Laurie Ackermann

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Laurie Ackermann
Transvaal Provincial
Personal details
Born
Lourens Wepener Hugo Ackermann

(1934-01-14) 14 January 1934 (age 90)
Transvaal
Union of South Africa
Spouse
Denise Ackermann
​
(m. 1958)​
EducationPretoria Boys High School
Alma materStellenbosch University
Worcester College, Oxford

Lourens Wepener Hugo "Laurie" Ackermann (born 14 January 1934) is a South African retired

advocate, and a judge of the Supreme Court of South Africa
.

Born in

Cape Provincial Division
until he was elevated to the Constitutional Court in August 1994. He retired from the judiciary in January 2004.

Early life and education

Ackermann was born on 14 January 1934 in

LLB in 1957.[1][3]

Apartheid-era career

In the first half of 1958, Ackermann clerked for Justice

Transvaal Provincial Division of the Supreme Court of South Africa.[1][3] During this period, he was also the national vice-president of the National Institute for the Prevention of Crime and the Rehabilitation of Offenders.[3]

In September 1987, he retired from the bench in order to take up an academic appointment at his alma mater, becoming the Harry Oppenheimer Chair in Human Rights Law at Stellenbosch University.

human rights law expert Louis Henkin, he came to endorse a "total rejection of apartheid" and of the sovereignty of the apartheid-era Parliament.[2] According to Ackermann, he was forced to resign because State President P. W. Botha would not permit him to take early retirement.[2]

He held his position at Stellenbosch until the end of 1992, and during that time he was a visiting scholar at

Namibian Supreme Court from 1991 to 1992.[2]

In January 1993, during the

Cape Provincial Division. He chaired the Cape Electoral Appeal Tribunal during the first post-apartheid elections of April 1994.[3]

Constitutional Court: 1994–2004

In August 1994, Ackermann became one of five judges whom post-apartheid President Nelson Mandela appointed to the inaugural bench of the newly established Constitutional Court of South Africa.[5] The court's first term began in February 1995 and Ackermann sat in the court until his retirement in January 2004.[3] Throughout his time on the bench, he chaired the Constitutional Court's library committee.[3][6]

Ackermann played a central role in the development of the court's early jurisprudence on

non-discrimination doctrine.[7][8] He was also renowned for his expertise in comparative constitutionalism.[9] He was described as a judicial maximalist,[10][11] and Drucilla Cornell argued that his jurisprudence was strongly Kantian.[12] Notable judgements written by Ackermann included National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality v Minister of Justice and National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality v Minister of Home Affairs, historic judgements on sexual-orientation discrimination which set the precedent for the subsequent legalisation of same-sex marriage in Minister of Home Affairs v Fourie.[4]

In January 2004, upon turning 70, Ackermann retired from the bench.[6] His final judgement, handed down in December 2003, was Shaik v Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development and Others, in which he struck down businessman Schabir Shaik's application to have provisions of the National Prosecuting Authority Act – which had been used to question Shaik about Arms Deal corruption – declared incompatible with the right to silence.[13]

Retirement and other activities

After his retirement, Ackermann founded the South African Institute for Advanced Constitutional, Public, Human Rights and International Law, a research institute at the University of Johannesburg. In 2012, he published Human Dignity: Lodestar for Equality in South Africa, a monograph which expounds the theoretical and constitutional background to the relationship between dignity, equality, and non-discrimination.[10][14]

Ackermann was formerly the chairperson of the board of governors of Pretoria Boys High School and he was later the South African secretary of the

Rhodes Trust from 1988 to 2003. Stellenbosch University awarded him an honorary LLD, and he is an honorary fellow of Worcester College, Oxford.[3]

Personal life

In 1958, he married Denise du Toit, who later became a feminist theologian at the University of the Western Cape. They live in Cape Town and have three children, two daughters and a son.[1][6]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f "Professional news: Mr Justice L W H Ackermann". De Rebus: 161. April 1981.
  2. ^
    ISBN 978-1920538750
    . Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j "Justice Laurie Ackermann". Constitutional Court of South Africa. Archived from the original on 7 January 2006. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  4. ^ a b De Vos, Pierre (2008). "From Heteronormativity to Full Sexual Citizenship: Equality and Sexual Freedom in Laurie Ackermann's Constitutional Jurisprudence". Acta Juridica. 2008: 254.
  5. ISSN 1464-3731
    .
  6. ^ a b c "Constitutional Court says goodbye to Ackerman". IOL. 3 December 2003. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  7. ISBN 978-0-7021-8137-5
    .
  8. SSRN 1336247
    .
  9. ^ Roux, Theunis (2008). "The Dignity of Comparative Constitutional Law". Acta Juridica. 2008: 185.
  10. ^
    JSTOR 24562861
    .
  11. ^ O'Regan, Catherine (2008). "From Form to Substance: The Constitutional Jurisprudence of Laurie Ackermann". Acta Juridica. 2008: 1.
  12. ^ Cornell, Drucilla (2008). "Bridging the Span toward Justice: Laurie Ackermann and the Ongoing Architectonic of Dignity Jurisprudence". Acta Juridica. 2008: 18.
  13. ^ Engelbrecht, Leon (2 December 2003). "Shaik's lawyer botches NPA court challenge". The Mail & Guardian. Retrieved 16 December 2023.
  14. ^ Pretorius, J. L. (2014). "Human Dignity: Lodestar for Equality in South Africa". Stellenbosch Law Review. 25: 628.

External links

Wikisource has original works by or about:
Lourens Ackermann
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Laurie_Ackermann&oldid=1199986195"