5 ms·

I'm as big a fan of the Oxford comma as anyone, but the court ruling here was ridiculous. External evidence, including the state legislature's style guide, mad

I'm as big a fan of the Oxford comma as anyone, but the court ruling here was ridiculous. External evidence, including the state legislature's style guide, made it perfectly clear what the law meant.

behindmyscreen 9y ago
style guides are not laws and if the style guide changes it changes the meaning of the law.
- lsaferite 9y ago
  But a style guide in effect at the time the law was written would clearly help disambiguate the intent of the law. That being said, I'm an Oxford comma fan.
- nv-vn 9y ago
  Yes, but the intent of a law matters. It's why it goes to court in the first place. I mean the meaning here is pretty clear, different from a real legal loophole where the system just hasn't been thoroughly planned.
SeanLuke 9y ago
I agree. I think the Oxford comma is a necessity; but so far as I can tell there is only one grammatically valid parsing of the sentence.
ubernostrum 9y ago
Not so ridiculous, really. A style guide isn't necessarily legally binding, and even clear evidence of legislative intent doesn't always get there if someone can argue the law that actually got written was ambiguous. California's red-light infractions are a pretty common example of this. The vehicle code lays out what the infractions are, and the people who drafted it have said very clearly that they intended to have a "rolling turn" -- making a right turn at a red light without coming to a full stop first -- be a lesser infraction than running a red (driving straight through without stopping). But a number of cities in California have argued the language is ambiguous enough to let them ticket a rolling turn as running the red light, and that's exactly what they do (most likely because the fines and fees are far higher). It's also pretty well known that anyone who hires a lawyer to fight one of those will get the ticket dismissed, because the cities don't want it to ever be argued all the way out and potentially turn into a ruling against their interpretation.
contravariant 9y ago
Style guides don't resolve the ambiguity, they just tell you it exists.

I'm as big a fan of the Oxford comma as anyone, but the court ruling here was ridiculous. External evidence, including the state legislature's style guide, made it perfectly clear what the law meant.

behindmyscreen 9y ago

style guides are not laws and if the style guide changes it changes the meaning of the law.

lsaferite 9y ago
But a style guide in effect at the time the law was written would clearly help disambiguate the intent of the law. That being said, I'm an Oxford comma fan.
nv-vn 9y ago
Yes, but the intent of a law matters. It's why it goes to court in the first place. I mean the meaning here is pretty clear, different from a real legal loophole where the system just hasn't been thoroughly planned.

SeanLuke 9y ago

I agree. I think the Oxford comma is a necessity; but so far as I can tell there is only one grammatically valid parsing of the sentence.

ubernostrum 9y ago

Not so ridiculous, really. A style guide isn't necessarily legally binding, and even clear evidence of legislative intent doesn't always get there if someone can argue the law that actually got written was ambiguous. California's red-light infractions are a pretty common example of this. The vehicle code lays out what the infractions are, and the people who drafted it have said very clearly that they intended to have a "rolling turn" -- making a right turn at a red light without coming to a full stop first -- be a lesser infraction than running a red (driving straight through without stopping). But a number of cities in California have argued the language is ambiguous enough to let them ticket a rolling turn as running the red light, and that's exactly what they do (most likely because the fines and fees are far higher). It's also pretty well known that anyone who hires a lawyer to fight one of those will get the ticket dismissed, because the cities don't want it to ever be argued all the way out and potentially turn into a ruling against their interpretation.

contravariant 9y ago

Style guides don't resolve the ambiguity, they just tell you it exists.