Core Meaning and Real Meaning Concept

The subject of statutory interpretation is important because much of New Zealand law is contained in the statute books and because the majority of legal issues that come before the courts involve statutory interpretation .Professor John Burrows "The Changing Approach to the Interpretation of Statutes"

[In 1996, sixty-four percent of cases in the Court of Appeal involved statutory interpretation . See Jane Allen " Statutory Interpretation and the Courts" (1999) 18 NZULR 439, 440. .] Issues of interpretation arise because the precise meaning of words is often uncertain. There is usually an inner core of meaning that all reasonable people would agree upon and also a vast world of meaning that is clearly not conveyed by the word. However, there is a murky area in between these two spheres where interpretation becomes more difficult. The case of Kecold Ltd v O'Brien [Kecold Ltd v O'Brien [1999] 3 NZLR 261 (CA).] illustrates the uncertainty at the outer edges of meaning. This case involved interpretation of the word "sick". The inner core of meaning of this word is clear. If a person has influenza, cancer or food poisoning, for example, their condition is clearly within the meaning of "sick". The Court of Appeal had to decide whether the word "sick" applied to a person who was injured.[ The Court concluded that the word "sick" in the context of the Holidays Act 1981 could apply to a person who was injured.]

It is thus important to understand that the meaning may or may no be exactly the prdinarily used word. The US Courts use the expressions that are in the Statutes as the following citations would show.[Blogger]

Approach Adopted By US Courts

When the meaning of specific statutory language is at issue, courts often need to consider the meaning of particular words or phrases. If the word or phrase is defined in the statute (federal statutes frequently collect definitions in a “definitions” section), or elsewhere in the United States Code,[The Dictionary Act, ch. 388, 61 Stat. 633 (1947), as amended, 1 U.S.C. §§ 1-6, has definitions of a few common terms used in federal statutes (e.g., “person,” “vessel,” and “vehicle”). These definitions govern in all federal statutes “unless the context indicates otherwise.” See Stewart v. Dutra Constr. Co., 543 U.S. 481, 489 (2005) (relying on Dictionary Act’s definition of “vessel”); Rowland v. California Men’s Colony, 506 U.S. 194 (1993) (context indicates otherwise; the term “person” as used in 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a) refers only to individuals and does not carry its Dictionary Act definition , which includes associations and artificial entities).] then that definition governs if applicable in the context used. [Colautti v. Franklin, 439 U.S. 379, 392 (1979). If the context indicates otherwise, i.e., if a mechanical application of a statutory definition throughout a statute would create an “obvious incongruity” or frustrate an evident statutory purpose for a particular provision, then it is permissible to depart from the definition. Lawson v. Suwannee S.S. Co., 336 U.S. 198, 201 (1949). But, as noted below, a term appearing in several places in a statute is ordinarily interpreted as having the same meaning each time it appears. See section on “Same Phrasing in Same or Related Statutes,”] Even if the word or phrase is not defined by statute, it may have an accepted meaning in the area of law addressed by the statute [See, e.g., Sullivan v. Stroop, 496 U.S. 478, 483 (1990) (phrase “child support” as used in Title IV AFDC provisions of Social Security Act). Note also that “where a phrase in a statute appears to have become a term of art . . . , any attempt to break down the term into its constituent words is not apt to illuminate its meaning.”], it may have been borrowed from another statute under which it had an accepted meaning,[ In appropriate circumstances, courts will assume that “adoption of the wording of a statute from another legislative jurisdiction carries with it the previous judicial interpretations of the wording.” Carolene Products Co. v. United States, 323 U.S. 18, 26 (1944) (finding, however, that circumstances were inappropriate for reliance on the principle). For the presumption to operate, the previous judicial interpretations must have been “known and settled.” Capital Traction Co. v. Hof, 174 U.S. 1, 36 (1899). See also Yates v. United States, 354 U.S. 298, 310 (1957) (in the absence of legislative history indicating that decisions of lower state courts were called to Congress’ attention, Court “should not assume that Congress was aware of them”). Variations in statutory wording may also refute the suggestion that Congress borrowed an interpretation. Shannon v. United States, 512 U.S. 573, 581 (1994) (Congress did not borrow the terms of the Insanity Defense Reform Act of 1984 from the District of Columbia Code).] or it may have had an accepted and specialized meaning at common law[See, e.g., Community for Creative Non-Violence v. Reid, 490 U.S. 730, 739-40 (1989) (relying on traditional common law agency principles for meaning of term “employee” as used without definition in the Copyright Act). See also Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co. v. Darden, 503 U.S. 318, 323 (1992) (following the same course after finding ERISA’s “circular” definition of “employee” to be useless); Clackamas Gastroenterology Assocs., P.C. v. Wells, 538 U.S. 440, 444 (2003) (same construction of similarly “circular” definition of “employee” in ADA).]. In each of these situations the accepted meaning governs“[W]here a common law principle is well established, . . . the courts may take it as a given that Congress has legislated with an expectation that the principle will apply except ‘when a statutory purpose to the contrary is evident.’” Astoria Federal Savings & Loan Ass’n v. Solimino, 501 U.S. 104, 108 (1991) (quoting Isbrandtsen Co. v. Johnson, 343 U.S. 779, 783 (1952)). No clear statement rule is required, however, in order to establish an “evident” contrary purpose. 501 U.S. at 108] and the word or phrase is considered a technical term or “term of art.” Justice Jackson explained why this reliance is appropriate: [Morissette v. United States, 342 U.S. 246, 263 (1952). See also Miles v. Apex Marine Corp., 498 U.S. 19, 32 (1990) (“We assume that Congress is aware of existing law when it passes legislation”).]

[W]here Congress borrows terms of art in which are accumulated the legal tradition and meaning of centuries of practice, it presumably knows and adopts the cluster of ideas that were attached to each borrowed word in the body of learning from which it was taken and the meaning its use will convey to the judicial mind unless otherwise instructed. In such a case, absence of contrary direction may be taken as satisfaction with widely accepted definitions, not as departure from them.

Order Code 97-589,Statutory Interpretation:General Principles and Recent Trends ,Updated August 31, 2008,Yule Kim,Legislative Attorney,American Law,Statutory Interpretation:,General Principles and Recent Trends

Trends in Statutory Construction-Newzeland

The subject of statutory interpretation is important because much of New Zealand law is contained in the statute books and because the majority of legal issues that come before the courts involve statutory interpretation .Professor John Burrows "The Changing Approach to the Interpretation of Statutes"

[In 1996, sixty-four percent of cases in the Court of Appeal involved statutory interpretation . See Jane Allen " Statutory Interpretation and the Courts" (1999) 18 NZULR 439, 440. .] Issues of interpretation arise because the precise meaning of words is often uncertain. There is usually an inner core of meaning that all reasonable people would agree upon and also a vast world of meaning that is clearly not conveyed by the word. However, there is a murky area in between these two spheres where interpretation becomes more difficult. The case of Kecold Ltd v O'Brien [Kecold Ltd v O'Brien [1999] 3 NZLR 261 (CA).] illustrates the uncertainty at the outer edges of meaning. This case involved interpretation of the word "sick". The inner core of meaning of this word is clear. If a person has influenza, cancer or food poisoning, for example, their condition is clearly within the meaning of "sick". The Court of Appeal had to decide whether the word "sick" applied to a person who was injured.[ The Court concluded that the word "sick" in the context of the Holidays Act 1981 could apply to a person who was injured.]

The meaning of some words is particularly uncertain, in that the very nature of the word involves an element of subjectivity. For example, the Consumer Guarantees Act 1993 requires that goods supplied to consumers must be of "acceptable" quality, and the Credit Contracts Act 1981 prohibits "oppressive" credit contracts. Other statutes require the Court to make such orders "as it thinks just".[See, for example, the Contractual Mistakes Act 1977 s 7(3) and the Contractual Remedies Act 1979 s 9.]Where such broad and non-specific wording is used, the courts must use their discretion to determine the scope of the words. If the provision comes before the court enough, an important body of case law will develop to fill out the meaning of the provision.

