Sir William Johnstone Ritchie (October 28, 1813 – September 25, 1892) was a Canadian judge who was the second Chief Justice of Canada from 1879 to 1892. He was one of the first judges appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada, and the second-longest serving chief justice of the court after Beverley McLachlin.

The Supreme Court under Ritchie continued to face many of the same criticisms as its predecessor, the Richards Court, including the concerns about the conduct of its justices, the excessive length and lack of clarity in its decisions, and significant delays in the publication of those decisions.

Life and career

Ritchie was born on October 28, 1813, in Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia, to Thomas Ritchie and Elizabeth Wildman Johnstone. He graduated from the Pictou Academy, and went to study law in Halifax in the office of his brother, John William Ritchie, who became a Father of Confederation. He was called to the bar of Nova Scotia in 1837 but moved to Saint John, New Brunswick, and was called to the bar of that province the following year.

In 1846 he was elected to the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick. In keeping with his pledge to resign if a fellow Liberal candidate failed to win a by-election, he gave up his seat in 1851, only to be re-elected three years later. In 1855 he left politics to accept an appointment to the Supreme Court of New Brunswick, and 10 years later he was named Chief Justice of New Brunswick. In 1869, during the development of one of the early drafts of the Supreme Court Act, Ritchie produced a 24-page document criticizing the draft bill for eroding the jurisdiction of provincial courts. Ritchie also advocated for abolishing the vast majority of appeals to the Privy Council, which would not occur in Canada until 1949. Ritchie also suggested that the original Supreme Court would have the best judges from the provincial courts as the first appointments, a suggestion historian Ian Bushnell suggests would have improved the reputation of the Court in its early years.

Supreme Court of Canada

He was appointed to the newly established Supreme Court of Canada on September 30, 1875, and a month later on November 8 took his oath of office from Chief Justice William Buell Richards along with the four other puisne justices: Samuel Henry Strong, Jean-Thomas Taschereau, Télesphore Fournier, William Alexander Henry. Ritchie was appointed at the age of 62 after 20 years of serving as a Judge. His appointment to the Supreme Court was described by historian Bushnell as perfectly "logical and unimpeachable".

In January 1879, Chief Justice William Buell Richards resigned following pressure from his longtime friend, Prime Minister Macdonald, likely due to his deteriorating health. On January 11, 1879, Ritchie was elevated by Prime Minister John A. Macdonald to Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Three days later, John Wellington Gwynne was appointed to fill his seat on the Court. Macdonald's decision to appoint Ritchie was seen as a non-partisan decision as the outgoing Liberal government had intended to elevate Ritchie as the senior justice to Chief Justice position.

On November 1, 1881, Richards was knighted on the occasion of Queen Victoria's 62 birthday. The ceremony took place in Quebec City and was presided over Governor General John Campbell, 9th Duke of Argyll.

Ritchie's tenure as Chief Justice has been criticized by historians for failing to bring coherence and unity to the Court. Ritchie did not sit in four cases where he was related to parties, including estate matters related to the family of his daughter, his brothers, and one other case.

Ritchie's health began to decline in his last years on the bench, and public opinion of the quality of his decisions in this time declined as well. Ritchie died at his home in Ottawa on September 25, 1892, after a relapse of bronchitis at the age of 78. She was the daughter of John Strang, a shipping merchant from St. Andrews.

References

Further reading

  • Supreme Court of Canada Biography