(1) The "12:01 a.m." habit.

The custom of doing mundane horoscopes for "12:01 a.m." - for instance when astrologers write about the Canadian constitution - has always seemed to me one of the sillier byproducts of the a.m.-p.m. system. If one must work within that system, it is easy to understand the "12:01 a.m." subterfuge: it sacrifices one measly minute but saves writing "12 Midnight at the beginning of" such-and-such a day. With a.m.-p.m. there is always the possibility of confounding the two 12s at the start and end of the day, or either one with 12 Noon. Writing 12 a.m. or 12 p.m. is no help at all, even if writer and reader both remember (as is highly unlikely) the convention about which is Noon and which Midnight.

Hence the usefulness of the 24-hour clock that glides unambiguously from 0:00 to 24:00 in one day. A.m. and p.m. should be reserved for such things as engraved banquet invitations, where panache is more important than clarity.

Many constitutions, legislative acts, and other instruments specify that something will begin on a given date. When no hour is started, it is reasonable to assume that whatever-it-is must begin at the very first instant of the stated day, namely at 00:00:00 of whatever civil time happens to be in effect. (Now some laws and contracts drafted in English-speaking countries do resort to the "12:01 a.m." gimmick, but I am dealing with cases - of which countless examples occur in mundane astrology - where no starting hour is available.)

However, a colleague recently told me I was wrong. He claimed the one-minute-after tradition was part of English common law, and that the astrologers who did 12:01 a.m. horoscopes were simply following "the way governments chose to do things."

Being unable to settle the question myself I asked a newsgroup, misc.legal.moderated, whether the British North America Act took effect at one minute past Midnight on 1 July 1867. A definite answer was supplied by a lawyer, Charles Breitel, who has kindly permitted me to reproduce his post:

The first thing I did to try and answer your question was consult the Canadian founding documents themselves, which the Canadian government displays here:

http://www.collectionscanada.ca/confederation/h18-2600-e.html

On March 29, 1867, the British Parliament signed into law the Constitution Act of 1867. The Act declared in relevant part, "It shall be lawful for the Queen, by and with the Advice of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, to declare by Proclamation that, on and after a Day therein appointed, not being more than Six Months after the passing of this Act, the Provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick shall form and be One Dominion under the Name of Canada; and on and after that Day those Three Provinces shall form and be One Dominion under that Name accordingly."

Thus, the Constitution Act did not itself "create" the Canadian government but rather enabled and empowered the Queen to do so through parliamentary consent. Subsequently, by Royal Proclamation on May 22, 1867, the Queen set the date in question as July 1, 1867. That proclamation may be viewed here:

http://www.canadiana.org/citm/imagepopups/c060281_e.html

The proclamation states in relevant part, "We therefore, by and with the Advice of Our Privy Council, have thought fit to issue this Our Royal Proclamation, and We do Ordain, Declare, and Command, that on and after the First Day of July One thousand eight hundred and sixty-seven the Provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick shall form and be One Dominion under the Name of Canada."

The absolutely most important fact in this analysis is that there is absolutely no mention in either the Proclamation or the Constitution Act of the notion that the first actual minute of July 1, 1867 shall be ignored. There is no mention of any specific time at all, much less 001 hours to the exclusion of 000 hours. As a matter of logic and common sense, 000 falls on July 1, 1867 and not on any other day. As a lawyer practicing in a common law nation whose jurisprudence borrowed heavily from the English common law (the United States) and as a dual citizen of Canada as well, I can attest for you my professional legal opinion that there is no principle at English common law which nullifies the first minute, 000 hours, of any given day as your friend suggests. If the new Canadian government had somehow undertaken a sovereign act at exactly 000 hours on July 1, 1867, that act would not have been illegal under the terms of the Royal Proclamation as though it had taken place on June 30, 1867. In sum, for all these reasons, you are right and your friend is wrong.

The entire thread can be found here.

(2) When does one become President of the United States?

My colleague Paul de Gruchy and I have been discussing the moment when the President-elect takes his (so far never her) oath of office. The time varies, but not much; it is usually a few minutes past Noon. So we have been searching out the sources which provide those elusive times.

Well, it now turns out that this ceremonial moment may be irrelevant. Here is the text of amendment XX, section 1, of the Constitution of the United States:

The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin.

On the other hand, article II, clause 1, section 8 of the original constitution says:

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, [the President-elect] shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:--`I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.'

I have no idea if amendment XX cancelled clause II.1.8 of the constitution. The amendment says nothing about the relation between the time of a President's taking office and the time of swearing-in. Confronted with this puzzle I turned to my cyberpal the Harvard law student, who took the time to send me a tentative reply. She asked me to point out that this is off the top of her head.

Interesting question.. maybe i'll attempt to get a con law professor to tell me if there's any bite to this. Here is my take: article II(1)(8) specifies that the oath must be taken before the new President shall "enter on the execution" of his office... Thus, perhaps the old President's term expires at noon, and the new President's term "shall then begin."

However, before the new guy takes any action as President, ie, "executes" any of his duties, he has to take the oath. So he is President at 12:00, but he can't act as President until 12:05 or whenever he does the oath.

That's a lawyerly answer for you, not sure if it helps. :) Here's a hypothetical.. Say, for example, there's some bomb threat on Jan 20 and they're all in a shelter at Noon.. The old President's term expires, the new President's term starts... While they're in the bunker, the new guy says "OK, by executive order, we're going to arrest every Arab in Washington DC and take them to Gitmo, today... Alert the troops." I would assume that such an order would be subject to attack under article II as being unconstitutional because he was executing duties without taking the oath. (This is assuming that the President has the power to make such an order, and i think that's open to debate depending on the current status of emergency powers, etc., but assuming it would be legally valid for him to do so had he taken the oath...)

That said, article II doesn't say that the oath has to be done publicly or anything like that.. so i guess if they had counsel down in the bunker, she would say "Dude, before you do anything, real quick, repeat after me..." In fact, article II doesn't even say it has to be witnessed by anyone.

That leaves us still uncertain, but for the time being I will assume terms of office begin at Noon.

When does one become prime minister of Canada or of a Canadian province?

Unlike the United States, parliamentary states do not run like clockwork. Heads of governments can fall in any season of any year and the royal prerogative, while tightly circumscribed, is still the mechanism by which the democratic choice of any new head is confirmed. This fact is reflected in the swearing-in ceremonies of new prime ministers. The new guy or gal steps up and takes the oath, and immediately afterwards the Governor General (or Lieutenant-Governor if it's a provincial premier's oath-taking) signs in witness of the oath. Contrary to the US case (see above), witnessing is part of the process in Canada. As the monarch's representative, the GG or Lt-G sanctions the ceremony and turns it into an official act. The moment to take down for a horoscope is therefore the moment when that signature is scratched on the page. There is no law forbidding the GG from saying, "You rascal, I refuse you and your slimy cabinet!" Probably the GG would then be grabbed and given a large dose of Prozac by the ushers, but the incident would be a constitutional crisis and no-one would know who was legally in charge. In fact it would be a new kind of ball game, more momentous than a mere change of government.

Until then, it's the signature that counts.