 U.C.Q.B. 133 at 134.
196(1853), 11 U.C.Q.B. 393 at 399.
197(1854), 12 U.C.Q.B. 22 at 31.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
In Rogers v. Great Western Railway (1 858),198 for instance, Robinson
had to consider the liability of the railway for delay in shipping a load of
furs from Toronto to New York. The delay occurred after the shipment had
left the defendant’s own line at the border. The Chief Justice upheld the
clause in the railway company’s contract which protected it from this even-
tuality; more significantly, he held further that even if the contract between
the company and the consignor had contained no such clause, the company
would only be liable for loss occurring on its own line. Robinson intervened
again on behalf of the same road in Griffin v. Great Western Railway (1858).
He held that there had to be clear evidence that the company had properly
received the goods before an action for compensation for damage to such
goods could be heard. As Robinson put it:
It must be most important to railway companies, if they are to be responsible
for the safe transportation of live animals, and especially of horses, that they
should be delivered to them in such a manner as shall give them an opportunity
of having the terms of their undertaking settled and understood, and moreover
of seeing that the horses are safely handed over to the charge of those servants
of theirs whose business it is to attend to them. 99
The development of an efficient passenger service also required atten-
tion to practical considerations. This was particularly obvious in “ticket”
cases. For example, in Duke and Wife v. Great Western Railway (1857), the
plaintiff Maria Duke purchased a ticket on the company’s line between St.
Catherines and Windsor. At Grimsby, an intermediate station, she failed to
produce her ticket when the conductor asked for it. Pursuant to the com-
pany’s regulations, she was obliged to leave the train. In court, Robinson
refused to apply the standard rule that what was known to the principal
(the company) regarding the plaintiff’s payment was in law known to the
company’s agent (the conductor). To invoke that rule, he argued, would be
“against reason”:
[I]t is better and more reasonable that a passenger should now and then have
to suffer the consequences of his own want of care, than that a system should
be rendered impracticable which seems necessary to the transaction of this
important branch of business. It is not for the sole advantage, or for the pleasure
or caprice of the railway company that these things are done in such a hurry.
The public, whether wisely or not, desire to travel at the rate of four or five
hundred miles a day, and that rapidity of movement cannot be accomplished
without peculiar arrangements to suit the exigency, which must sometimes be
found to produce inconvenience. If the passenger in this case, who I have no
doubt lost her ticket, could claim as a matter of right to have it believed on
198(1858), 16 U.C.Q.B. 389.
199(1858), 15 U.C.Q.B. 507 at 512.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
her word that she paid her passage … everybody else in a similar case must
have the same right to tell the same story …. 200
The benefits of railways to trade, settlement and the general conven-
ience of Upper Canadians were obvious. At the same time, however, those
benefits could not be gained without sacrifice. The railroads changed the
face of the land; their operation necessarily posed a danger to property and
even to human life. As Chief Justice of the colony, Robinson had to reconcile
the demands of justice in individual claims with the practical imperative
of protecting the overall commercial viability of the companies.
The railroads had a considerable impact on traditional transportation
routes within the province. They obstructed highways, made existing junc-
tions unworkable, and often required bridges that made rivers unnavigable.
Robinson nevertheless hesitated to fix liability on the lines for these things.
He preferred instead to hold that, in the manner of their construction, the
roads had been authorized under statute, or, alternatively, that the plaintiff
lacked standing in nuisance because the “injury” had been suffered by the
public. In McDonell v. Ontario, Simcoe and Huron Railroad (1854), for
instance, the plaintiff landowner alleged that by erecting a bridge over a
public highway, the railroad had in the process blocked his own access to
it. The Chief Justice, however, found for the company:
The fourteenth clause of the [incorporating] act precisely authorizes that to be
done which was done in this case, and which is complained of as an injury in
the second count, that is, the raising the common highway by an embankment
so as to carry it above the railway. It was lawful, therefore, for the company
to do this; and more than that, they were bound to do it, for the safety and
convenience of the public. 20′
In Ward v. Great Western Railway (1856), persons who were in the habit
of using another public highway sued the defendant railway for obstruction.
Again, Robinson held that the works complained of were authorized by
statute, and hence the plaintiffs could not recover. Going further, he pointed
out that in any event these plaintiffs had no right of action because the
highway did not pass through the plaintiffs’ lands:
It follows that no individual could bring an action for his share of the incon-
venience, except where there is some clear ground for distinguishing his case
from that of her Majesty’s subjects in general; some special damage which has
not been suffered by others. Now … there is nothing peculiar in the case of
any one of the plaintiffs …. For all that appears, there may have been many
others having occasion to use the road more frequently than, or quite as fre-
quently as, the plaintiff and if the plaintiff were allowed to recover upon this
declaration and evidence, we do not see on what principle we could say that
200(1857), 14 U.C.Q.B. 377 at 384.
201(1854), 11 U.C.Q.B. 271 at 279.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
there may not be some hundreds or thousands of others having the same right
to a separate civil action. 202
As a result, Robinson saved the company from expensive litigation.
If the existence of the lines posed one type of problem, their actual
running posed others. In the first place, the trains were pulled by steam
locomotives which burned coal, and which invariably (at this stage in their
technological development) threw off sparks in the combustion process. Not
infrequently, these sparks set off brush fires which damaged crops and farm
buildings. Farmers could be ruined by such blazes. On the other hand, it
was not technologically or economically feasible for railways to eliminate
the sparks. What was to be done? Robinson believed that the companies
were required to keep their lines clear of materials which might aid com-
bustion –
logs, brush, and rubbish – but apart from these things, he refused
to hold the companies liable for fires if they had taken reasonable care in
the running of their engines. Thus, in Hewitt v. Ontario, Simcoe and Huron
Railroad (1854), Robinson stated:
In actions of this nature it is always necessary to be borne in mind, that it is
more than railway companies can be expected to undertake, that the business
which they are conducting should be always so managed as to prevent accidents,
though undoubtedly they are bound to do what they can to prevent mischief
to others.20 3
The burden of loss was therefore placed on farmers. The Chief Justice made
this explicit in a later case against the same line, Hill v. Ontario, Simcoe &
Huron Railroad (1855), where he told the jury that a farmer
had a right to use his barn and barn-yard as farmers generally use them, [but]
that if he chose to allow it to remain near the track he must submit to the risk
which would exist as a consequence of the Legislature having intrusted the
defendants with an agent of a dangerous character, provided they used all the
appliances and precautions which could be expected reasonably from them. 24
202(1856), 13 U.C.Q.B. 315 at 320. Yet another strategy of avoidance was to deny the existence
of a nuisance altogether. Thus, in R. v. Great Western Railroad Company (1855), 12 U.C.Q.B.
