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- From: tzs@stein.u.washington.edu (Tim Smith)
- Newsgroups: talk.abortion,misc.legal
- Subject: Re: Blackmun calls the Roe v. Wade dividing line "arbitrary"
- Date: 24 Jan 1993 10:13:58 GMT
- Organization: University of Washington School of Law, Class of '95
- Lines: 15
- Message-ID: <1jtq56INNs2v@shelley.u.washington.edu>
- References: <1993Jan10.034956.15662@rotag.mi.org> <C0xCws.5yB@news.cso.uiuc.edu> <1993Jan24.024901.21410@rotag.mi.org>
- NNTP-Posting-Host: stein.u.washington.edu
-
- kevin@rotag.mi.org (Kevin Darcy) writes:
- >there is a rule of statutory construction called _expressio unius est exclusio
- >alterius_ (literally: "the expression of one thing is the exclusion of
- >another"). I have invoked _expressio unius_ many times in explaining to the
- >RightToKeepAndBearArms fanatics why the Second Amendment only applies to the
- >"well-regulated militia".
-
- There's another rule of statutory construction called _find out what the words
- mean_. If you apply this to "well-regulated militia" you will find out that
- nearly everyone in the NRA, for example, is a member, and thus, even if you
- ignore the rules of English grammar in order to limit the Second Amendment
- to members of the "well-regulated militia," those RightToKeepAndBearArms
- fanatics, as you call them, do have the right to keep and bear arms.
-
- --Tim Smith
-