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Date of birth: Place of birth:
Calling:
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Photo : Larry Munns avec l'autorisation de la Cour suprème du Canada
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His mother came from
Chicoutimi and his father from Acadia. He spent his
entire childhood and teenage years in Moncton, New
Brunswick. He studied medicine at Université
Laval. He obtained a Licenciate in Public Law from
the Université de Moncton in 1970, a Licence
d'études supérieures en droit public
from the University of Nice in 1972 and, in 1978, a
degree in common law from the University of Ottawa.
He was called to the New Brunswick, Alberta and
Ontario Bars in 1980, 1985 and 1986,
respectively.
He began his career in 1980
as a legal translator for the Government of New
Brunswick. Three years later, he was appointed
Secretary General of the Société des
Acadiens du Nouveau Brunswick, a position he held
for a year, before becoming administrative
assistant, agency director and then Vice President
and Director of Marketing for Assumption Mutual
Life Insurance Company. In 1978, he joined the
faculty of the Université de Moncton's
École de droit and accepted the deanship in
1980. He held a senior position in the Directorate
of Official Languages Promotion at the Secretary of
State Department of Canada. In 1984, he became
associate dean in the common law section at the
University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law and, from
1987 to 1989, he practised law in Ottawa. From 1989
to 1994, he was President and CEO of Assumption
Life of Moncton. He was appointed to the New
Brunswick Court of Appeal in March 1995. He has
presided over cases in constitutional law,
administrative law and especially in the field of
education law.
He fought hard for
recognition of the rights of francophone minorities
across Canada: school and language rights and
access to courts in the language of the minority. A
fervent activist in the Fédération
des communautés francophones et acadiennes,
he was one of the artisans of New Brunswick's
bilingual status, but it was the Mahé case
that he piloted to the Supreme Court of Canada, on
the right of francophones to manage their own
schools, that attracted the greatest admiration. In
1993, his contribution was lauded by the
Association des juristes d'expression
française du Nouveau-Brunswick. He was also
awarded the medal of the 125th Anniversary of
Canada, and was appointed member of the Ordre des
francophones d'Amérique in 1981 by the
Government of Quebec.
On October 1, 1997, the
Minister of Justice and Solicitor General of
Canada, Anne McLellan, announced the appointment to
the Supreme Court of Canada of the Hon.J.E. Michel
Bastarache, of Fredricton, J.A. (Justice of the New
Brunswick Court of Appeal). His mastery of Canada's
two main systems of private civil law and common
law, and his fight for the defence of the rights of
the francophone minorities of Canada, have received
their reward.
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