250 at 252, Robinson declined to find a nuisance where a railway had built a bridge slightly
more narrow than the original street: “If the passage being narrowed must of necessity constitute
a nuisance, then we should have to apply such a principle without discrimination, for we would
have as judges no discretion to exercise, but must go by the rule, and the bridge being a foot
or an inch narrower than the street must be held to be inevitably fatal; and the consequence
would be that as a part of the judgement in all such cases must be that the nuisance be abated,
every bridge by which the former highway has been carried above the railway must be pulled
down, and that not merely in the case of this line of railway, but of many others, for there are
many railway acts in which the very same words are used in relation to bridges as in the one
now in question.”
203(1854), 11 U.C.Q.B. 604 at 608.
204(1855), 13 U.C.Q.B. 503 at 503-04.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
This is not to suggest that the Chief Justice was unmindful of the dangers
of the roads. He demonstrated particular concern in instances involving, or
potentially involving, danger to persons. Accidents resulting in personal
injury were often attributable to the high speed at which trains moved
through the countryside. This practice made it difficult for trains to stop at
crossings or other points where people, animals or wagons were on the
tracks. Here Robinson insisted on strict safety standards. Railways were to
install crossing gates where needed and provide cattle guards and fences to
separate their lines from adjacent lands.20 5 Moreover, “conductors” (in the
sense of engine drivers) were responsible for ensuring that the speed of the
train was reduced near highways. They were never to assume that the track
ahead was clear. As Robinson said in Renaud v. Great Western Railway
(1854), a case involving the death of several farm animals owned by the
plaintiff-
[W]hen the conductor of [the] train approached this highway, he could have
no reason for expecting that he would find anything placed there for the purpose
of keeping people and cattle from getting upon the track. He knew well that
there was no protection of the kind here. Now, if the collision with the plaintiff’s
cows had happened, as it might, to have thrown the engine or some of the cars
off the track, producing such a deplorable casualty as has lately occurred on
the same railway, would it be thought satisfactory to the mutilated passengers,
or the relations of those who were killed, to be told by the conductor, that he
took it for granted all the people or cattle that might be on the road on either
side of the track would take care of themselves; that every animal, rational
and irrational … would be fully aware of the approaching danger, able to cal-
culate accurately both time and distance, certain to judge correctly of the course
… to take, and to be careful in acting up to the exigency.20 6
This remonstrative attitude was exceptional. Overall, Robinson sup-
ported the roads much more than he criticized them. This support was all
the more remarkable because it occurred in an atmosphere of increasing
institutional tension between judge and jury. Robinson started out with
profound respect for the jury system. Selection of jurors in Upper Canada
was originally at the discretion of district sheriffs who chose from eligible
householders. In practice, jurors were often citizens of considerable property
and social standing.207 It was in this context that the Chief Justice declared
in Armour v. Boswell (1842):
The trial by jury is the great pillar on which our freedom and security rests.
It has contributed more than any other of our civil institutions, more, I believe
than all of them, to elevate the English character. The protection it throws
Ontario, Simcoe & Huron Railway Company (1854), 12 U.C.Q.B. 463.
205See, e.g., Bradly v. Great Western Railway Company (1854), 11 U.C.Q.B. 220; Wilson v.
206Supra, note 189 at 423-24.
207P Romney, Mr. Attorney: The Attorney General for Ontario in Court, Cabinet and Leg-
islature, 1791-1899 (Toronto: Osgoode Society, 1986) at 291-95.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
around life, property and reputation, produces a confidence and a feeling of
security and independence, which is the foundation of prosperity and happi-
ness. In proportion as these advantages are valuable, we ought to guard the
source from which they mainly flow, and not suffer respect for trial by jury to
be impaired. 208
During this period, however, the usefulness of the jury system was
already being seriously questioned. In Armour v. Boswell, Robinson decided
that the only way to preserve respect for it was to overrule the jury and
order a new trial. In other instances, the Chief Justice found himself doing
the same thing. Robinson began to appreciate that there were problems with
the system. In McDonald v. Cameron (1847), he commented that jurymen
are, in truth, more exposed than the court is to improper importunities. They
are open to the influence of prevailing impressions, transient and mistaken as
they often are; and they may sometimes err even on the side of good morals
and humanity, by carrying a laudable and amiable feeling to excess ….209
By 1852, Robinson’s doubts had turned into cynicism. Two years pre-
vious, the colony’s new Reform government had passed a bill shifting the
task of jury selection to elected officials in the districts. This democratized
the selection process and extended jury eligibility to the average male rate-
payer. In a letter to J.B. Macauley, the Chief Justice observed that under
these conditions juries were inclined “to favour any available weakness
which disposes necessary to believe that the poor are always in the right –
at least when they find themselves engaged in a contest with the rich. 210
In the railway cases, the jury problem took on new dimensions. High
damage awards and verdicts against the lines threatened to cripple the new
enterprises. In this context, Robinson tended to uphold only those jury
verdicts and awards which, if not favourable to the roads, were at least
reasonable. In other instances, he entered non-suits or ordered new trials.
Thus, in upholding the jury’s decision in Wilson v. Ontario, Simcoe & Huron
Railroad (1854), Robinson commented that “it is satisfactory that the dam-
ages are reasonable, for these occurrences are unfortunate in their effect
upon the interests of a company whose exertions have conferred great benefit
upon the community”. 21′ By contrast, Robinson had no trouble in setting
aside a jury order for 1000 in Hewitt v. Ontario, Simcoe & Huron Rail-
208(1842), 6 U.C.Q.B. (O.S.) 352 at 359.
209(1847), 4 U.C.Q.B. 1 at 3.
21OQuoted in Brode, supra, note 14 at 257.
