Marshall Edward Rothstein was born on December 25, 1940, in Winnipeg, Manitoba, the only child of Jewish parents who had immigrated to Canada from Eastern Europe. His father, a bookkeeper and merchant, was born in Poland as one of eleven children; his family had owned a barrel factory and hotel, but these assets could not support all the siblings' families, and the younger children — including Rothstein's father — emigrated to Canada before World War I. Those who remained in Poland perished in the Holocaust. His mother was a Russian-born schoolteacher. Rothstein grew up in Winnipeg, where discussion of the Holocaust was notably absent during his childhood — the prevailing attitude being that such traumatic subjects should be shielded from children (SCC biography; Everything Explained; Osgoode IP keynote, 2022).
During his university years, Rothstein worked in food service on passenger trains between semesters — an experience he later credited with shaping his character and influencing how he evaluated law clerks and job applicants for their work ethic and life experience. He was a member of the Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity at the University of Manitoba (Everything Explained; en-academic.com).