Literal/plain Meaning Rule

The Plain meaning rule, also known as the literal rule, is a type of statutory construction, which dictates that statutes are to be interpreted using the ordinary meaning of the language of the statute unless a statute explicitly defines some of its terms otherwise. In other words, the law is to be read word for word and should not divert from its true meaning. It is the mechanism that underlines textualism and, to a certain extent, originalism.

What is Plain Meaning Rule

To avoid ambiguity, legislatures often include "definitions" sections within a statute, which explicitly define the most important terms used in that statute. But some statutes omit a definitions section entirely, or (more commonly) fail to define a particular term. The plain meaning rule attempts to guide courts faced with litigation that turns on the meaning of a term not defined by the statute, or on that of a word found within a definition itself.

According to the plain meaning rule, absent a contrary definition within the statute, words must be given their plain, ordinary and literal meaning. If the words are clear, they must be applied, even though the intention of the legislator may have been different or the result is harsh or undesirable. The literal rule is what the law says instead of what the law means.

Prof. Larry Solum's Legal Theory Lexicon expands on this premise:

Some laws are meant for all citizens (e.g., criminal statutes) and some are meant only for specialists (e.g., some sections of the tax code). A text that means one thing in a legal context, might mean something else if it were in a technical manual or a novel. So the plain meaning of a legal text is something like the meaning that would be understood by competent speakers of the natural language in which the text was written who are within the intended readership of the text and who understand that the text is a legal text of a certain type.

Lord Evershed was echoing the same point: 'The length and detail of modern legislation has undoubtedly reinforced the claim of literal construction as the only safe rule.'

If the statute was long, this suggested that parliament had expressed its full meaning and that there was no need or scope to imply any additional meanings. Anything omitted was a casus omissus which the judge could not supply because that would amount to legislation. But the literal approach was used equally for wills, contracts, and other legal documents, so that the philosophy was by no means based exclusively on the constitutional relationship between courts and parliament nor on the growing length of statutes.

The plain meaning approach cannot survive modern hermeneutic understandings of how we read texts. No words are simply "plain in themselves." The words are just scratches on a page. They are said to be plain only because the interpreter is deciding to treat them as such and giving a particular connotation to them, a connotation that the judge claims to be the connotation intended by the legislator. The judge in dividing up the words into plain categories or ambiguous categories is really doing so by supplying a context and assigning a connotation, even unconsciously, for the words. Professor Zander summarizes the criticisms as follows at 49:

But the literal rule has also been subjected to severe criticism:

(l) The most fundamental objection to the rule is that it is based on a false premise, namely that words have plain, ordinary meanings apart from their context. Professor H.L.A. Hart of Oxford has argued that a word has a core meaning 'or standard instance in which no doubts are felt about its application' even though at the edges there is a margin of uncertainty. But Professor Lon Fuller has contested this by urging that meaning attaches not to individual words but to sentences and paragraphs, and that 'surely a paragraph does not have a "standard instance" that remains constant whatever the context in which it appears.' If a statute seems to have a core meaning 'this is because we can see that, however one might formulate the precise objective of the statute, this case would still come within it.'

(2) Those who apply the literal approach often talk of using the 'dictionary meaning' of the words in question, but dictionaries normally provide a number of alternative meanings.

(3) The plain-meaning approach cannot be used for general words, which are obviously capable of bearing several meanings.

(4) Not infrequently the courts say that the meaning of the words is 'plain' but then disagree as to their interpretations.

(5) The plain-meaning theory may be acceptable outside the courtroom, since it could be true that a high proportion of statutory materials and other legal documents can in fact be interpreted without recourse to any mischief or golden rule.

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