211(1854), 12 U.C.Q.B. 463 at 465.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
road.212 In Morley v. Great Western Railway (1858), he intervened to strike
down a 5000 sum awarded for a fatality.213
At a general level, it would seem that juries were sympathetic towards
the victims of the new technology, while judges such as Robinson were more
concerned with corporate solvency and the future of the colony’s transpor-
tation network. Indeed, the jury/judge conflict worsened as the railway boom
progressed; most of Robinson’s orders for non-suits or new trials in favour
of railways (notably, he appears never to have made any similar order in
favour of non-railway parties) were made in the late 1850s when the boom
was in full swing. It was perhaps no coincidence that articles debating the
legitimacy and utility of civil juries began to appear during this period in
the colony’s legal periodical, the Upper Canada Law Journal. An 1856 ed-
itorial went so far as to declare that “the indiscriminate application of trial
by jury in civil cases is a great evil, and we rejoice to see the day approaching
when it will be confined to cases where it may serve a useful purpose. ‘214
An article in May of the following year expressly laid the blame for the
problem at the feet of the reform legislation referred to earlier. Difficulties,
the editors suggested, were
becoming more formidable every year since the duty of selection was taken
from Sheriffs and transferred, to the most part, to the ballot box. At every
Court men are found acting who are wholly unfit for the task imposed by law
upon them as jurors, and as a natural result verdicts are so uncertain and
capricious that no sane lawyer would hazard a decided opinion upon the result
of a case to be decided by jury.215
The solution to the problem, the Journal ventured, lay in the replacement
of jury trials by trial by judge alone:
It is hazarding too much to say that jurors are better fitted than judges to
determine all questions of fact … Judgement is the result of reason. The power
to reason accurately is not possessed in a higher degree by farmers, mechanics,
or tradesmen, than by Judges – men of learning – men of ability – whose
212Supra, note 203.
213(1858), 16 U.C.Q.B. 504. For other railway cases in which Robinson overturned jury
verdicts in favour of new trials or non-suits, see Gillis v. Great Western Railway (1854), 12
U.C.Q.B. 427; Jack v. Ontario, Simcoe & Huron Railroad (1857), 14 U.C.Q.B. 328; Purdy v.
Grand Trunk Railway (1858), 15 U.C.Q.B. 571; Detler v. Grand Trunk Railway (1858), 15
U.C.Q.B. 595; Augur v. Ontario, Simcoe & Huron Railroad (1858), 16 U.C.Q.B. 92; Ferris v.
Grand Trunk Railway (1858), 16 U.C.Q.B. 474; Wallace v. Grand Trunk Railway (1858), 16
U.C.Q.B. 551;Simpson v. Great Western Railway (1859), 17 U.C.Q.B. 57; Utterv. Great Western
Railway (1859), 17 U.C.Q.B. 392; Thompson v. Grand Trunk Railway (1859), 18 U.C.Q.B. 92;
Huntsman v.Great Western Railway (1860), 20 U.C.Q.B. 24; Browne v. Brockville and Ottawa
Railway Company (1860), 20 U.C.Q.B. 202; Tyson v. Grand Trunk Railway (1860), 20 U.C.Q.B.
256.
214(1856) 2 U.C.L.J. 174.
215(1857) 3 U.C.L.J. 98.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
previous study and training peculiarly befit them for the task …. Were trial by
Judge in all civil cases to be optional we should less frequently hear of perverse
verdicts …. We should less frequently hear of second, third, and fourth trials
to the impoverishment of the suitor. The administration of justice would be
more speedy and less expensive than at present….216
Robinson never openly disavowed the civil jury as an institution.
Nevertheless, he often lectured juries, and even scolded them when they
failed in their duty. More importantly, when his reprimands failed to work,
he simply set their verdicts aside. In his last decade on the bench in Upper
Canada, the railway cases forced the Chief Justice to do this at an unprec-
edented rate. The practicalities of progress had finally overtaken the rhetoric
of respect.
The confrontation between Robinson and the juries in the railway cases
dramatizes the fact that for all the Chief Justice’s good intentions, there were
both “winners” and “losers” in his judicial strategy. Significantly, many of
the winners were members of Robinson’s own social group, the Family
Compact. 21 7 Among these men were the colony’s large landowners (Section
II), the leading merchants (Section III) and the local financiers who backed
216″Trial by Jury on its Trial” (1858) 4 U.C.L.J. 75 at 77. The Upper Canadian debate was
doubtless encouraged by developments in England where the civil jury was under attack for
many of the same reasons. For instance, the 1853 report of the English common law com-
missioners acknowledged the argument that “twelve men, taken at hazard from the body of
society, unused to judicial duties or forensic discussions, cannot possess the same aptitude for
judicial investigations as a judge, in whom a professional education, the habit of considering
the effect of evidence, a long course of training and experience, have developed all the faculties
which are required for the judicial office”; as quoted in A.H. Manchester, A Modern Legal
History of England and Wales 1750-1950 (London: Butterworths, 1980) at 97.Direct colonial
references to contemporary English controversies were rare, indicating that the Upper Canadian
debate was more than simply derivative. The English experience with the Common Law Pro-
cedure Act, 1854 (U.K.), 17 & 18 Vict., c. 125, however, provided the inspiration for a private
members’ bill introduced in the Upper Canadian assembly in 1858 to eliminate jury trials in
civil cases unless one of the parties to a suit demanded it. The colonial government ultimately
chose not to go this far, but The Upper Canada Jurors’Act of 1858, 22 Vict., c. 100 nevertheless
increased the property qualification for jurors in an attempt to “obtain a better class of jurors
than are now obtained”. See Romney, supra, note 207 at 297. The jury trial requirement in
all civil cases was finally abolished, except on demand or by judicial order, by The Law Reform
Act of 1868, 32 Vict., c. 6.
217Romney suggests this in his assessment of Bowes v. Toronto (City 0.1: “[U]nderneath
Robinson’s superficially progressive, ‘instrumentalist’ wish to free elected officials from the
harsher constraints of fiduciary obligation for the sake of promoting economic growth, there
lurked a deeply conservative impulse to vindicate privileges which Robinson himself had once
enjoyed, but which the trend to responsible government had recently all but eradicated in
England and Upper Canada”. Romney, supra, note 64 at 183.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
many of the colony’s important capital projects (Section IV).218 The losers
tended to be from the less powerful strata of society: squatters who struggled
to wrench a living from land they could not buy, private businessmen forced
to compete against privileged public corporations, and small farmers who
suffered as railways destroyed their crops and killed their animals. The law,
however, was not uniformly harsh or merciless. In the context of the railway
cases, Robinson insisted on protecting innocent passengers by strictly en-
forcing safety requirements. Even though many of his decisions reflected a
substantial bias in favour of established wealth and power, the Chief Justice
was moreover never conscious of participating in any class conspiracy.
The suggestion that Upper Canadian law evolved in the general interests
of the Family Compact goes far in explaining the nagging inconsistencies
in Robinson’s approach to legal doctrine. The Chief Justice’s determination
to shape the existing laws of commerce and transportation in favour of
development was clear, but his willingness to alter traditional laws of prop-
erty to the same purpose was much less pronounced. Changes were made,
but the judge who was responsible for Dean v. McCarty (1846)219 was equally
responsible for Weller v. Burnham (1853).220 The members of the Family
Compact, however, were not very interested in agricultural advancement.
