Frank Manning Covert

Frank Manning Covert
Author: Frank Manning Covert
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 260
Release: 2005
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780773528093

Annotation Fifty Years in the Practice of Law is the engrossing autobiography of a public citizen who worked almost non-stop at a career he both loved and cherished. A power - often behind the scenes - in big business, high finance, and Liberal Party politics, Frank Manning Covert advised Pierre Trudeau to seek the leadership of the federal Liberal Party. He was the brains behind Sun Life's head office move from Montreal to Toronto, introduced labour relations as a practice area for corporate lawyers, and reorganized two universities. A member of what Peter Newman christened the "Munitions and Supply Gang" in World War II Ottawa, Covert was a protege of the legendary minister of everything, C.D. Howe, for whom he later helped create the post of chancellor of Dalhousie University. Appointed an officer of the Order of Canada in 1982, Covert's citation noted that he had "given generously of his counsel and leadership to universities, hospitals and charitable organizations"--An understatement typical of the man, who believed that successful work was its own best reward. Based in part on diaries that he kept and carefully preserved for some sixty years, Fifty Years in the Practice of Law provides a significant primary source for the history of the Canadian legal profession in the twentieth century.

Frank Manning Covert

Frank Manning Covert
Author: Barry Cahill
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2004-12-08
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 077357235X

A member of what Peter Newman christened the "Munitions and Supply Gang" in World War II Ottawa, Covert was a protégé of the legendary minister of everything, C.D. Howe, for whom he later helped create the post of chancellor of Dalhousie University. Appointed an officer of the Order of Canada in 1982, Covert's citation noted that he had "given generously of his counsel and leadership to universities, hospitals and charitable organizations" - an understatement typical of the man, who believed that successful work was its own best reward.

Inside the Law

Inside the Law
Author: Carol Wilton
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 606
Release: 1996-12-15
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1442651288

Law firms are important economic institutions in this country: they collect hundreds of millions of dollars annually in fees, they order the affairs of businesses and of many government agencies, and their members include some of the most influential Canadians. Some firms have a history stretching back nearly two hundred years, and many are over a century old. Yet the history of law firms in Canada has remained largely unknown. This collection of essays, Volume VII in the Osgoode Society's series of Essays in the History of Canadian Law, is the first focused study of a variety of law firms and how they have evolved over a century and a half, from the golden age of the sole practitioner in the pre-industrial era to the recent rise of the mega-firm. The volume as a whole is an exploration of the impact of economic and social change on law-firm culture and organization. The introduction by Carol Wilton provides a chronological overview of Canadian law-firm evolution and emphasizes the distinctiveness of Canadian law-firm history.

The Thousandth Man

The Thousandth Man
Author: Barry Cahill
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 324
Release: 2000-01-01
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780802048424

James McGregor Stewart (1889-1955) was perhaps the foremost Canadian corporate lawyer of his day. He was also an appellate counsel, venture capitalist, Conservative Party fundraiser, bibliographer of Rudyard Kipling, and sometime university teacher of classics. A leader of the bar in the inter-war period, he was the first Maritimer to serve as president of the Canadian Bar Association. He distinguished himself mainly in constitutional cases before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. During his career, Stewart was also head of the leading law firm in eastern Canada (now Stewart McKelvey Stirling Scales), director and vice-president of the Royal Bank of Canada, and senior counsel to the Royal Commission on Dominion-Provincial Relations. Above all, Stewart was committed to the idea of law as a truly learned profession and to the bar as the most important legal institution. To this day, no lawyer has held such prestige and power both within and outside Atlantic Canada; in his time he was the only Maritime lawyer who gained full acceptance by every branch of the Canadian establishment. Thematic rather that chronological in approach, this fascinating legal biography provides both a history of a uniquely Canadian career and an interpretation of its significance for Stewart's time and ours.

Paths to the Bench

Paths to the Bench
Author: Dale Brawn
Publisher: UBC Press
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2014-09-15
Genre: Law
ISBN: 0774826789

A lawyer wanting to become a judge in early 20th-century Manitoba could attract the attention of his peers through his work – but it was a friendship with a powerful mentor that got him to the bench. In Paths to the Bench, Dale Brawn looks at the appointments and careers of early judges who were charged with laying the legal foundations of a province. By looking at both official records and correspondence from this era, Brawn uncovers the highly political nature of the judicial appointment process and the intricate bonds that ensured that judges acquired the values not of their society, but of their fellowship groups. A fascinating look at the careers of practical, hard-headed, and influential judges, Paths to the Bench is also an incisive study of the political nature of Canada’s judicial appointment process.

Professional Autonomy and the Public Interest

Professional Autonomy and the Public Interest
Author: Barry Cahill
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages: 275
Release: 2019-11-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 0773559787

Formed in 1825, the Nova Scotia Barristers' Society is the second-oldest law society in common-law Canada, after the Law Society of Ontario. Yet despite its founders' ambitions, it did not become the regulator of the legal profession in Nova Scotia for nearly seventy-five years. In this institutional history of the Nova Scotia Barristers' Society from its inception to the Legal Profession Act of 2005, Barry Cahill provides a chronological exploration of the profession's regulation in Nova Scotia and the critical role of the society. Based on extensive research conducted on internal documents, legislative records, and legal and general-interest periodicals and newspapers, Professional Autonomy and the Public Interest demonstrates that the inauguration of the Nova Scotia Barristers' Society was the first giant step on the long road to self-regulation. Highlighting the inherent tensions between protection of professional self-interest and protection of the larger public interest, Cahill explains that while this radical innovation was opposed by both lawyers and judges, it was ultimately imposed by the Liberal government in 1899. In light of emerging models of regulation in the twenty-first century, Professional Autonomy and the Public Interest is a timely look back at the origins of professional regulatory bodies and the evolution of law affecting the legal profession in Atlantic Canada.

J.L. Ilsley: A Political Biography

J.L. Ilsley: A Political Biography
Author: Barry Cahill
Publisher: James Lorimer & Company
Total Pages: 214
Release: 2021-11-09
Genre: History
ISBN: 1459506871

A farmer’s son from rural Nova Scotia, J. L. Ilsley (1894–1967) is an almost forgotten figure who played a key role in government during the Second World War, even though he was despised by Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King. Ilsley was spectacularly successful in cajoling and compelling Canadians to pay for the war. He became a highly regarded national figure. He gradually established his claim to succeed William Lyon Mackenzie King as Prime Minister when the time came. Ultimately, in his devious way, King thwarted Ilsley’s ambition. Ilsley abandoned politics to take up the post of chief justice in Nova Scotia for 17 years. His place in Canadian political history has been undermined by family members who destroyed his personal papers. Historian and biographer Barry Cahill has pieced together the story of Ilsley’s career for the first time. He used the personal papers of other Ottawa figures of the times, previously secret cabinet records, and glimpses of the man as seen by others in his circle – including, of course, Mackenzie King in his voluminous diaries.