Statutory Interpretation: Pragmatics and Argumentation

✍ Scribed by Douglas Walton, Fabrizio Macagno, Giovanni Sartor

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2021
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 348
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Statutory interpretation involves the reconstruction of the meaning of a legal statement when it cannot be considered as accepted or granted. This phenomenon needs to be considered not only from the legal and linguistic perspective, but also from the argumentative one - which focuses on the strategies for defending a controversial or doubtful viewpoint. This book draws upon linguistics, legal theory, computing, and dialectics to present an argumentation-based approach to statutory interpretation. By translating and summarizing the existing legal interpretative canons into eleven patterns of natural arguments - called argumentation schemes - the authors offer a system of argumentation strategies for developing, defending, assessing, and attacking an interpretation. Illustrated through major cases from both common and civil law, this methodology is summarized in diagrams and maps for application to computer sciences. These visuals help make the structures, strategies, and vulnerabilities of legal reasoning accessible to both legal professionals and laypeople.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover
Half-title page
Title page
Copyright page
Dedication
Contents
List of
Figures
List of
Tables
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1 Interpretation and Statutory Interpretation
1.1 The Idea of Interpretation
1.2 Interpretations Outside of the Law
1.2.1 Interpretation in Science
1.2.2 Interpretations of Intentional Systems
1.2.3 Interpretation in Communication
1.2.4 Interpretation in Art
1.3 Legal Interpretation
1.3.1 The Object of Legal Interpretation
1.3.2 The Practical Significance of Legislative Interpretation
1.3.3 Legal Interpretation and Legal Decision
1.3.4 Descriptive and Evaluative Interpretative Assertions
1.4 The Scope of Legal Interpretation
1.4.1 Interpretation and Understanding
1.4.2 Interpretation and Construction
1.4.3 Legal Construction and Creation of New Law
1.4.4 Conclusion on Understanding, Interpretation, and Construction
1.4.5 Interpretation and Semantics
1.4.6 Cognitive and Decisional Interpretation
1.5 Reasons in Interpretation: From Texts to Purposes and Values
1.5.1 Reasons and Motives for Interpretation
1.5.2 Reasons for Interpretations
1.5.3 The Semantics of Words and their Combinations
1.5.4 The Historical Context in Which the Legislative Text Was Adopted
1.5.5 Coherence with Other Norms, and with the Purposes of the Norm and of the Systems
1.6 Argument Schemes in Legal Interpretation
1.6.1 Tarello’s List of Interpretative Arguments
1.6.2 MacCormick and Summers
1.6.3 Balkin’s List of Interpretative Arguments
1.6.4 The Legislator’s Intention
1.6.5 Criteria for Comparing Interpretative Arguments
1.6.6 Rationales for Interpretative Canons
References
Cases cited
2 Statutory Interpretation as Problem Solving
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Interpretation as Decision Making