Their concerns were “overwhelmingly in the commercial and governmental
activities of the emerging cities. ‘221 Admittedly, they often speculated in
unimproved land –
the Durham Report of 1839 noted that they owned
much of the undeveloped land of the province –
but they “showed no
inclination to retain and develop it”.222 As speculators, they displayed little
enthusiasm for doctrinal changes that would have favoured clearing and
cultivation only to diminish the value of their holdings in the process. 223
Robinson responded to these concerns by retaining traditional laws such as
waste and dower. At the same time, he attempted to promote the colony’s
economic development in other ways by offering progressive interpretations
of commercial and transportation law. In these areas, however, entrenched
doctrine was more likely to compromise the Compact’s urban-commercial
interests. These interests dominated consistently whenever they came into
conflict with the interests of landed property (recall the transportation cases
in particular). This is not to suggest that class concerns were at the root of
218McRae defines the Family Compact as follows: “[T]he heads of departments in the colonial
administration, judges, most barristers, and the bishop or ranking churchman of the Church
of England. But this is not all, for closely associated with this official oligarchy we find the
leaders of the commercial and banking community.” McRae, supra, note 11 at 241.
2 19Supra, note 70.
22OSupra, note 75.
221 McRae, supra, note I 1 at 241.
222Ibid. at 241-42.
223Recall the discussion in Section II, supra.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
Robinson’s legal thought – pre-classical legal ideology was not a mere cipher
for the political, social and economic preferences of the Family Compact.
Within the framework of this ideology, Robinson’s own class perspective
may have predisposed him to accept change in some contexts while causing
him to be more conservative in others, all in the -name of the community.
Conclusion
This attempt to reconstruct Robinson’s legal thought from his reported
decisions has suggested that, notwithstanding conclusions in the recent lit-
erature, Robinson was patently not the “converse of Wisconsin”. He was
not a precedent-bound colonial magistrate who clung to an outmoded eigh-
teenth century formalism. Rather, he was a jurist well aware of modem
doctrines and basically committed to the idea that law should reflect colonial
circumstances and facilitate progress and prosperity. His approach to law
and the judicial enterprise led him to share much with his American con-
temporaries; they too were concerned with social development and making
traditional law relevant to the conditions of a new commercial age.
This is not to suggest that there were no limits to Robinson’s willingness
to recast the existing law. On the contrary, Robinson refused to introduce
fundamental legal reforms if they required the wholesale rejection of existing
principles. Fundamental reform was the task of the legislature or the English
courts, and it was to these institutions that Robinson considered himself
constitutionally bound. Similarly, the Chief Justice often declined to depart
from precedent. This tendency reflected more than constitutional obligation;
it also revealed Robinson’s faith in the substantive sense of the rules. Ro-
binson believed that legal certainty and economic restraint were at times
more important to the peace, order and even commercial welfare of society
than was change or aggressive growth.
This belief manifested itself in a variety of situations. For instance,
Robinson did not deny that the English laws of waste and dower were
applicable in Upper Canada. He declined to undermine existing notions of
the exclusivity of franchises to permit unregulated competition. He refused
to free corporations from the seal requirement which was strictly enforced
in the context of executory contracts. He also insisted that railway com-
panies be held liable for injuries to persons.
Understood solely in the context of “Tory touch” notions of Canadian
history, such instances might be interpreted as evidence of a fundamental
difference between the legal philosophy of Robinson and his American ju-
dicial counterparts. Not only was Robinson more supportive of economic
development than these instances would suggest, but American judges were
not as aggressively “instrumentalist” in the early nineteenth century as some
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
Canadian scholars have implied. In this sense, “Wisconsin” never existed.
American jurists of the early nineteenth century displayed both “instru-
mentalist” and “formalist” tendencies. This demonstrates that commitment
to change and respect for principle were intertwined in the legal thought of
the time, and that innovation and conservatism could alternatively serve
the interests of legally-favoured groups.224 In this respect, the intellectual
similarities between Robinson and his most prominent American counter-
parts were significant.
Three American judges of the early nineteenth century might be singled
out for comparison with Robinson: James Kent, Chief Justice of the New
York Supreme Court from 1804-1814 and Chancellor of the State from 1814-
1823; Joseph Story, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United
States from 1811-1844; and Lemuel Shaw, Chief Justice of the Supreme
Judicial Court of Massachusetts from 1830-1860. Like Robinson, all three
men were legislators prior to their appointment to the bench.225 As successful
lawyers, each demonstrated a commitment to established interests and a
concomitant resistance to the rising tides of democracy and revolutionary
social change. 226 As judges, all three exercised a profound influence on Amer-
ican law, an influence which, in the instances of Kent and Story at least,
spilled directly over into the courts of Upper Canada.227
James Kent, the senior of the three jurists, had already retired when
Robinson became Chief Justice in 1829. He may nevertheless be considered
a contemporary of Robinson because his famous Commentaries, published
2 40n the syncretism of instrumentalism and formalism in nineteenth century American
jurisprudence, see H. Scheiber, “Instrumentalism and Property Rights: A Reconsideration of
American ‘Styles of Judicial Reasoning’ in the 19th Century” (1975) Wis. L. Rev. 1. There is
evidence that notable members of the English judiciary similarly mixed these two approaches
during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Even a progressive jurist such as
Lord Mansfield was quite capable of deferring to precedent and principle. For instance, on a
point of corporate law, Mansfield pronounced that “certainty is one great object of all legal
determinations, and particularly to be wished for in that branch of the law which concerns
corporations, (because such questions are often agitated with a heat and spirit not to be satisfied
by the best reasons of the soundest discretion, and only to be checked by the authority of rules
and precedents, deliberately settled upon former occasions).” R. v. Daws; R. v. Marten (1767),
4 Burrow’s Reports 2120 at 2121.
225For a comparative analysis of Kent, Story and Shaw, see G.E. White, TheAmerican Judicial
Tradition: Profiles of Leading American Judges (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976) at
34-63.
2261bid. at 37.
2
7Story’s influence on Robinson has already been noted. See supra, notes 35 and 36 and
accompanying text. Kent’s influence on Robinson and his peers was less striking, although
nonetheless evident. Robinson made explicit use of Kent’s Commentaries on American Law,
infra, note 228, in Beaver v. Reed, supra, note 98 at 165; Rogers v. Hooker (1857), 15 U.C.Q.B.
63 at 71. In Matthews v. Holmes, supra, note 86 at 137, Robinson referred admiringly to Kent
as a “very learned and experienced judge”.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
between 1826 and 1830, had a profound influence on American law during
the decades immediately following their publication. Kent, like Robinson,
believed that the common law was a “collection of principles” born of
“cultivated reason”. 22 8 The best evidence of these principles lay in decisions
of courts ofjustice –
in particular the English courts. American judges were
generally bound to follow previous decisions as it was through adherence
to precedent that “people in general … [could] buy and trust and deal with
each other. ‘229 To do otherwise would be to “disturb and settle the great
landmarks of property”.23 0 At the same time, however, Kent, like Robinson,
admitted that there were important limits to the notion of stare decisis:
It is probable that the records of many of the courts … are replete with hasty
and crude decisions; and such cases ought to be examined without fear, and
revised without reluctance, rather than to have the character of our law im-
paired, and the beauty and harmony of the system destroyed by perpetuity of
error. Even a series of decisions are not always a conclusive evidence of what
is law; and the revision of a decision very often resolves itself into a question
of mere expediency, depending upon the consideration of the importance of
certainty in the rule, and the extent of property to be affected by a change of
it…. We must look to the principle of the decision, and not to the manner in
which the case is argued upon the bench … .231
Similarly, Kent recognized that the law had to adapt to changes in social
conditions:
Considering the influence of manners upon law, and the force of opinion, which
is silently and almost insensibly controling the course of business and the
practice of the courts, it is impossible that the fabric of our jurisprudence should
not exhibit deep traces of the progress of society, as well as of the footsteps of
time.232
This was not to say, however, that all traditional notions and values
were to be arbitrarily overthrown. In a declaration that would have been
characteristic of Upper Canada’s Chief Justice, Kent said:
It would, no doubt, be at times very convenient and perhaps a cover for
ignorance, or indolence or prejudice to disregard all English decisions as of no
authority, and set up as a standard my own notions of right and wrong. But I
can do no such thing. I am called to the severer and more humble duty of
laborious examination and study ….233
228J. Kent, Commentaries on American Law, 3d ed., vol. 1 (New York: E.A. Clayton, 1836)
at 470-7 1.
229Ibid at 475.
23 OIbid.
231Ibid. at 476.
232Ibid. at 478.
233Manning v. Manning, 1 Johns. Ch. 527 (1815) (N.Y. Ch. Ct.).
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
If an error was made or confirmed in this process, it was “the province
of the legislative and not of the judicial power to change the law.”‘234 Leg-
islation was to be construed broadly, that is, the real intention of the leg-
islators was to prevail over the literal meaning of terms. 235 This method of
interpretation was clearly facilitative: when a power was given by statute,
every thing necessary to its end or effect was to be implied.236
Private rights of property deserved particular judicial protection in this
approach to statutory interpretation. Since Kent felt that wealthy and in-
dependent landowners were the backbone of national prosperity,237 the pro-
tection of property rights was considered to be essential to progress:
The sense of property is graciously bestowed on mankind, for the purpose of
rousing them from sloth, and stimulating them to action; and so long as the
right of acquisition is exercised in conformity to the social relations, and the
moral obligations which spring from them, it ought to be sacredly protected.
The natural and active sense of property pervades the foundations of social
improvement. It leads to the cultivation of the earth, the institution of gov-
ernment, the establishment of justice, the acquisition of the comforts of life,
the growth of the useful arts, the spirit of commerce, the production of taste,
the elections of charity and the display of the benevolent affections. 238
Although adamant in his views, Kent was, however, never so doctrinaire
as to insist that private property rights had to stand in the way of the public
interest:
[T]here are many cases in which the rights of property must be made subser-
vient to the public welfare…. So, lands adjoining the canals which have been
recently made in New York were made liable to be assumed for the public use,
so far as was necessary for the great object of the canals …. In these and other
instances, the interest of the public is deemed paramount to that of any private
individual … [;] private interests must be made subservient to the general
interest of the community.239
In the commercial arena, Kent’s views were also similar to those of
Robinson. Contracts were to be interpreted according to the intentions of
the parties. To determine intention, recourse would be not only to the words
of the agreement, but to common usage:
The mutual intention of the parties to the instrument, is the great, and some-
times the difficult object of enquiry…. To reach and carry that intention into
effect, the law, when it becomes necessary, will control even the literal terms
234Ibid.
235Supra, note 228 at 461.
2361bid. at 463.
237J. Dorfman, “Chancellor Kent and the Developing American Economy” (1961) 61 Colum.
L. Rev. 1290 at 1292.
238Supra, note 228, vol. 1 at 319.
239Ibid. at 338-40.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
of the contract, if they manifestly contravene the purpose …. If it be a mer-
cantile case, and the instrument be not clear and unequivocal, the usage of
trade will enable us frequently to determine the precise point of particular
terms …. 240
Kent was consistently responsive to the concerns of the merchant com-
munity. He held Lord Mansfield in high esteem (as did Robinson –
recall
Section III), and, as a result, sought to interpret the law in the interests of
commerce.241 He extended and protected the use of negotiable instruments,
and of bills of exchange and promissory notes, explaining that “as they serve
the purposes of cash … they may be truly said to enlarge the capital stock
of wealth in circulation, as well as increase the trade of the country. ‘ 242 His
generally supportive attitude toward trade, however, did not preclude him
from restricting contract, competition and enterprise in name of the “public
interest”. He firmly believed in the wisdom of the laws forbidding usury.243
He defended exclusive franchises, commenting in one case that “[t]his power
to encourage the importation of improvements by the grant of exclusive
enjoyment for a limited period is extremely useful and the English nation
have long perceived and felt its beneficial results.”‘244 He advocated freer
use of the corporate form for business, but still insisted on certain restrictions
because he feared that the corporation might supplant private enterprise
and check the “free circulation of labour”. 245 Finally, while generally sup-
portive of creditors’ rights, he attempted to protect debtors from exploita-
tion, commenting at one point that the relation between debtor and creditor
“has in all ages of the world produced fearful consequences”. 246 Commerce
was to be encouraged, but at the end of the day Kent feared the political
domination of “master capitalists” over masses of propertyless workers. 247
Joseph Story was perhaps more supportive of corporate enterprise than
was Kent,248 but in many other areas he held views very similar to those
of the New York Chancellor; consequently, there existed common ground
between Story and Robinson. Some of that common ground was the result
Century, 1939) at 157.
24OIbid. at 554-55.
241See J.T. Horton, James Kent: A Study in Conservatism 1763-1847 (New York: Appleton-
242See Dorfman, supra, note 237 at 1304 n. 89.
2431bid. at 1301. See also Thompson v. Berry, Johns. Ch. 395 (1817) (N.Y. Ch. Ct.) at 399:
“I should apprehend dangerous effects upon the public morals, if creditors were left at liberty
to demand what rate of interest they please, and compound interest when they please, without
being under any admonition of human laws. I consider the statute against usury to be a check
to hard-headed avarice, and a protection thrown around the necessitous.”
244Horton, supra, note 241 at 172-73.
245Dorfman, supra, note 237 at 1293.
246Thompson v. Berry, supra, note 243 at 395.
247Dorfman, supra, note 237 at 1292.
248Supra, note 225 at 51.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
of direct influence: Story, more than any other commentator of the age, had
a profound effect on Robinson’s decisions, especially in the area of bills and
notes, where his works encouraged the Upper Canadian Chief Justice to
expand the limits of negotiability in the interests of enterprise.249 Socially
and politically, both men were conservatives committed to religion and
morality and fearful of democratic tendencies. 250
“Law” to Story was very much the product of reason and principle.
This approach to law guaranteed rights of property in the moral interest of
the community and ensured that property would remain “the foundation
of the whole dynamic moral structure of free enterprise and free govern-
ment”. 251 At the same time, however, law –
as a guarantor of the common
good – was a practical instrument to be used to meet the needs of real
people, in particular businessmen.252 Writing in the North American Review
in 1825, Story declared:
It is obvious, that the law must fashion itself to the wants and in some sort
to the spirit of the age. Its stubborn rules, if they are not broken down, must
bend to the demands of society.253
The essence of the judicial task was, in the manner of Lord Mansfield, to
adjust old law to new circumstances and balance change with stability.2 54
In light of these similar conceptions of law and the judicial enterprise,
it is not surprising that Story –
notwithstanding the erudition of his judg-
ments –
imposed many of the same commercial restrictions as his con-
temporary in Upper Canada. This was perhaps most apparent in Story’s
consideration of franchise rights. Dissenting in the famous case of Charles
River Bridge Co. v. Warren Bridge Co.,255 he insisted that such rights had
249See, e.g., Davidson v. Bartlett, supra, note 35; Beckett v. Cornish, supra, note 35; Bank of
Upper Canada v. Smith, supra, note 35; Bank ofMontreal v. DeLatre, supra, note 35; McCuniffe
v. Allen, supra, note 35; Wilcocks v. Tinning, supra, note 35; Sinclair v. Robson, supra, note
35.2500n the life and thought of Joseph Story, see J. McClellan, Joseph Story and the American
Constitution:A Study in Political and Legal Thought (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press,
1971); R.K. Newmyer, Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story: Statesman of the Old Republic
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1985).
251Newmyer, ibid. at 144.
2521bid. at 116.
2531bid. at 115. See also Story’s essay, “Codification of the Common Law”, where Story defines
law as “a system of elementary principles and of general juridical truths, which are constantly
expanding with the progress of society, and adapting themselves to the gradual changes of trade,
and commerce, and the mechanic arts, and the exigencies and uses of the country”. As quoted
in W. Lapiana, “Swift v. Tyson and the Brooding Omnipresence in the Sky: An Invesiigation
of the Idea of Law in Antebellum America” (1986) 20 Suffolk U.L. Rev. 771 at 774.
254Newmyer, supra, note 250 at 246.
255Charles River Bridge Co. v. Warren Bridge Co., 36 U.S. (11 Pet.) 419 (1837). For a dis-
cussion of Story’s decision in this case, see Newmyer, supra, note 250 at 217-35.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
to be exclusive. No one, he argued, would invest business capital in risky
ventures unless the legislature guaranteed some protection of the investment
from other entrepreneurs. When this argument failed to persuade his col-
leagues on the Supreme Court, Story lamented that principle guided by
reason had given way to legislative whim. Commerce unrestrained by the
moral authority of law could only encourage “darkness, and ominous con-
jectures”, 256 and promote the disintegration of the community.
Lemuel Shaw, in association with Daniel Webster, for a time defended
the original franchisee in Charles River Bridge, he did not, however, share
Story’s despair at the outcome of the case.257 This is not to suggest a stark
contrast between Shaw on the one hand and Story and Robinson on the
other. Rather, it is simply to note that, of the three American jurists con-
sidered here, Shaw was probably least disturbed by the restrictions on es-
tablished property rights in the interests of economic growth. In part, this
was a product of his age; Shaw, the youngest of the three men, came to the
bench just as the second great wave of American post-Revolutionary com-
mercial expansion was cresting.2 58 At the same time, although he was capable
of occasionally inveighing against the “irregular action of mere popular
will”,259 he was less fearful of the rising democratic tide.
At a more general level, Shaw obviously shared much with his own
he believed
American predecessors. Like all of them –
that law was a creatire of reason and principle. This was its strength:
and Robinson –
It is one of the great merits and advantages of the common law that instead
of a series of detailed practical rules … [i]t consists of a few broad and com-
prehensive principles founded on reason, natural justice, and enlightened pub-
lic policy modified and adapted to the circumstances of all the particular cases
that fall within it.260
Like Robinson, Shaw did not display the scholarly tendencies of Kent
or Story; his decisions, unlike theirs, were not littered with references to
previous case law or supported with extensive historical research. This did
not reflect disdain for the cases or for the values that lay beneath them, but
rather a conviction that by themselves they could set a trap for an unwary
jurist and, if applied mechanically, could potentially harm the community.
Reason and principle, on the other hand, provided both men with the tools
with which they could shape a legal environment sympathetic to and fa-
26Newmyer, ibid. at 218.
257L.W. Levy, The Law of the Commonwealth and Chief Justice Shaw: The Evolution of
American Law 1830-1860 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1957) at 16, 232.
25SIbid. at 315.
259Supra, note 228, vol. 1 at 55.
26Norway Plains Company v. Boston and Maine Railroad, 1 Gray 263 (1854) (Sup. Jud. Ct.
Mass.) at 267.
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
cilitative of development. In this way, old law could be reconciled with new
circumstance:
[A]lthough steamboats and railroads are but of yesterday, yet the principles
which govern the rights and duties of carriers of passengers, and also those
which regulate the rights and duties of carriers of goods, and of the owners of
goods carried, have a deep and established foundation in the common law,
subject only to such modification as new circumstances may render necessary
and beneficial.261
In the process of reconciliation, however, precedent was not to be summarily
abandoned. The following dictum from an 1830 case was not atypical:
In the general absence of a bankruptcy law, a series of judicial decisions has
taken place upon this subject, extending over a period of nearly thirty years
…. Under this system, and its reliance upon it, contracts and transfers have
been made, rights and remedies acquired, to a large extent; and it would be
inconsistent with the plain principles of justice now to disturb them, or to
change the law, in any mode other than by a legislative act, which should look
only to the future, and guard by adequate provisions, all acquired and existing
rights. 262
Robinson would have understood.
Shaw and Robinson were particularly concerned with the development
of transportation infrastructures. Both jurists sought to ease the burdens on
carriers by regarding them as mere warehousemen wherever possible. For
instance, Robinson’s approach to the problem of common law liability in
Ham v. McPherson,263 decided in 1842, was mirrored by Shaw considering
the position of a railroad company in an 1845 case. 264 Both jurists also cited
statutory authority to protect railways against nuisance actions. In an 1849
decision concerning the liability of a railway for obstructing a river after it
had built a bridge, Shaw commented:
The public have a right to regulate the use of public navigable waters for the
purpose of passage; and the erection of a bridge … by the authority of the
legislature, is a regulation of a public right, and not the deprivation of any
private right, which can be a ground for damages. 265
Robinson eventually made the same point in such cases as McDonell v.
Ontario, Simcoe & Huron Railway (1854), and Ward v Great Western Rail-
way (1856).266 Similarly, Shaw decided in 1854 that, English law notwith-
standing, a local railway was not liable for damage to goods sustained before
2611bid.
262Russell v. Woodward, 10 Pick. 407 (1830) (Sup. Jud. Ct. Mass.) at 412.
263Supra, note 174.
264Thomas v. Boston and Providence Railroad, 10 Met. 472 (1845) (Sup. Jud. Ct. Mass.).
265Davidson v. Boston and Maine Railroad, 3 Cush. 91 (1849) at 106.
266McDonell, supra, note 201, and Ward, supra, note 202.
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
those goods reached their ultimate destination on a connecting line. 67 With-
out reference to the Shaw decision, Robinson decided this question the same
way in Rogers v. Great Western Railway four years later.268
The extensive similarities that seem to exist between the legal approach
of Robinson on the one hand, and that of Kent, Story and Shaw on the
other cannot be explained using the “Tory touch” paradigm of Canadian
legal history. It will be recalled that this interpretation –
in its grand form
posits a fundamental divergence in Canadian and American culture in
–
the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, one reflecting the expulsion of
“Tory” elements from the United States and their establishment and con-
gealment in Canada. In the legal sphere, it suggests that, while American
jurists were freed from English precedent after the Revolution and began
to reshape the existing law in the economic interests of a rapidly developing
society, Canadian colonial judges were content to defer to English authority
and only rarely took the initiative in adapting English law to their own
circumstances.
The present analysis obviously encourages a re-thinking of such notions.
At the level of legal history, it supports the potential of a more sympathet-
ically comparative approach to the study of Canadian legal history which
concedes the existence of differences between American and Canadian legal
cultures while being more sensitive to broad ideological and philosophical
similarities between them.
This approach is underdeveloped in the literature that draws on Hart-
zian social fragment theory. This theory posits that the Thirteen Colonies
themselves were primarily bourgeois-liberal fragments cast off from the tur-
moil of seventeenth century England. 269 Taking root in American soil, these
fragments became ideologically “immobilized”. The “Tory touch” thesis is
simply an extension of this analysis. Those aspects of conservative Tory
ideology that were originally submerged within the American colonies were
cast off in the Loyalist migrations after the Revolution. Eventually, a new
country – Canada – was created by the Loyalists and their descendants.
The key point here is not similarity between the cultures, but rather
difference.
After 1965, however, the basic view of American history as “three
hundred years of liberal immobility” 270 began to come apart. Marching
267Nutting v. Connecticut River Railroad, I Gray 502 (1854) (Sup. Jud. Ct. Mass.).
268Supra, note 198.
269See L. Hartz, The Liberal Tradition in America (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World,
1955); L. Hartz, ed., The Founding of New Societies, supra, note 11.
270L. Hartz, “The Fragmentation of European Culture and Ideology” in Hartz, ed., The
Founding of New Societies, ibid.
REVUE DE DROIT DE McGILL
[Vol. 34
under the banner of “republicanism”, younger scholars such as Bernard
Bailyn and Gordon Wood (to name two of the most prominent) shifted the
focus of academic attention from liberal-capitalism to a more traditional,
deferential, communitarian strain of thought which the American colonists
and revolutionaries had inherited not from the English political mainstream
but, rather, from seventeenth century theorists of the British opposition.271
Here, it was argued, lay America’s true founding ideology –
an ideology
which permeated American thought so deeply that it was the basis of social
and political consensus almost until the outbreak of the Revolution.
While Bailyn and Wood were writing in the United States, certain Ca-
nadian academics such as David V.J. Bell and H.V. Nelles 272 were ques-
tioning the implications of Hartzian theory as an adequate explanation for
Canadian history. In particular, they pointed to the predominance of the
liberal heritage in Canada as well as in the United States. 273 Other critics
attempted to avoid ideology entirely, explaining particular historical tend-
encies and events in terms of simple economic self-interest.274
Taken together, American republicanism and recent Canadian schol-
arship represent a powerful historiographical convergence which suggests
that, while liberalism and Loyalism were never irrelevant, the differences
between American and Canadian culture during the late eighteenth and
271B. Bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution (Cambridge: Harvard Uni-
versity Press, 1967); G.S. Wood, The Creation ofthe American Republic, 1776-1787 (New York:
W.W. Norton & Co., 1969). For surveys of more recent “republican” historiography, see R.E.
Shalhope, “Towards a Republican Synthesis: the Emergence of an Understanding of Repub-
licanism in American Historiography” (1972) 29 Wm. & Mary Quarterly 49; R.E. Shalhope,
“Republicanism and Early American Historiography” (1982) 39 Wm & Mary Quarterly 334.
272D.V.J. Bell, “The Loyalist Tradition in Canada” (1970) 5 J. Can. Stud. 22; H.V. Nelles,
The Politics of Development: Forest, Mines and Hydro-Electric Power in Ontario, 1849-1941
(Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1974).
273″There were some important differences in outlook between Loyalists and Revolutionaries,
but they did not correspond to the categories denoted by “conservative” and “liberal”. To the
contrary, a careful analysis of the pre-revolutionary debate between Whigs and Tories reveals
that both groups shared liberal (Lockeian) assumptions about the nature of sovereignty, good
government, the right of resistence, etc. The debate did not juxtapose one ideology against
another, instead it featured the conflict of two views of the existing situation derived from
identical premises… Thus, the Loyalists resembled fairly closely the persecutors from whom
they fled.” Bell, ibid. at 22-23.
274See, e.g., K.C. Dewar, “Toryism and Public Ownership in Canada: A Comment” (1983)
64 Can. Hist. Rev. 404. Dewar attempts to explain the movement in favour of the public
ownership of utilities in the early twentieth century as a function of “business pragmatism”.
At 417, he writes: “[T]he movement’s concern was for a stable and low-cost fuel supply which
would ensure economic growth and prosperity. From that basic concern arose a willingness,
evident at the very outset of the power movement to consider a broad range of alternative
tactics, from the organization of bulk purchases of power from private generating companies
to public ownership.”
