This focus on shifting legislative and social facts is conceptually linked to Lord Sankey’s famous “living tree” metaphor, which acknowledges that interpretations of the Constitution Act, 1867 evolve over time, given shifts in the relevant legislative and social context: Edwards v. Attorney-General for Canada, 1929 CanLII 438 (UK JCPC), [1930] 1 D.L.R. 98 (P.C.), at pp. 106-7. In Edwards, both legal and social changes that had opened the door to women’s increased integration into public life after Confederation confirmed that it was no longer appropriate to read the term “person” in the impugned constitutional provision as anything other than its plain gender-neutral meaning: pp. 110-12.
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