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Full-Text Articles in Law
Quasi-Constitutional Law: Clear Statement Rules As Constitu, William N. Eskridge, Jr., Philip P. Frickey
Quasi-Constitutional Law: Clear Statement Rules As Constitu, William N. Eskridge, Jr., Philip P. Frickey
Vanderbilt Law Review
In one of the most celebrated law review articles of all time, Karl Llewellyn argued that the traditional canons of statutory construction are not reliable guides to predicting judicial interpretations, because for every canon supporting one interpretation there is a counter-canon cutting against that interpretation. He accomplished his tour de force in large part by focusing upon the "referential" canons-rules referring the Court to an outside or preexisting source to determine statutory meaning'-and upon the "linguistic" canons-general conventions of language, grammar, and syntax. Llewellyn did not explore in any detail the "substantive" canons, the clear statement rules or presumptions of …
The Presumption Of Reviewability: A Study In Canonical Construction And Its Consequences, Daniel B. Rodriguez
The Presumption Of Reviewability: A Study In Canonical Construction And Its Consequences, Daniel B. Rodriguez
Vanderbilt Law Review
The much-maligned canons of statutory construction stubbornly have survived, largely on the strength of the assertion that whatever the aim of the statute's interpretation, an interpretive canon will improve the chances that the statute's aim will be realized. Canonical construction serves two different functions. Some of the canons ostensibly are designed as short-cuts to the discovery of the legislature's "true" intent. Professor Geoffrey Miller has explained how the canons may reflect the judicial articulations of conversational conventions that help courts understand otherwise vexing statutory language.' Canons may also serve as surrogates for other, better evidence of legislators' intent. In this …