2.3 The Fire Engine Example
2.3.1 The Arguments of the Fire Engine Example
2.3.2 Mapping the Fire Engine Example
2.4 Problem Solving
2.4.1 The Notion of Problem Solving
2.4.2 Problem Solving in Computer Science
2.4.3 Cooperative Problem Solving
2.5 Deliberation Dialogue
2.6 A Simple Example of Problem Solving
2.7 An Argumentation Model of Problem Solving
2.8 Applying the Model to a Legal Case
2.8.1 The Decision-Making Process
2.8.2 The Decision-Making Arguments
2.8.3 The Argumentative Structure of the Dialectical Decision-Making Process
2.9 The Purpose of the Law and Relevance
2.10 Conclusions
References
Cases Cited
3 Interpretation and Pragmatics – Legal Ambiguity
3.1 Introduction. Ambiguity and Interpretation
3.1.1 Interpretation
3.1.2 The Meanings of Ambiguity
3.1.3 Interpretation and the Blurred Notion of Ordinary Meaning
3.1.4 Ambiguity and Vagueness
3.2 Syntactic Ambiguity
3.2.1 Pragmatics and the Rules of Grammar
3.2.2 Syntactic Ambiguity and Interpretative Disputes
3.2.3 Inferences and Syntactic Ambiguity
3.2.4 Disambiguation in the Housing Example
3.2.5 Mapping Presumptions and Arguments in the Housing Example
3.3 Syntactic and Semantic Ambiguity in Heller
3.3.1 The Sources of the Dispute
3.3.2 The Pragmatic Dimension of the “Ordinary Meaning” of the Second Amendment
3.3.3 The Interpretative Arguments in Heller
3.3.4 The Missing Dimension of the “Original Meaning”
3.4 Semantic Ambiguity in Muscarello v. United States
3.4.1 The “Linguistic” Arguments
3.4.2 Argumentative Inferences in Muscarello
3.5 Conclusion
References
Cases cited
4 Pragmatic Maxims and Presumptions in Legal Interpretation
4.1 Introduction
4.2 A Pragmatics of Legal Interpretation: Is It Theoretically Possible?
4.3 Pragmatics and Argumentation Theory in Statutory Interpretation
4.3.1 Interpretation as Argumentative Reasoning
4.3.2 The Pragmatics of Legal Interpretation
4.3.3 Where Pragmatics and Argumentation Meet: Inference to the Best Interpretation
4.4 Prima Facie and Deliberative Interpretative Reasoning
4.5 The Pragmatics of Interpretation
4.6 Reasoning from Best Interpretation and Argumentation Schemes
4.7 The Function of the Conversational Maxims in Implicatures
4.8 Legal Interpretation and the Heuristics Underlying Generalized Implicatures
4.9 The Maxims in Legal Interpretation
4.9.1 Maxims and Interpretative Arguments
4.9.2 Maxims, Arguments, and Presumptions on Interpretation
4.10 Presumptions and the Purpose of the Law
4.10.1 The Purpose of the Law as a Presumption
4.10.2 Ordering Interpretative Presumptions
4.11 Types of Intentions and Levels of Presumptions
4.11.1 Types and Levels of Presumptions
4.11.2 Types and Levels of Presumptions in Statutory Interpretation
4.12 Conclusion
References
Cases Cited
5 Arguments of Statutory Interpretation and Argumentation Schemes
5.1 Introduction
5.2 Interpretation and Its Arguments
5.3 Argumentation Schemes
5.4 A Contrario Argument
5.5 Arguments from Analogy
5.5.1 Problems of Analogy in Law
5.5.2 The Structure of Analogical Arguments (Additive Analogy)
5.5.3 Analogia Legis (Argument from Written Law)
5.5.4 Analogia Iuris (Argument from General Principles)
5.5.5 Analogies and Precedents
5.5.6 Interpretative Analogical Arguments: Ejusdem Generis and Noscitur a Sociis
5.6 A Particular Analogical Argument: The a Fortiori Argument
5.7 Arguments from Authority
5.7.1 Psychological Argument (Intention of the Actual Legislator)
5.7.2 Historical Argument (Presumption of Continuity or Conservative Legislator)
5.7.3 Authoritative Argument (Ab Exemplo)
5.7.4 Appeal to Popular Opinion: Naturalistic Argument
5.8 Arguments from Consequences
5.8.1 Reductio ad Absurdum
5.8.2 Equitative Argument
5.8.3 Ancillary Argument: Argument from Coherence of the Law
5.8.4 Economic Argument
5.9 Practical Reasoning and Teleological Argument
5.10 The Logical Role of Definitions – The Argument from Classification
5.10.1. Reasoning from Rules
5.10.2 Reasoning from Classification
5.10.3 Defeasibility Conditions of Argument from Classification
5.11 Abductive Arguments
5.11.1 Ordinary and Technical Meaning Arguments
5.11.2 Systematic Argument
5.11.3 Ancillary Argument: Argument from Completeness of the Law
5.12 Conclusion
References
Cases Cited
6 Classification and Formalization of Interpretative Schemes
6.1
Introduction
6.2 Interpretative Arguments
6.2.1 Classifying Interpretative Arguments
6.2.2 The Association between Language and Meaning
6.2.3 Common Template
6.2.4 Positive Uses of Interpretative Schemes
6.2.5 Negative Uses of Interpretative Schemes
6.3 Attacking, Questioning, and Defending interpretative Arguments
6.3.1 From Critical Questions to Counterarguments in Formal Argumentation Systems
6.3.2 Argument Graphs in Carneades
6.3.3 The Education Grants Example: Modeling Judicial Interpretation
6.3.4 The Dunnachie Example: Fitting Interpretative Schemes to Cases
6.4 The logic of Interpretative Arguments
6.4.1 Interpretative Canons as Defeasible Rules
6.4.2 Defeat Relations: Rebutting and Undercutting
6.5 Formal Dialectical Structure of Interpretative Arguments
6.5.1 The Structure of an Interpretative Argument
6.5.2 The Dialectic of Interpretative Argument: Rebutting and Undercutting
6.5.3 Preference Arguments over Interpretative Arguments
6.6 From Best Interpretations to Individual Claims
6.7 Conclusions
References
Cases Cited