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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-autospace:none'>For those of you who don’t
keep up with this kind of thing, the FBI recently demanded that Wikipedia
remove its rendition of the FBI insignia from their website. (<a
href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/03/us/03fbi.html?_r=2">http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/03/us/03fbi.html?_r=2</a>)
Wikipedia, in its response (<a
href="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/us/20100803-wiki-LetterToLarson.pdf">http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/us/20100803-wiki-LetterToLarson.pdf</a>)
to the FBI saying, “Go jump in a lake,” wrote the following: <span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>The underlined
words are conclusive proof that the canon of statutory construction <i>ejusdem<o:p></o:p></i></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='text-autospace:none'><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>generis </span></i><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>applies. Under
that principle, “where general words follow specific words in a statutory<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='text-autospace:none'><span style='font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>enumeration, the general words are
construed to embrace only objects similar in nature to those<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='text-autospace:none'><span style='font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>objects enumerated by the preceding
specific words.” Circuit City Stores, Inc. v. Adams, 532<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='text-autospace:none'><span style='font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>U.S. 105, 114-15 (2001). Courts use <i>ejusdem
generis </i>in conjunction with common sense and<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>legislative
history to discern the legislature’s intent in writing a statute.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>I
was struck by the similarity between ejusdem generis and “P’rat u’klal,
ein b’klal ela mah she’b’prat.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>KT,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'>MYG</span>
<o:p></o:p></p>
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