The spirit of the law, not its letter ZOOMING IN Rudy Romero 02/26/2010

The spirit of the law, not its letter ZOOMING IN Rudy Romero 02/26/2010 The responsibility of legislators is to encourage the doing of things likely to promote the progress of wellbeing and progress of society and prevent the doing of things likely to give rise to disunity, injustice and misuse of national resources. Unfortunately, legislators, like the rest of their countrymen, are imperfect beings, and in going about the business of crafting laws they often omit things, state things in an unclear or opaque way or fail to anticipate things or make appropriate distinctions. When legislators — whether members of a constitutional commission or of the national legislature — go about their business in an unsatisfactory way, trouble ensues and lawyers are deployed to argue one side or the other of a constitutional or legal uncertainty. When a constitutional or legal provision appears clear but gives rise to questions of fairness, soundness or delicadeza, resort is had to the proceedings of the Constitution-drafting body or the national legislature. The question that is posed is, what did the Constitution framers or legislators really have in mind when they were drafting the now-controversial constitutional provision or law?... MORE Source:  The Daily Tribune ALTERNATE URL: http://www.classicposters.com/commentary/20100226com3.html

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