The legal meaning of bankruptcy and insolvency law has often remained elusive, even to practitioners and scholars in the field, despite having been enshrined in Canada’s Constitution since Confederation. Federal jurisdiction in this area must be measured against provincial powers over property and civil rights, among others. Debt and Federalism traces conceptions of the bankruptcy and insolvency power through four cases that form the constitutional foundation of the Canadian bankruptcy system: the 1894 Voluntary Assignments Case, Royal Bank of Canada v Larue in 1928, the 1934 Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act Reference Case, and the 1937 Farmers' Creditors Arrangement Act Reference Case. Together, they produced the bedrock for modern understandings of bankruptcy and insolvency law.

Debt and Federalism is the first complete account of the Canadian federal bankruptcy and insolvency power, showing how four landmark cases form the bedrock of the modern bankruptcy system.

The legal meaning of bankruptcy and insolvency law has often remained elusive, even to practitioners and scholars in the field, despite having been enshrined in Canada’s Constitution since Confederation. Federal jurisdiction in this area must be measured against provincial powers over property and civil rights, among others. Debt and Federalism traces changing conceptions of the bankruptcy and insolvency power through four landmark cases that form the constitutional foundation of the Canadian bankruptcy system: the 1894 Voluntary Assignments Case, Royal Bank of Canada v Larue in 1928, the 1934 Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act Reference Case, and the 1937 Farmers' Creditors Arrangement Act Reference Case. Together, these decisions ultimately produced the bedrock for modern understandings of bankruptcy and insolvency law. Thomas G.W. Telfer and Virginia Torrie draw on archival and legal sources to analyze the decisions from a historical and doctrinal perspective. This astute book demonstrates that the legal changes introduced by these landmark cases underpin contemporary bankruptcy and insolvency law and scholarship.

Introduction: An Untested Federal Power

1 The Voluntary Assignments Case (1894) and Lord Herschell’s Dicta

2 Royal Bank of Canada v Larue and the Brave New World of Bankruptcy Law

3 The Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act Reference Case and the Debtor’s Financial Condition

4 The Farmers’ Creditors Arrangement Act Reference Case and Rehabilitating Debtors

Conclusion: A Modern View of Bankruptcy and Insolvency

Notes; Bibliography; Index of Cases; Index

This book is a masterpiece of academic contribution enriching our understanding on the bankruptcy law development in Canada and beyond … I am overwhelmed by the quality of the in-depth analysis in this book.

Scholars and students of bankruptcy and insolvency, debtor-creditor relations, constitutional law, and federalism will find this work invaluable, as will lawyers and judges who practise in these areas.

Telfer and Torrie offer a highly readable and deeply researched account of the compelling history of the federal bankruptcy and insolvency power in Canada that will be of great interest to law reformers, lawyers, and historians, as well as a lay audience.

CA

Thomas G.W. Telfer is a professor and teaching fellow in the Faculty of Law at Western University. He is the author of Ruin and Redemption: A Struggle for a Canadian Bankruptcy Law, 1867–1919 and co-editor of Bankruptcy and Insolvency Law in Canada: Cases, Materials, and Problems. Virginia Torrie is an associate professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Manitoba. She is the author of Reinventing Bankruptcy Law: A History of the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act, as well as several articles on bankruptcy and insolvency law.

While the tradition of any book review is to mention a few blemishes, I was hard pressed to find any... This is an excellent, thought-provoking and informative book.

The legal meaning of bankruptcy and insolvency law has often remained elusive, even to practitioners and scholars in the field, despite having been enshrined in Canada’s Constitution since Confederation. Federal jurisdiction in this area must be measured against provincial powers over property, civil rights, and other aspects of provincial power.

Debt and Federalism traces changing conceptions of the federal bankruptcy and insolvency power through four landmark cases that together form the constitutional foundation of the Canadian bankruptcy system: the 1894 Voluntary Assignments Case, Royal Bank of Canada v Larue in 1928, the 1934 Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act Reference Case, and the 1937 Farmers' Creditors Arrangement Act Reference Case. At times when federal and provincial views appeared seemingly irreconcilable, each decision incrementally laid the groundwork for the next constitutional challenge, ultimately producing the bedrock for modern understandings of bankruptcy and insolvency law.

Thomas G.W. Telfer and Virginia Torrie draw on a wide array of archival and legal sources to analyze the four decisions from a historical and doctrinal perspective, and to situate them within the appropriate social, economic, and political contexts. This astute book demonstrates that together, the specific legal changes brought about by these landmark cases underpin contemporary bankruptcy and insolvency law and scholarship.

This book, written by two leading historians of Canadian bankruptcy law, provides a critical historical examination of four landmark cases in the judicial evolution of Canadian bankruptcy and insolvency law. It demonstrates how each decision, occurring at critical historical junctures, brought about incremental changes in the law that, taken together, constructed the modern scaffolding of Canadian bankruptcy and insolvency law.