Peter Wardell Hogg (12 March 1939 – 4 February 2020) was a New Zealand–born Canadian

legal scholar Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior, with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been variously described as a science and as the a ...

and

lawyer A lawyer is a person who is qualified to offer advice about the law, draft legal documents, or represent individuals in legal matters. The exact nature of a lawyer's work varies depending on the legal jurisdiction and the legal system, as w ...

. He was best known as a leading authority on

Canadian constitutional law Canadian constitutional law () is the area of Canadian law relating to the interpretation and application of the Constitution of Canada by the courts. All laws of Canada, both provincial and federal, must conform to the Constitution and any la ...

, with the most academic citations in Supreme Court jurisprudence of any living scholar during his lifetime, according to Emmett Macfarlane of the University of Waterloo.

Early life and education

Born in

Lower Hutt Lower Hutt () is a list of cities in New Zealand, city in the Wellington Region of New Zealand. Administered by the Hutt City Council, it is one of the four cities that constitute the Wellington#Wellington metropolitan area, Wellington metropoli ...

, New Zealand, on 12 March 1939, Hogg attended Nelson College from 1952 to 1956. He earned his LLB from Victoria University College, a constituent college of the

University of New Zealand A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Uni ...

, in 1962, his

LLM A large language model (LLM) is a language model trained with Self-supervised learning, self-supervised machine learning on a vast amount of text, designed for natural language processing tasks, especially Natural language generation, language g ...

from

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

in 1963, and his

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

from

Monash University Monash University () is a public university, public research university based in Melbourne, Victoria (state), Victoria, Australia. Named after World War I general Sir John Monash, it was founded in 1958 and is the second oldest university in the ...

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

, Australia, in 1970.

Career

In 1970, he was appointed

Professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...

Law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior, with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been variously described as a science and as the ar ...

Osgoode Hall Law School Osgoode Hall Law School, commonly shortened to Osgoode, is the law school of York University in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is home to the Law Commission of Ontario, the ''Journal of Law and Social Policy'', and the ''Osgoode Hall Law Journal ...

in Toronto and was appointed Dean in 1998. In 2003 he accepted a position as scholar in residence at the

law firm A law firm is a business entity formed by one or more lawyers to engage in the practice of law. The primary service rendered by a law firm is to advise consumer, clients (individuals or corporations) about their legal rights and Obligation, respon ...

of Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP. Hogg wrote several books, including ''Constitutional Law of Canada'', the single most-cited book in decisions of the

Supreme Court of Canada The Supreme Court of Canada (SCC; , ) is the highest court in the judicial system of Canada. It comprises nine justices, whose decisions are the ultimate application of Canadian law, and grants permission to between 40 and 75 litigants eac ...

. In 2004, he was lead counsel for the Canadian government in the Supreme Court's same-sex marriage reference. Hogg also advised the committee that studied Marshall Rothstein's nomination to the Supreme Court, saying the creation of the committee was important to Canada's legal history and informing it that it should not ask political questions about

abortion Abortion is the early termination of a pregnancy by removal or expulsion of an embryo or fetus. Abortions that occur without intervention are known as miscarriages or "spontaneous abortions", and occur in roughly 30–40% of all pregnan ...

and

same-sex marriage Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same legal Legal sex and gender, sex. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 38 countries, with a total population of 1.5 ...

. Hogg supported judicial restraint in cases dealing with disputes over

Canadian federalism Canadian federalism () involves the current nature and historical development of the federal system in Canada. Canada is a federation with eleven components: the national Government of Canada and ten Provinces and territories of Canada, p ...

. Hogg was the academic

supervisor A supervisor, or lead, (also known as foreman, boss, overseer, facilitator, monitor, area coordinator, line-manager or sometimes gaffer) is the job title of a lower-level management position and role that is primarily based on authority over la ...

of Randal Graham during Graham's

studies at

Death

Hogg died on 4 February 2020.

Honours

* 1980 – appointed a

Queen's Counsel A King's Counsel (Post-nominal letters, post-nominal initials KC) is a senior lawyer appointed by the monarch (or their Viceroy, viceregal representative) of some Commonwealth realms as a "Counsel learned in the law". When the reigning monarc ...

* 1988 – named a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Canada The Royal Society of Canada (RSC; , SRC), also known as the Academies of Arts, Humanities, and Sciences of Canada (French: ''Académies des arts, des lettres et des sciences du Canada''), is the senior national, bilingual council of distinguishe ...

. * 1991 – made an Officer of the

Order of Canada The Order of Canada () is a Canadian state order, national order and the second-highest Award, honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the Canadian Centennial, ce ...

. * 1996 – awarded Law Society Medal by the Law Society of Upper Canada. * 2003 – promoted to Companion of the Order of Canada. * 2003 – received the

Canadian Bar Association The Canadian Bar Association (CBA), or Association du barreau canadien (ABC) in French, represents over 37,000 lawyers, judges, notaries, law teachers, and law students from across Canada. History The Association's first Annual Meeting was ...

's Ramon John Hnatyshyn Award for Law, which recognizes outstanding contributions to the law and legal scholarship in Canada. * 2003 – received from the

Law Society of Upper Canada The Law Society of Ontario (LSO; ) is the law society responsible for the self-regulation of lawyers and paralegals in the Canadian province of Ontario. Founded in 1797 as the Law Society of Upper Canada (LSUC; ), its name was changed by statu ...

an honorary degree of

Doctor of Laws A Doctor of Laws (LL.D.) is a doctoral degree in legal studies. The abbreviation LL.D. stands for ''Legum Doctor'', with the double “L” in the abbreviation referring to the early practice in the University of Cambridge to teach both canon law ...

(LLD) * 2005 – received from

Université de Montréal The Université de Montréal (; UdeM; ) is a French-language public research university in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university's main campus is located in the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood of Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce on M ...

an honorary Doctorate. * 2006 – received from

Victoria University of Wellington Victoria University of Wellington (), also known by its shorter names "VUW" or "Vic", is a public university, public research university in Wellington, New Zealand. It was established in 1897 by Act of New Zealand Parliament, Parliament, and w ...

in New Zealand an honorary Doctor of Laws degree (LLD) * 2006 – received from York University an honorary Doctor of Laws.

Selected works

* * *

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hogg, Peter 1939 births 2020 deaths Lawyers in Ontario Legal educators Canadian university and college faculty deans Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada Companions of the Order of Canada Monash Law School alumni New Zealand emigrants to Canada Harvard Law School alumni Victoria University of Wellington alumni Academic staff of York University People from Lower Hutt Academic staff of the Osgoode Hall Law School Canadian scholars of constitutional law People educated at Nelson College Canadian King's Counsel