Author Archives: J.W.J. Bowden

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About J.W.J. Bowden

My area of academic expertise lies in Canadian political institutions, especially the Crown, political executive, and conventions of Responsible Government; since 2011, I have made a valuable contribution to the scholarship by having been published and cited extensively. I’m also a contributing editor to the Dorchester Review and a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Parliamentary and Political Law.

Which Are Better: Endnotes or Footnotes?


First, I’m sure that we can agree that Chicago-style notes are vastly superior to the stupid in-text citations of APA. Incidentally, since Cambridge University Press journals use Chicago while the Oxford University Press journals mandate some ghastly in-text citations, we can conclude that Cambridge … Continue reading

Posted in Random Thoughts | 4 Comments

Tony Blair’s Canadian Style of Prime Ministerial Government


The British would certainly not say outright that Tony Blair governed like a Canadian prime minister, because it would be beneath the Mother Country to acknowledge one of her former Crown colonies as having provided an example in government. But that is the best … Continue reading

Posted in Crown (Powers and Office) | 1 Comment

Senator Pratte’s Doublespeak on the Two O Canadas


This country has, in fact, two national anthems: the original French O Canada, which has remained unchanged since 1880, and Weir’s English version of O Canada. The two anthems say completely different things and bear no resemblance to one another, … Continue reading

Posted in Dorchester Review, O Canada | 3 Comments

Justin Trudeau Will Make Prorogation Great Again


I don’t want to pre-empt my upcoming longer article on this subject, so I will boil down this subject to its essence. The Liberals pledged in their election platform from 2015 that they would never use prorogation for purely political … Continue reading

Posted in Crown (Powers and Office), Dorchester Review, Prorogation | 2 Comments

The O Canada Bill: Third Reading Purgatory & Grammatical Pedantry


In my AP English class in 2004, I recall that several of my classmates protested against diagramming sentences on the erroneous and misplaced grounds that “Our boss will never ask us to diagram a sentence!” (Incidentally, the fact that we were using … Continue reading

Posted in Dorchester Review, History of British North America, O Canada | 1 Comment