The Controversial Person by GM Fletcher

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http://www.wattpad.com/219396-the-co...by-gm-fletcher

The Controversial Person by GM Fletcher

1


Contents p.1
Introduction p.2
Part 1: What is this thing we call a person p.4
Introduction...................................... .................................. p.5
Etymology and History of the word "person".................. p.5
Modern usage of the word "person"................................. p.11
Political correctness, Language and the 'person'............ p.14
Conclusion of Part 1................................................. ........... p.18
Part 2: Law and the "person" p.19
Introduction...................................... ................................ p.20
The language of law............................................... ........... p.20
The legal definition of 'person'....................................... p.22
Jurisprudence and the 'person'....................................... p.23
Rights, Duties and the 'person'....................................... p.23
Natural persons vs. Legal persons.................................. p.26
Corporations as Legal Persons........................................ p.27
The Rights of a 'Person'.......................................... .......... p.29
A 'person' in the history of law........................................ p.31
Is a Person a Human Being in Law?................................ p.33
Part 3: The Laws of Britain p.36
Introduction...................................... ................................ p.37
The two divisions of English law..................................... p.37
Common law..................................... p.37
Statute law..................................... p.39
Statutory Definition of the "Person"............................... p.40
The Interpretation Act 1978............................................. p.41
Statutory Construction and Interpretation................... p.48
Statutory Interpretation and The Interpretation Act... p.51

Conclusion: Is a Human Being a Person? P.55
Bibliography
Appendixes A,B,C

2

Introduction


We are now living in a rapidly changing world, which seems to be moving at
an exponential rate. An ineffable amount of changes just within the past 150
years have created a different world now to one that was known before. Some
changes have been beneficial, some catastrophic and some things haven't
changed at all. This is the way the world works. Yet it is seen more and more by
an ever increasing mass of people that something just isn't quite right. Some of
these changes are so blatant that none could miss it, even if their eyes were
closed. On the other hand some changes are so subtle that they pass before our
eyes unnoticed like the air we breathe. It is about one of these subtle changes on
which this piece of work is going to focus.
What is that subtle change that affects our lives so deeply yet we are
unaware of it? The answer lies in a word.
What we are presented with before us is but one simple word. That's
right; one word. A word so common, so ubiquitous that one would be surprised
at the mischief, confusion and debate it has caused. It is a word that has evolved,
over thousands of years, corrupted from its original form, undergoing a
transformation that would be analogous to a single seed becoming a mighty
forest. Unlike many parts of our language which wither away and are forgotten
in antiquity, or others that enter and leave our language in but a single
generation, this slippery little word continues with us like a chameleon adapting
itself to a hostile environment.
So what is this pernicious little word that has created such
pandemonium? Laughingly it is but the ridiculously commonplace word
"person." That's it!
One may even ask the question, "why would a paper need to be written on
such a seemingly banal and insipid part of our language?" It must be one of the
most commonly used words in the English language and at the same time the
most misunderstood. Yet it is because it is a part of our language, a part which
affects everyone in the English speaking world, that it is our duty that it must be
questioned, analysed and understood.
A resurfacing of the nature of this word is now being contested in many
areas, none more so than in the area of law, and if there is one area of life that
touches the lives of everyone to a greater or lesser extent, it is that of the Law.
Innocent people are convicted wrongly on the use of this word. It restricts our
lives covertly in so many ways, and yet we are ignorant of this. Certain people in 3