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
early-nineteenth centuries have been overstated. This is arguably as true of
legal thought in the two countries as of political, social and economic
thought.275 If Robinson’s attitudes are at all indicative, Canadian judges of
the period were not nearly so narrow, deferential and precedent-obsessed
as historians have presumed. They were aware of the social dimensions of
law and attempted to interpret legal rules and principles in a way that
promoted the colony’s economic development. At the same time, notable
American judges such as Kent and Story and even Shaw, were restrained
in their legal innovation and in their support for aggressive economic
growth. Rather, they subscribed to a moral vision of law which recognized
an objective, organic common good apart from the aggregation of private
interests and which appreciated the importance of commercial restraint.
These convergent ideological predispositions, arguably inherited from the
years before the Revolution, were directly reinforced by the flow into Upper
Canada of a significant number of American reports and treatises during
most of the nineteenth century –
a phenomenon which has only recently
been documented by Professor G. Blaine Baker of McGill University.276
The extent of cross-border intellectual influence on the developing Canadian
legal community went well beyond Robinson’s personal reliance on Joseph
Story.
275For a recent perspective on the alleged distinctiveness of Canadian political thought and
behaviour, see ibid. at 414-15: “[T]he more one looks at the experience of other western cap-
italist societies, the less peculiar Canadian political practice appears ..
. . Surveying the lit-
erature on state action in the United States, R.A. Lively concludes, ‘The broad and well-
documented theme reviewed here is that of public support for business development. Official
vision and public resources have been associated so regularly with private skill and individual
desire that the combination may be said to constitute a principal determinant of American
economic growth.’ If we accept these characterizations … Canadian state action is cut adrift
from the anchor of national peculiarity.” See also Nelles, supra, note 272 at 494: “On close
examination the much discussed Toryism that Ontario Hydro is supposed to represent looks
much like some varieties of American corporate liberalism. It might as well have the same
name.”
276See Baker, supra, note 10 at 234-39. For contemporary accounts of the use of American
reports and texts in mid-nineteenth century Upper Canada, see 0. Mowat, “Observations on
the Use and Value of American Reports in Reference to Canadian Jurisprudence” (1857) 3
U.C.L.J. 3; “Mr. Mowat’s Lecture – American Reports and Law Books” (1857) 3 U.C.L.J.
16. Although the Law Society of Upper Canada did not institute a formal program to acquire
American material until 1856, there is evidence to suggest that a considerable market for
American texts and reports had developed by the 1840s. For instance, one Canadian customs
investigator was able to report in 1843 that the bulk of duty collected from books imported
from the United States came from American law texts. See Baker, supra, note 10 at 237. The
use of American authorities in Upper Canada was parelleled in the other colonies. In Nova
Scotia, the Chief Justice was relying on Supreme Court jurisprudence from Massachusetts as
early as 1835. See Jackson v. Campbell (1835), 1 N.S.R. 18 (S.C.). A year later, the New
Brunswick Supreme Court was making liberal use of Kent’s Commentaries and Dane’s Abridge-
ment. See Hanington v. McFadden (1836), 2 N.B.R. 260 (S.C.).
McGILL LAW JOURNAL
[Vol. 34
None of this is to say that Robinson or his Upper Canadian contem-
poraries were intellectually identical to Kent, Story, Shaw or other American
judges of the period. Significant differences in approach unquestionably ex-
isted. Some of these resulted from the peculiarities of their respective con-
stitutional systems. Most obviously, Robinson was constitutionally bound
by English precedent while American judges were not. Moreover, Robinson
was constitutionally required to defer to the local legislature, whereas his
American counterparts functioned in a context which permitted and even
encouraged judicial review of legislative action. The ability to review and
hence to resist such action was of particular significance to jurists like Kent
and Story, especially during the era of Jacksonian democracy. As a result,
they came increasingly to regard themselves as guardians of established
property against the mob –
a responsibility which did not weigh so heavily
on the members of the Upper Canadian judiciary. For instance, while Story
protected the exclusivity of the franchise in Charles River Bridge Co. by
protecting the original franchisee against legislative interference with his
property rights, Robinson preferred to accomplish the same thing in R. v.
Davenport by deferring completely to the legislative grant.
Behind these constitutional differences lay a different attitude toward
English practices and values. American jurists of the early to mid-nineteenth
century sought to preserve much of their English legacy, but affinity to
England proved stronger in Upper Canada. Robinson’s rhetoric of consti-
tutional deference reflected a profound respect for the mother country and
her traditions which simply did not exist in the United States. This, perhaps,
was the greatest impact .of “Loyalism”, especially if one understands it not
so much as a legal or social ideology than as a predisposition towards English
culture, of which the common law was but one dimension.
Constitutional and cultural distinctions aside, there existed between
Upper Canada and the United States a subtle yet significant legal conti-
nentalism (or, as Blaine Baker has put it, a “pan-Americanism”), 277 char-
acterized by a shared concern with law as an instrument of gradual economic
development and supported by a common ideological heritage and profes-
sional literature. 278 This continentalism not only helps to explain the sim-
277See Baker, supra, note 10 at 234.
278The most notable form of legal continentalism –
the citation of American case law and
texts – became even more common in Ontario in the decades immediately following Robin-
son’s death. The accession of Robert Harrison in 1875 to the position of Chief Justice of Queen’s
Bench resulted in a tripling of judicial references to American cage law. See J.M. Maclntyre,
“The Use of American Cases in Canadian Courts” (1964-66) 2 U.B.C. L. Rev. 478 at 482.
Reliance on American sources became less pronounced after Harrison’s untimely death in
1878; during the 1890s, the increasingly imperialist and centralist English judiciary reversed
its previously sympathetic attitude toward American authority and even began to discourage
its use in courts throughout the Empire. See, e.g., the Court’s highly critical comments in Re
1989]
JOHN BEVERLEY ROBINSON
ilarities apparent in the attitudes of leading Canadian and American jurists,
but it also suggests the usefulness of a comparative approach to the study
of this period in Canadian legal history. The legal thought of Sir John Bev-
erley Robinson, Canada’s greatest nineteenth century jurist, provides but a
starting point in this enterprise.
Missouri Steamship Company (1889), 42 Ch. Div. 321 (C.A.). Given the important role of the
Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in Canadian legal affairs, many members of the
Canadian judiciary, including the Canadian Supreme Court, found the new view persuasive.
Only Nova Scotia, the province with the closest historical and legal links to the United States,
managed to resist imperial pressure and preserve a meaningful degree of continentalism until
the late 1920s.
