Citation

Stevens K. Argumentation 2020; 34(1): 55-81.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2020, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s10503-019-09491-1

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The passage of time influences the content of the law and therefore also the validity of legal arguments. This is true even for charter-arguments, despite the widely held view that constitutional law is made to last. In this paper, I investigate the reason why the sanctity-of life argument against physician assisted suicide lost its validity between the Supreme Court decision in Rodriguez v. British Columbia in 1993 and Carter v. Canada in 2015. I suggest that a rhetorical approach to argument evaluation is the best basis for a satisfying explanation. © 2019, Springer Nature B.V.

Language: en

Keywords

Time; Constitutional law; Argument validity; Charter interpretation; Common-law constitutionalism; Living tree constitutionalism; Universal audience; Waluchow