power abuse this ignorance of the word's meaning and use it to their advantage
causing hardship and distress to the common man or woman.
So does it not behove us to look more closely at this problematic little
part of our everyday speech. Can we now dare to put an end to this
bewilderment that affects all men and women alike? Can clarity be achieved?
Because what it comes down to is one simple question "Is a human being a
person"
It is the aim of this work to provide clarification on this word; to elucidate
its encroachment into some of the more important spheres of our lives and what
the upshot of this is to us, the people. This will be achieved by firstly looking
into the common definition, combined with the etymology and usage of the
word "person." Then we will look at how this word is used in the area of law,
delving into the world of "legal persons," and the idea of a "legal personality." In
the final part we will look more closely into the laws of this country and the
interpretation of our contentious little friend or foe, for it has yet to be decided
whether it is an ally or the enemy, or neither or both.
A little disclaimer must be added here. To avoid confusion I will be using
the word man to avoid the commonly used word "person." There are no sexist
connotations to this, as when I write man, I mean man, woman, child, boy, girl
and human being. Do not be offended by the usage of the word man it is simply
a tool to avoid any misunderstanding and absurdity in this work. Furthermore
nothing in this work represents legal advice, it is solely a piece of research on a
word which touches on topics in law.









4











Part 1


What is this thing we call a "person"










5

Introduction

The simplest way to begin this enquiry is to state the obvious. What is the
obvious? Simply put, we use the word person to refer to a Human Being. If we
look to any Standard English dictionary we see the primary definition of person,
i.e. the first in the list of definitions, as a human being; nothing contentious in
this. This is what the common man believes and is told, taught, shown and
indoctrinated into believing, as a child, what a person is. Yet this is from where
the confusion or obfuscations, whatever you want to call it, arises. From this
perturbation a lot of misunderstanding and injustice is born. A quote from
James Mitchell sums up the situation quite succinctly:
"And what is this person or persona of which we hear so much? Most people are
now inclined to adopt the view of Max Müller. Nothing can be more abstract: it is
neither male nor female, neither young nor old. As a noun it is hardly more than
what to be is as a verb. In French it may even come to mean nobody ; for if we ask
our concierge at Paris if anyone has called on us during our absence he will reply
"Personne, monsieur!" which means "Not a soul, sir !"
1



Etymology and History of the word "person"

So, now I think it is incumbent on us to look to the origins of the word before
we begin to elaborate on the other various definitions of the word "person." To
do this we will look in to the etymological history of the word and its evolution.
Basically, etymology will give us an account of the conception of a word and its
original use, as sometimes old words were just compounded to form a new word.
This will become more apparent as we journey further back in time, and of
course with word time travelling we must also take the epochs into account how
the word was used.
First we must recognise that the words person and persona in today's usage are
intimately related of a sort, for they arise from the same mother, and are
brothers of a kind. It is documented that these words person/persona have their
origin in Latin, which in turn is borrowed from the Greek equivalent.

1
Significant Etymology by James Mitchell (1908), footnote, William Blackwood and Sons. P.237‐239
6

Of course, all this began within the world of theatre in Greece where "religion
was the cradle of Drama."
2
The Greek triad of their history, religion and culture
was represented in the theatre with the actors representing the various roles.
However to do this disguises were needed and so became an integral part of the
relevant depictions were, and as Hastings (1901) says:
"...the most important part of the disguise was the mask, by means of which the
actor's countenance could be distinguished at a distance, and which made it
possible for the same person to play different parts by making repeated changes.'
This device was particularly apt for men who had to play the part of women."
3

Thus the mask was a vital feature needed for the representation of the
appropriate character. But what importance does this have to our inquiry? Well
it is the Greek word for mask that is important. The word used for mask was
prosopon. This simply is translated as 'what is before the face', pros meaning
before and opon meaning face.
Now as time passed the Romans slowly adopted the theatre into their own
culture, translating many Greek works into Latin. Yet there were differences, for
example, the Romans did not wear masks at the genesis of their theatre, but,
after time the wearing of masks was adopted. That which was not adopted was
the Greek word for mask. Instead the Romans named their mask 'persona',
which is the combination of two words, the first being 'per' meaning 'through or
by means of'; and 'sono,' which meant to sound. Thus the word personare
literally meant through‐sounders
4
. The reason behind this definition was that
because these masks, both in Greece and Italy, used some apparatus which lay
behind the mask, which helped channel and augment the volume of the actor's
voice, which was entirely necessary in an open amphitheatre.
Thus the word persona was born. Later it was to become the mother to various
children. Yet, as a noun, a persona was simply a physical mask made from thin
wood or clay, made into various countenances, nothing more, and nothing less.
If it had stayed that way then this work would not be necessary, nevertheless it
has changed and evolved into more than what it used to be.
So now we have the origin of the word and with a little history to back it up,
yet we must see why it came into use in England. For it was the roman
occupation which, began in 55 B.C., that planted the seed for Latin to move into

