When a statute addresses judges, its meaning can be reshaped both ways

Evidence

Notice the significance for interpretation of the fact that the arrangement in question is not self-applying, and that the primary addressees of it are judges. In the original Schwimmer, Macintosh and Bland cases, these circumstances made it easier to read into the oath what the Court did read in, did they not? By the same token, do they not also make it easier to read the meaning back out, if the relevant underlying principles seem to call for that? — Henry M. Hart, Jr. and Albert M. Sacks, The Legal Process, 3322

Categorization

• XREF: Reinforces the volume’s recurring theme that statutes addressed to judges rather than self-applying arrangements invite interpretive flexibility — callback to ch10 on three presumptions of statutory purpose. — connects to: Courts should rarely infer legislators intended to freeze a decision’s rule — Henry M. Hart, Jr. and Albert M. Sacks, The Legal Process: Basic Problems in…, 3351; Equitable construction can restrain, enlarge, or contradict a statute’s letter — Henry M. Hart, Jr. and Albert M. Sacks, The Legal Process: Basic Problems in…, 1903