Legalese

NilByMouth

Why cant law be written in plain english?I know for the law makers when they are making new laws they have to nail down every option so that no loopholes exist but surely that can be done in 'normal'english?

Just curious thats all

McCrack

Some people will say that text speak is 'normal English', get my point?

The legislation is generally written down comprehensively but it doesn't use legal vocabulary so really anybody literate can read it and understand it.

Legal speak on the other hand is unique to the practice of law (drawn heavily from Latin and French) and granted the general population wouldn't be familiar with it but why should they be? It's used because of the need to be formal and precise given the importance of getting things right for one's client.

Every profession and discipline has its own lingo really, law is no exception.

NilByMouth

Ah fair enough.Thanks for the explanation.

hullaballoo

Just out of curiosity, were you thinking of anything in particular that might cause difficulty?

I agree with McCrack to an extent; legislation, especially recent legislation, very much veers away from using 'legalese'. On the other hand, the syntax still remains complex and there is a knack to reading it properly. Further, there are certain phrases that are common in legislation that only lawyers and Gardaí might understand by their implications.

There are also interpretative problems when people read legislation themselves that are common and not even the citizens' information website (which is handy, to an extent) can fully remove some of the misconstructions.

jmck87

Because they dont want you to be able to understand properly and play them at their own game.

For example: Legalese is a great way of conning people into admitting guilt: Do you understand the charges brought against you today? = Do you stand under the charges brought against you today?

NilByMouth

No I dont have any legal problems:)I read awhile back in a paper about a judgement handed down by a court(was to do with a business law i think)and it was nearly impossible to read.

nuac

Agree that the legislature could do a lot to make law easier to find. E.g. Road Traffic Act legislation is spread over a series of Acts and Regulations. Some sections have been partly amended, some totally replaced in new Acts,

Scope for redrafting here. While drafting ledislation is a skill in itself, there are a lot of unemployed or underemployed lawyers about who could do some of this.

In my experience Judges are very careful to explain matters to unrepresented defendants

McCrack

Agree Road Traffic is spread out all over the place, that is a major criticism of the law, somebody finds a Statute when in fact there has been an amending one and indeed an amending one after that.

I find Murdochs dictionary excellent in giving you an up to date reference on Statute and case-law.