“Guardian of Civil Rights … Medieval Relic”: The Civil Jury in Canada

Bogart offers some explanations of why Canadian civil juries exist only at the margins by examining the availability of civil juries, empirical evidence regarding their use and cost in Ontario Canada and academic and policy debates concerning their role

Appropriate and Just : Section 24 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Question of Judicial Legitimacy

At the heart of procedural law lie questions concerning the role of courts in a liberal democratic state. What is the essence of their function? What is the proper relationship between the judiciary and other governmental institutions? What is the well-spring for values with which courts can make law? The questions are perennials and will be asked so long as there is interest in the workings and malfunctions of all aspects of government. Courts, like all institutions of government, are continually being assessed on their own terms and in relation to other branches. In Canada this examination has received a new impetus. The recently proclaimed Charter of Rights and Freedoms1 adorns the courts with new status. They have now been given an explicit role in determining the ambit of government power. Their review of legislation and legislative actions is no longer limited, as it previously was, to refereeing between levels of government in this federal state. The courts can now invalidate statutes and strike at governmental actions based on invasion of certain proclaimed fundamental rights and freedoms. They stand now as a bulwark between citizen and state

Helping Concerned Volunteers Working out of Their Kitchens : Funding Citizen Participation in Administrative Decision Making

Broad citizen participation in decision making by administrative bodies is important in achieving fairness, improving the quality of decisions, and realizing accountability and legitimacy. Yet such broad participation often hinges on adequate financial capacity. In this regard, the authors review a number of mechanisms used for funding citizen participation. These mechanisms are variations of essentially two models: public funding (direct and indirect) and direct funding by proponents. The article concludes with a plea for such mechanisms--even in a time of severe financial restraint-as one reflection of a vigorous participatory democracy

Access to Justice for a New Century: The Way Forward

This book is a timely addition to the literature on access to justice. The book\u27s essays address all aspects of the topic, including differing views on the meaning of access to justice; ways to improve access to legal services; litigation and its role in achieving social justice; and the roles of lawyers, citizens, and legal insitutions. Access to Justice for a New Century is based on papers given at an international symposium presented by the Law Society of Upper Canada, sponsored by the Law Foundation of Ontario.https://digitalcommons.osgoode.yorku.ca/faculty_books/1095/thumbnail.jp

Structure of the near-surface layers of the Sun: asphericity and time variation

We present results on the structure of the near-surface layers of the Sun obtained by inverting frequencies of high-degree solar modes from "ring diagrams". We have results for eight epochs between June 1996 and October 2003. The frequencies for each epoch were obtained from ring diagrams constructed from MDI Dopplergrams spanning complete Carrington rotations. We find that there is a substantial latitudinal variation of both sound speed and the adiabatic index Gamma_1 in the outer 2% of the Sun. We find that both the sound-speed and Gamma_1 profiles change with changes in the level of solar activity. In addition, we also study differences between the northern and southern hemispheres of the Sun and find a small asymmetry that appears to reflect the difference in magnetic activity between the two hemispheres.Comment: To appear in ApJ (January 2007

Few smooth d-polytopes with n lattice points

We prove that, for fixed n there exist only finitely many embeddings of Q-factorial toric varieties X into P^n that are induced by a complete linear system. The proof is based on a combinatorial result that for fixed nonnegative integers d and n, there are only finitely many smooth d-polytopes with n lattice points. We also enumerate all smooth 3-polytopes with at most 12 lattice points. In fact, it is sufficient to bound the singularities and the number of lattice points on edges to prove finiteness.Comment: 20+2 pages; major revision: new author, new structure, new result

Two-Dimensional Helioseismic Power, Phase, and Coherence Spectra of {\it Solar Dynamics Observatory} Photospheric and Chromospheric Observables

While the {\it Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager} (HMI) onboard the {\it Solar Dynamics Observatory} (SDO) provides Doppler velocity [$V$], continuum intensity [$I_C$], and line-depth [$Ld$] observations, each of which is sensitive to the five-minute acoustic spectrum, the {\it Atmospheric Imaging Array} (AIA) also observes at wavelengths -- specifically the 1600 and 1700 Angstrom bands -- that are partly formed in the upper photosphere and have good sensitivity to acoustic modes. In this article we consider the characteristics of the spatio--temporal Fourier spectra in AIA and HMI observables for a 15-degree region around NOAA Active Region 11072. We map the spatio--temporal-power distribution for the different observables and the HMI Line Core [$I_L$], or Continuum minus Line Depth, and the phase and coherence functions for selected observable pairs, as a function of position and frequency. Five-minute oscillation power in all observables is suppressed in the sunspot and also in plage areas. Above the acoustic cut-off frequency, the behaviour is more complicated: power in HMI $I_C$ is still suppressed in the presence of surface magnetic fields, while power in HMI $I_L$ and the AIA bands is suppressed in areas of surface field but enhanced in an extended area around the active region, and power in HMI $V$ is enhanced in a narrow zone around strong-field concentrations and suppressed in a wider surrounding area. The relative phase of the observables, and their cross-coherence functions, are also altered around the active region. These effects may help us to understand the interaction of waves and magnetic fields in the different layers of the photosphere, and will need to be taken into account in multi-wavelength local helioseismic analysis of active regions.Comment: 18 pages, 15 figures, to be published in Solar Physic