Date: 24 July 2006 16:29:56

From: John Swan

Subject: Extreme prolixity of the High Court of Australia

A close runner-up is Canadian National Railway Co. v. Norsk Pacific Steamship Co., [1992] 1 S.C.R. 1021; 91 D.L.R. (4th) 289, with some 52,000 words.

Mercifully, the Supreme Court, unlike some other Canadian courts, seems to avoid footnotes.

John

-----Original Message-----
From: DAVID CHEIFETZ
Sent: July 24, 2006 11:59 AM
Subject: Re: ODG: Extreme prolixity of the High Court of Australia

Fortunately, the Supreme Court of Canada no longer issues serial opinions so that tends to cut down on the prolixity and it doesn't use footnotes very often.

Off hand, the longest set of reasons (including a dissent is) in a tort case that I recall is London Drugs Ltd. v. Kuehne & Nagel International Ltd., [1992] 3 S.C.R. 299 (here and here).

London Drugs is about 54,000 words including cases names - it's 102 pages in MS Word using 12 point Times New Roman - and 298 "numbered" paragraphs in the version of the reasons produced by Carswell/Thompson. The official version doesn't have numbered paragraphs. There are more prolix trial judgments, of course, which we will attribute the need to review the evidence adequately.

<<<< Previous Message  ~  Index  ~  Next Message >>>>>