John "Jack" Howard Sissons (July 14, 1892 – November 11, 1969) was a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

barrister, author, judge and federal politician.SISSONS, John Howard
/ref>

Early life

Sissons was born in

Orillia Orillia is a city in Ontario, Canada. It is in Simcoe County between Lake Couchiching and Lake Simcoe. Although it is geographically located within Simcoe County, the city is a single-tier municipality. It is part of the Huronia region of ...

, Ontario and, at the age of four, contracted

polio Poliomyelitis, commonly shortened to polio, is an infectious disease caused by the poliovirus. Approximately 70% of cases are asymptomatic; mild symptoms which can occur include sore throat and fever; in a proportion of cases more severe s ...

, which injured his leg and he walked with a limp for the rest of his life.John Howard Sissons at The Arctic Instuite of North America
/ref> His father worked at the Orillia Mental Asylum and Sissons was also employed there during the summer.
Having left Orillia to teach in both Ontario and

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

Sissons then moved to Kingston to attend Queen's University. In 1917 he returned to Alberta and passed the

bar examination A bar examination is an examination administered by the bar association of a jurisdiction that a lawyer must pass in order to be admitted to the bar of that jurisdiction. Australia Administering bar exams is the responsibility of the bar associ ...

Edmonton Edmonton ( ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region. The city ancho ...

in 1920. He then moved to

Grande Prairie Grande Prairie is a city in northwest Alberta, Canada within the southern portion of an area known as Peace River Country. It is located at the intersection of Highway 43 (part of the CANAMEX Corridor) and Highway 40 (the Bighorn Highway), a ...

to practice law.

Federal politics

Sissons was elected to the House of Commons of Canada for the

Peace River The Peace River (french: links=no, rivière de la Paix) is a river in Canada that originates in the Rocky Mountains of northern British Columbia and flows to the northeast through northern Alberta. The Peace River joins the Athabasca River in th ...

electoral district in the

1940 Canadian federal election The 1940 Canadian federal election was held March 26, 1940, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 19th Parliament of Canada. Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King's Liberal Party was re-elected to their second consecuti ...

. Representing the

Liberal Party The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left. __TOC__ Active liberal parties This is a li ...

he defeated incumbent René-Antoine Pelletier to win a term in office. Sissons was defeated in the 1945 Canadian federal election by

Social Credit Social credit is a distributive philosophy of political economy developed by C. H. Douglas. Douglas attributed economic downturns to discrepancies between the cost of goods and the compensation of the workers who made them. To combat what he ...

leader Solon Earl Low.

Judge

After losing the 1945 election he was made a judge of the Alberta District Court and became the chief judge in 1950. Sissons was appointed as the first judge to the Supreme Court of the Northwest Territories (then called the Territorial Court of the Northwest Territories) in 1955. He became the first judge to serve on the Supreme court since 1905.''Images of Justice: A legal history of the Northwest Territories as traced through the Yellowknife courthouse collection of Inuit sculpture'' by Dorothy Harley Eber He made many landmark decisions, and was very fair in his rulings. One intriguing move he made was to hire an

Inuit Inuit (; iu, ᐃᓄᐃᑦ 'the people', singular: Inuk, , dual: Inuuk, ) are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwest Territories ...

carver to make soapstone carvings of prominent murder cases he presided over throughout the Far North; he was inspired to do this when he ruled in the favour of traditional justice in the case of a young boy, and the boy presented him with a soapstone carving after the trial. These carvings are on display in the present day Yellowknife Court House, and the collection continued to be added to by Justice William Morrow when he took Justice Sissons’ place.

Notable Inuit cases

* Kikkik * Stephen Angulalik

Heritage

Sissons Lake, Sissons Court (the street, not the hall of justice), and the Ecole J.H. Sissons School in

Yellowknife Yellowknife (; Dogrib: ) is the capital, largest community, and only city in the Northwest Territories, Canada. It is on the northern shore of Great Slave Lake, about south of the Arctic Circle, on the west side of Yellowknife Bay near the ...

are named after him.

References

External links

*
1962 Regina v. Sikyea
NWT historical Timeline, Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre {{DEFAULTSORT:Sissons, John 1892 births 1969 deaths Judges in the Northwest Territories Liberal Party of Canada MPs Members of the House of Commons of Canada from Alberta People from Orillia People with polio Writers from Ontario Writers from Yellowknife