“No judge should ‘legislate from the bench,’ or act as a moral philosopher or an ethicist deciding what in his or her view achieves some desired social end or policy.”
Against that I would recall (and I am relying entirely on memory) Justice James Fitzjames Stephen’s view in R. v. Tolson where he cites the centuries old case of Fowler v. Padgett, where a judge says, and I am paraphrasing, that he would stretch the meaning of words any distance to avoid a manifest injustice.

Randal Marlin ’59
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada