Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts

In this groundbreaking book by best-selling authors Justice Antonin Scalia and Bryan A. Garner, all the most important principles of constitutional, statutory, and contractual interpretation are systematically explained in an engaging and informative style-including several hundred illustrations from actual cases. Never before has legal interpretation been so fascinatingly explained. Both authors are individually renowned for their scintillating prose styles, and together they make even the seemingly dry subject of legal interpretation riveting. Though intended primarily for judges and the lawyers who appear before them to argue the meaning of texts, Reading Law is sound educational reading for anyone who seeks to understand how judges decide cases-or should decide cases. The book is a superb introduction to modern judicial decision-making. Justice Scalia, with 25 years of experience on the Supreme Court, is the foremost expositor of textualism in the world today. Bryan A. Garner, as editor in chief of Black's Law Dictionary and author of Garner's Dictionary of Legal Usage, is the most renowned expert on the language of the law. Reading Law is an essential guide to anyone who wishes to prevail in a legal argument-based on a constitution, a statute, or a contract. The book is calculated to promote valid interpretations: if you have lame arguments, you'll deplore the book; if you have strong arguments, you'll exalt it. But whatever your position, you'll think about law more clearly than ever before.