First Twitter Moot Court Takes Place In Canada

by Keith Edmund White
Editor-in-Chief

I find it stunning that this story hasn't gotten more play in U.S. law blogs, but the West Coast Environmental Law (WCEL) hosted the first twitter moot court. The competition simulated an appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada on the May 2011 Court of Appeal for British Colombia's decision in West Moberly First Nations v. British Columbia. The case, which suspended a coal exploration permit granted to First Coal Corporation in threatened caribou habitat, "is precedent-setting, confirming that the government of British Columbia has an obligation to ensure that incremental intrusions on the habitat of an at-risk species do not, over time, deprive a First Nation of its Treaty rights."

Here's the twitter transcript, of the two-appellant, one respondent, and one intervenor-case, I'd recommend scrolling up from 36 (the document starts from the end of the competition to the beginning, unfortunately). Dalhousie, Osgoode, Ottawa, UBC and UVic competed the twitter moot. Dalhousie won the competition, but Team UVic won the public's vote of those who followed the debate (41% to Ottawa's 39%).

Below is one of the exchanges that suggests twitter could be the future of appellate argumentation: