The Contextual Textualism of Justice Alito

Abstract

Justice Samuel Alito’s approach to statutory interpretation is best be described as “contextual textualism.” He is a textualist and frequently resorts to dictionaries to help determine the meaning of words He is also willing to enforce the plain meaning of a text as against justices who would like to create ambiguities from whole cloth. Nevertheless, the most important characteristic of Alito’s brand of textualism is his recognition that the text of a statute, like all language, cannot always be understood by combining the semantic content of individual words, but must be enriched by context. That context includes the overall structure of the statute as well as the social context in which the words are written. But importantly, it also regularly includes the legal context. The most important context for a legal text is often the law itself because most statutes are written in light prior law. As a result, the text is not created ex nihilo but against a rich background of legal tools of interpretation.

Keywords: Alito, Statutory Intepretation, Language of Law

JEL Classification: K10, K19, K30, K39, K40, K41, K49