The third volume in the Canadian State Trials series examines Canadian legal responses to real or perceived threats to the safety and security of the state from 1840 to 1914, a period of extensive challenges associated with fundamental political and socio-economic change. Trials for treason and related political offences, suspensions of habeas corpus, and other public order and security-related measures, supported by new institutions such as secret policing, are studied in essays by leading scholars in the field.

The book is divided into four parts: trials and related proceedings arising from the Fenian invasions; attempts to regulate large-scale manifestations of public disorder; trials following the North-West Rebellions of 1870 and 1885, including the Riel trial; and the modernization and enforcement of Canada’s national security laws. Building upon the established scholarship of the series, the essays place these legal responses in context, shedding light on the complex and changing relationship between law and politics in Canadian history.

Barry Wright is a professor in the Departments of Law and History, Director of Kroeger College, and Associate Dean of the Faculty of Public Affairs at Carleton University

Barry Wright's profile page

Susan Binnie has taught criminology and legal history at the University of Toronto, York University, and the University of Ottawa. She is a former legal historian at the Law Society of Upper Canada.

Susan Binnie's profile page

‘Binnie & Wright have produced a book that provides much needed background to the current situation in Canada, and one that will prove to be an excellent resource for scholars of modern legal responses to security threats… This volume highlights the importance of this series to our understanding of both Canadian legal history and the development of the Canadian state.’

<em>Labour/Le Travail</em> vol 66: Fall 2010