Nellie McClung once wrote, "People must know the past to understand the present and to face the future." It seems to be the ethos that the famed feminist's grandson, Justice John Wesley McClung, took literally. The judge, who died in his sleep on October 21, was an avid student of history. Less than two weeks before his death, at 69, McClung celebrated Edmonton's centennial by christening the Heritage Room at the Edmonton courthouse, a collection of artifacts and photographs of the province's legal history--a project he had personally supported. And those who knew McClung, or Buzz, his nickname since grade school, say it was his admiration for Canada's legal tradition that awakened him to the dangers of increasing judicial activism, and stirred him to resist it.

While McClung took pride in the legacy of his grandmother, his principled, if at times unfashionable, stands often infuriated feminist and gay advocates, and made him a target for many in the Canadian media. He was condemned by homosexual rights activists for what became one of his most famous judgments, in Vriend vs. Alberta, in which he overturned a Court of Queen's Bench ruling that would have opened the door to extending human rights protection to homosexuals. The province had declined to allow the case of the plaintiff, Delwin Vriend, to be heard before a human rights tribunal, after an Edmonton Christian school fired Vriend for being openly gay. On appeal, in 1996, McClung ruled that it was up to the legislature to determine whether or not to extend such protection to homosexuals. In his decision, McClung cautioned against "ideologically driven" judicial decisions that defied sound legal reasoning. "He was definitely from the generation of pre-charter legal and judicial tradition, which saw the primary responsibility for making policies with elected governments," says University of Calgary political science professor Ted Morton, author of The Charter revolution and the Court Party. "That made him the target of criticism for the supporters of judicial activism." Ultimately, the Supreme Court overturned McClung, reading the protection of gays into the charter.

In 1999's R. vs. Ewanchuk, McClung again publicly butted heads with the Supreme Court, after it unanimously ruled to convict an Edmonton man of sexual assault. At the time, it was considered extraordinary in legal circles that the Supreme Court elected to rule at all in the case, rather than sending it back to Alberta, and that one justice, Claire L'Heureux-Dub‚, took the unusual step of writing a separate opinion castigating McClung's ruling on the case. In weighing whether Steve Ewanchuk had committed sexual assault after making sexual advances and touching the breast of a woman who had come to his trailer seeking employment, McClung upheld a lower court's judgment that the woman had implied consent, even though she had said no to Ewanchuk's advances. The motives of Ewanchuk, ruled McClung, were "less criminal than hormonal" and he could have been managed with a "well-chosen expletive, a slap in the face or, if necessary, a well-directed knee."

In her opinion, L'Heureux-Dub‚ singled out McClung's comment that the woman hadn't exactly presented herself to Ewanchuk in a "bonnet or crinolines," arguing that it was the role of the court to "denounce this kind of language, unfortunately still used today, which not only perpetuates archaic myths and stereotypes about the nature of sexual assaults but also ignores the law." The dispute spilled into the open when McClung wrote a letter to the National Post, accusing L'Heureux- Dub‚ of a "graceless slide into personal invective," allowing personal beliefs to colour her judgment, and suggested that it was her ideologically based rulings that were contributing to a rise in male suicides in Quebec. McClung apologized after learning that the Supreme Court judge's husband had killed himself. "People make reference to him because of this one case," says Alberta Chief Justice Allan Wachowich, an old friend. "But he won't be remembered by the legal community, nor should the public at large remember him, for that one case."

McClung's responsibilities as an adjudicator weighed heavily on him. It was usual for him to deliberate upon a decision through sleepless nights. And "he was probably one of the best writers in the history of the court," says Wachowich. Just based on the colourful turns of phrase and tactful use of humour, "you could tell right away it was a McClung decision," he says.

Prior to his appointment to the bench in 1976, McClung was ranked one of Canada's 10 best criminal attorneys by Weekend Magazine in 1975. Yet his interests were well rounded. He had been a competitive golfer in his youth and was known for his exceptional putting skills. "He didn't hit the ball far, but he sure was accurate," says Wachowich, who first came to know McClung when both were young, aspiring duffers. He was a longtime Edmonton sports fan and hunted upland game birds near a lodge he kept in Viking, Alta. He is survived by his wife, Eda.