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What's more important? The intent of the law, or the letter of the law?

What's more important? The intent of the law, or the letter of the law?

  • Intent (spirit).

    Votes: 5 27.8%
  • Letter.

    Votes: 5 27.8%
  • Could be either, depends on the specifics.

    Votes: 7 38.9%
  • Other.

    Votes: 1 5.6%

  • Total voters
    18

radcen

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What's more important? The intent of the law, or the letter of the law?

The questions related to how the law should be pursued and/or prosecuted by the justice system.
 
Both are important.
Laws should follow the 'kiss' principle and yet not allow frivolous interpretation.
 
As a general rule I believe the intent/spirit of the law should be paramount, but there are times where the letter of the law should be enforced as well, though I think that is less often. I voted "Could be either...".
 
Intent. Specifics change more frequently, often because they don't match intent. We never change the intent for the specifics.
 
Letter ... Intent can be manipulated or otherwise vary from interpretation to interpretation leading to unequal application of the law.

If the letter doesn't make sense or is wrong, it ought to be reconciled with the intent by lawmakers or the judiciary system.
 
Intent. Specifics change more frequently, often because they don't match intent. We never change the intent for the specifics.

So, the law should express in 'clear' words the intent?
 
The letter of the law.

At the end of the day it's impossible to ascertain the intent of a law. You often don't know what was on the mind of the writers of the law and even if you do it's always going to be uncertain whether or not the legislators who voted for a law used intent in casting their vote.

The only objective standard you have is what the law says.
 
I would like to see the intent of the law practiced in most cases, but I think for practicalities sake we use the letter of the law.
 
What's more important? The intent of the law, or the letter of the law?

The questions related to how the law should be pursued and/or prosecuted by the justice system.

Most criminal laws have no specific intent requirement: You were speeding or you were not; you shoplifted or you did not; you possessed a firearm as a felon or you did not. Some states allow you to not be punished under certain circumstances in the discretion of the Court but you still are guilty in some very defined emergency circumstances where you had no other option but to speed or drive without a license to save a life or something and there were no other reasonable options.

Here are some of the more common specific intent crimes. (10 Specific Intent Crimes)
 
other: the enforcement of the law
 
Most criminal laws have no specific intent requirement: You were speeding or you were not; you shoplifted or you did not; you possessed a firearm as a felon or you did not. Some states allow you to not be punished under certain circumstances in the discretion of the Court but you still are guilty in some very defined emergency circumstances where you had no other option but to speed or drive without a license to save a life or something and there were no other reasonable options.

Here are some of the more common specific intent crimes. (10 Specific Intent Crimes)

Excellent post and source.

I knew the difference between assault and battery... even though I commonly misuse the word "assault" to mean battery... but I was not aware there was a difference between the criminal and civil definitions and uses.

One example that comes readily to my mind regarding the original question is civil asset forfeiture. We were assured it would never be used for insidious purposes, would be used sparingly as "another tool for law enforcement to fight the war on drugs", yada yada yada, yet it has precisely turned into nothing but a shakedown in many jurisdictions. All the warnings and assurances proved squat. The letter of the law says LE can do 'x', so they do 'x'.
 
Excellent post and source.

I knew the difference between assault and battery... even though I commonly misuse the word "assault" to mean battery... but I was not aware there was a difference between the criminal and civil definitions and uses.

One example that comes readily to my mind regarding the original question is civil asset forfeiture. We were assured it would never be used for insidious purposes, would be used sparingly as "another tool for law enforcement to fight the war on drugs", yada yada yada, yet it has precisely turned into nothing but a shakedown in many jurisdictions. All the warnings and assurances proved squat. The letter of the law says LE can do 'x', so they do 'x'.

Civil forfeiture is certainly taken to the extreme in some places. Ours isn't one of them. The property is taken and then once the person is convicted, they have a hearing as to the seized property with notice to people with obvious legal interest like the defendant, the people whose names are on the title or to whom a weapon was registered. If you can make a reasonable case that it was your property and you did not know the person was, for instance, using your car to transport drugs, you can usually get it released back to you well before the person goes to court or the hearing is held. Sometimes it is pretty self-evident like an employee in a company car with a business bank deposit who also happened to have a brick of pot on them. It always amuses me to see the cases listed in the docket because they are styled like "State v. $28.53; State v. 1994 Ford Ranger; State v. Remington 12 gauge shotgun" and the like.
 
I knew the difference between assault and battery... even though I commonly misuse the word "assault" to mean battery...

I think it depends on the state, some do not have battery, if I understand correctly.
 
I think this issue (intent vs. specifics) is easy to settle:

We change specifics to match intention. We never change intention to match specifics. Therefore, intention takes precedence.
 
Civil forfeiture is certainly taken to the extreme in some places. Ours isn't one of them. The property is taken and then once the person is convicted, they have a hearing as to the seized property with notice to people with obvious legal interest like the defendant, the people whose names are on the title or to whom a weapon was registered. If you can make a reasonable case that it was your property and you did not know the person was, for instance, using your car to transport drugs, you can usually get it released back to you well before the person goes to court or the hearing is held. Sometimes it is pretty self-evident like an employee in a company car with a business bank deposit who also happened to have a brick of pot on them. It always amuses me to see the cases listed in the docket because they are styled like "State v. $28.53; State v. 1994 Ford Ranger; State v. Remington 12 gauge shotgun" and the like.
For all my attention on civil asset forfeiture... it is my #1 pet issue... I do know that not all jurisdictions abuse it. Probably most don't abuse it. But, the ones that do abuse it really seriously abuse it.



I think this issue (intent vs. specifics) is easy to settle:

We change specifics to match intention. We never change intention to match specifics. Therefore, intention takes precedence.
That's always what I've thought. Over the last few decades I've read of people having concerns regarding proposed laws, and the sponsors of the law will say something like, "Oh, it'll never be used for that.", but at the same time will resist placing verbiage into the law to ensure it is never abused because they claim such verbiage would be "too restrictive".
 
That's always what I've thought. Over the last few decades I've read of people having concerns regarding proposed laws, and the sponsors of the law will say something like, "Oh, it'll never be used for that.", but at the same time will resist placing verbiage into the law to ensure it is never abused because they claim such verbiage would be "too restrictive".

I don't think bickering over the specifics of intent in proposed legislation counters the fundamental issue of which is more important regarding established law.
 
What's more important? The intent of the law, or the letter of the law?

The questions related to how the law should be pursued and/or prosecuted by the justice system.
If we are talking about philosophies of constitutional/statutory interpretation, I think the letter is most important. Legislators have a wide variety of intents. The letter is what they agree upon, and even then the letter likely meant different things to different people. It should be interpreted with this in mind, but also with a practical focus. If legislators intended something different, they can always clarify that intent by passing new legislation.
 
The intent and the letter should be one in the same. Any deviation from that, is just too Democrat for America to put up with.
 
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