The question really revolves a quote that floats around constitutional law. It's something like, no one debates the need for the expansion of civil liberties, what is debated is who gets to decide what a civil liberty is.
This was really a matter surrounding the common law tradition in Canada, that predates the Charter 1982 and the Bill of Rights 1960. Parliamentary debate, when it respects public opinion (through the whole spectrum) and Canada's traditions and conventions of freedom and liberty, has done a pretty good job of protecting and expanding Canadians rights. Further, through this debate, the subject gains legitimacy and support of the populace as citizens to a large extent will engage in partisan debate themselves. This leads to compromise.
When a court rules on civil liberties, it changes the law and doesn't necessarily add the democratic legitimacy to it. This is really judicial activism, something that was argued in regards to the Supreme Court decison on the Gay Marriage reference. Is a law or liberty really legitimate when almost half of the population reject all or part of it?
Now, I am personally not really against gay marriage at all. From my experiences, alot of conservatives aren't either. A lot of conservatives do line up, not surprisingly, on the common law and democratic interpretation of civil liberties. I think Harper was essentially making a gesture to alot of those conservatives.
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