Statutory interpretation

When the young legal is confronted with an instrument, whether statutory or contractual, she must bring with her some keys, codexes, tools and techniques. She will need these to extract from a morass of impenetrable verbiage an optimal course of action for her client. These we now call the canons of interpretation. They originated in the parsing of statutes, but they were so useful even commercial lawyers desirous of getting out the door before closing time soon glommed on to the fact that the same rules of engagement ought to apply to private as well as public charters of action.

So they were born.

See also

• Statutory interpretation
• Contractual interpretation
• Ejusdem generis
• Noscitur a sociis
• Generalia specialibus non derogant
• Fair, large and liberal
• And the JC’s own short-hand to the lot of them: non mentula esse