Kent Greenawalt - Statutory and Common Law Interpretation

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• Oxford University Press 2013

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• Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
• Greenawalt, Kent, 1936
• Statutory and common law interpretation /Kent Greenawalt.
• p.cm.
• Includes bibliographical references and index.
• ISBN 978-0-19-975614-8
• 1. LawInterpretation and construction. 2. Common law.
• 3. LawMethodology. I. Title.
• K231.G742013
• 340.1dc232012012055

• 987654321

• Printed in the United States of America
• on acid-free paper

(p.v) To past and present colleagues at Columbia, who have created a congenial and supportive community for teaching and scholarship. (p.vi)

The two topics of this book are ones that have engaged my interest for most of my teaching career. During the last quarter century, I have had the good fortune to teach Legal Methods to incoming students, using Peter Strausss challenging casebook on that subject, which offers an excellent introduction to both statutory and common law interpretation. During the same period, participants in seminars on legal interpretation have enriched my understanding with their insightful discussions and their papers. In 1999, Statutory Interpretation: 20 Questions was published. The present volume draws to a degree from that book, but my views have developed considerably since that time, largely in response to the insights of colleagues on the faculty and other scholars. My interest in aspects of common law interpretation was stimulated by the work on reasoning by analogy of Lloyd Weinreb, with whom I had the good fortune to be co-clerk for Justice John Marshall Harlan.

As this book was nearing its final stages, I benefitted greatly from discussions of the chapter on analogy at Pace Law School, and the chapter on text and intention at a conference on statutory interpretation held at Columbia Law School. In February of this year, I had the great fortune to present numbers of the chapters to groups of faculty at the University of Virginia Law School.

The research assistance I have enjoyed in this effort has been extraordinarily valuable. Among those who have contributed greatly by finding and summarizing references, and by offering comments on my earlier formulations, have been Lauren Barlow, Michael Fernndez, Kyle Gazis, Martie Kutscher, Adam Mehes, Miles Pope, Laura Swanson, and Leonid Traps. In addition to offering perceptive substantive criticisms, Stephen Farrelly, at the stage before final submission, filled in missing citations and proposed significant improvements in the language of many of the chapters. During the main process of research and writing, Adam Hochroth was invaluable. In identifying sources I almost certainly would not otherwise have learned about (especially those involving commentary from other common law countries), in coming up with new ideas and possible approaches, and in raising nuances of analysis that had not occurred to me, he was indispensable to the final content of this volume.

Marianne Carroll word-processed numbers of the chapters at different points, perceiving elusive handwriting quickly and accurately, and identifying omissions. Katherine Bobbitt dealt with all the chapters at one stage or another, and, as always, she discerned places where I had left out needed (p.x) words or written mistaken ones, correcting these and also making editorial suggestions for improvements. She also shepherded the manuscript through the final review after copyediting. At that stage Samantha LiTrenta (with help from Jason Hipp), under considerable time pressure, filled in missing references and helped assure consistency in citations.

I am very grateful to members of Oxford University Press who have guided this through the publication process. As with the first volume, David McBride made many helpful comments that greatly improved the clarity of the manuscript and how it was organized. Elina Carmona did an insightful and prompt job of copyediting, and Marc Schneider and Anitha Chellamuthu saw that the production process proceeded both carefully and according to a precise schedule.