Colour-Coded: A Legal History of Racism in Canada, 1900-1950

Ashley Thomson is a full librarian at Laurentian University and co-editor or co-author of nine books, most recently Margaret Atwood: A Reference Guide, 1988-2005.

In the early 1990s, Backhouse, a professor of law at the University of
Ottawa, set out to research the legal history of racism in Canada
between 1900 and 1950. She analyzed every legal decision published in a
Canadian law report within the established time frame; sampled
unreported decisions in the archives of British Columbia, Saskatchewan,
Ontario, and Nova Scotia; reviewed every federal and provincial statute
enacted in Canada between 1900 and 1950; and ploughed through every
conceivable piece of historical writing on the topic. That footnotes and
bibliography occupy 190 pages of this book is a testament to her
prodigious research.

Backhouse focuses attention on seven pivotal legal cases: Re Eskimos, a
1939 case in which the Supreme Court of Canada had to decide whether
Eskimos were Indians; Wanduta’s Trial, a 1903 Manitoba case in which
Wanduta was charged with violating a prohibition against aboriginal
dance; Sero v. Gault, a 1921 Ontario case in which a Mohawk woman trying
to support her family was prohibited from fishing; the Yee Clun
Incident, a 1924 Saskatchewan case in which the owner of a Chinese
restaurant wanted to hire white women; R. v. Phillips, a 1930 Ontario
case involving the Ku Klux Klan; and the Viola Desmond case wherein a
woman spent a night in a Nova Scotia jail because she wanted to sit on
the main floor of a movie theatre.

The author’s impressive research has not resulted in a dry legal
textbook packed with citations to case law. Her text is well organized,
as gracefully written as it is informative, and enhanced by well-chosen
photographs. This splendid book deserves a wide readership.