The history of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms begins with several Parliamentary committees in the 1940s and 1950s that investigated the possibility of creating a constitutional bill of rights. But first major legislative attempt was not until 1960 with the Canadian Bill of Rights.…

The Cold War began with the defection of Igor Gouzenko in 1945 and revelations surrounding a Soviet spy ring operating in Canada. The Gouzeko Affair symbolized the crumbling of the wartime alliance between East and West, and the emergence of a new era of global…

A brief history of human rights activism in Canada, as well as the origins of the first human rights and civil liberties associations. “Rights associations” first emerged in Canada during the mid-twentieth century. Unlike their more expansive social movement counterparts, such as the women’s movement, the rights…

Canada accepted some minor international human rights obligations in the first half of the twentieth century: Canadians attended the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, signed the Treaty of Versailles, and joined the League of Nations. But Canada was hardly committed to advancing human rights abroad.…

Montreal’s Summer Olympics in 1976 was outrageously expensive, costing $1.65 billion. It took thirty years to pay the debt, despite Mayor Drapeau’s claim in 1970 that the “Olympics could no more have a deficit than a man could have a baby.” The Olympic stadium was…