Common Law rules

Where a statute is not clarified by reference to the above statutory guides, a judge may look to the following common law rules:

(i) “The Literal Rule” lays down that words must be given their literal, grammatical meaning. Words in old statutes are given the meaning they had when the statute was passed, e.g. The Statute of Treason, 1351. Words appearing more than once must usually be given the same meaning throughout the Act. The duty of the court is to interpret the words that the legislature has used. If a statute so interpreted is clear and produces hardship, the remedy is to create a new statute; it is not the duty of a judge to fill in the gaps.

(ii) “The Mischief Rule” is also known as the Rule in Heydon’s case (1584), lays down that the court must look at the Act to see what mischief or defect in the common law the Act was passed to prevent. Four questions should be considered:

1. What was the common law before the Act was passed?

2. What was the mischief and defect for which the common law did not provide?

3. What remedy had Parliament resolved to provide?

4. What was the true reason for the remedy?

Judges were enjoined to make such construction “as shall suppress the mischief and advance the remedy”.

(iii) “The Golden Rule” lays down that a judge should construe the statute in its grammatical and ordinary sense:

“It is a very useful rule in the construction of a statute to adhere to the ordinary meaning of the words used, and to the grammatical construction, unless that is at variance with the intention of the legislature to be collected from the statute itself, or leads to any manifest absurdity or repugnance, in which case the language may be varied or modified so as to avoid such inconvenience, but no further” (Parke, В., in Becke v. Smith, 1836).

For example, section 57 of the Offences Against the Person Act, 1861, defines the offence of bigamy and provides: “Whosoever being married shall marry any other person during the life of the former husband or wife ... shall be guilty of bigamy.” Under English law a married person cannot “marry”, and to avoid absurdity or repugnance the word “marry” in this section means “to go through the form of marriage” (R. v. Allen, 1872).

(iv) The “Ejusdem Generis” Rule. Where general words follow specific words, the general words must be construed as applying to the persons or things of the same class (ejusdem generis) as those already mentioned. Thus “other person”, “other cattle”, “other animals” are vague and a reference in an Act to “dogs, cats, and other animals” was held not to include lions and tigers, for “other animals” meant those ejusdem generis with dogs and cats, i.e. domestic animals (Evans v. Cross, 1938).

(v) Expressio unius est exdusio alterius (the express mention of one thing implies the exclusion of another). This means that where specific words are used in a statute and are not followed by general words, the statute applies only to those things mentioned.

(vi) Noscitur a sociis (the meaning of a word can be comprehended from its context). Ambiguous or doubtful words may be determined by reference to those words appearing in association with them.

(vii) The Exclusionary Rule excludes reference to parliamentary materials in interpreting an Act. However, if the Act is ambiguous or obscure, or its literal meaning leads to an absurdity, the court may have regard to the Official Report of Debates (usually referred to as Hansard) for assistance in interpreting the Act (Pepper v. Hart, 1993).

Task 10. Review the text: