Dennis G. Molinaro. An Exceptional Law: Section 98 and the Emergency State, 1919–1936.

Abstract

Scholarly attention to the history of the legal repression of perceived radicalism in Canada has grown substantially since 9/11. This interest infuses the recent volumes of the Canadian state-trials series published by the University of Toronto Press and the Osgoode Society for Canadian Legal History, and other works such as Secret Service: Political Policing in Canada from the Fenians to Fortress America by Reg Whitaker, Gregory S. Kealey, and Andrew Parnaby (2012). Present-day concerns also permeate An Exceptional Law: Section 98 and the Emergency State, 1919–1936, Dennis G. Molinaro’s detailed examination of Section 98 of the Canadian Criminal Code. This section, passed by Parliament in 1919, took aim at “unlawful associations” and their members. An association was unlawful if its professed purpose was to “bring about any governmental, industrial or economic change within Canada by the use of force, violence, terrorism, or physical injury to person or property” (quoted on 239). This very broad definition of such associations allowed authorities to silence critics of the status quo, particularly Communists. Molinaro suggests that examining repressive laws “[helps] us find possible solutions to present-day problems” (5), and he concludes his study by connecting Section 98 to recent anti-terrorism legislation, the response to G20 riots in Toronto, and the Edward Snowden revelations.