2
The theatre, its development in France and England, and a history of its Greek and Latin origins by Charles Hastings (1901)
Duckworth & Co. P. 1
3
Ibid,.16
4
Significant Etymology by James Mitchell, 1908, footnote, William Blackwood and Sons. P.237‐239
7

the language of Britain. However the Romans were not to stay forever in the
land of Britain, but as H.M. Scarth has said in his work Roman Britain.
"The most enduring record of Roman times, and the change wrought by Roman
conquest throughout the civilised world, is the adoption of the Roman letters
of the alphabet, which have been used ever since."
5


It was language that was the legacy of the Roman Empire, and as well as a few
ruins and roads, but one significant part of the legacy lies in this simple word
person. Naturally with the Norman Conquest and the introduction of French
into England we have a reinforcement of another Latin based language adding to
the richness and complexities of the English language itself, a language that was
in the process of evolving. But as we see in our quote from James Mitchell above
the word personne in French is translated as nobody into English.
Now we have two words in our language today person and persona. It is clear
these two words are related and from where the relationship stems. Yet it is the
word persona that hasn't strayed far from its original form, but it does give us a
clue as to why person has changed so much. Persona as we define it today simply
means a role or character we assume in certain situations. For example, a boss
must adopt a persona when he works, which can be completely different from his
personality at home. In such situations people adopt these personas to help
them accomplish something, or protect themselves from something. A persona
is something we put on and take off when necessary, as was the case with the
masks in Ancient Greece and Rome.
So we can see a simple shift in the meaning of persona, originally as mask, to
its current meaning of a role or character; a shift is so subtle most people in
society are totally oblivious to it. This is also so shown by the phrase dramatis
personae and Persona non grata, which are still used today. Is it not easy to see
how this could happen? Yet when we turn to person we have a more difficult
time of tracking its changes through the ages. It is now that we turn to the
works of the etymologists to provide clarity. Etymology, as mentioned above, is
simply the study of historical linguistic change, and from their hard work we can
begin to look more into the history of the person.
First we must diverge somewhat from our theme and look into various themes
of etymology that will provide us with some clarification. Greenough and
Kittridge in their work 'Words and their ways in English speech'
6
give us some

5
Roman Britain by H.M. Scarth, p. 178
6
Words and their ways in English speech by Greenough and Kittridge, (1902), Macmillan and Co.

8

clues on how words change in relation to their original meaning, yet keep their
connection to the original source of meaning. One of the concepts they use is
called radiation, which means at the core is the original meaning of the word and
its subsequent words are off‐shoots, like rays from the sun. They are all
connected to the source yet they are not the source. A good example of this that
Greenough and Kittridge give of this is the word power. The word originally
comes from the Latin 'potere', which means 'to be able', and of course in modern
Italian the same word is still used. From this the old French word pouer (the
modern French is pouvoir) from which our word power comes, probably from
when Old French became an important language in the British Isles. One can
look to other Latin based languages and see the similarities, for example in
Spanish 'poder' is the equivalent of the English 'to be able' or 'can' in its verb
form but as a noun it means power. So for example the Spanish sentence "poder
tener el poder" literally means 'to be able to have the power.' Now all derivations
of the word power all come from the source meaning, which is to be able to do
something or have the capacity to do something. This is how radiation of a word
works.
The next clue Greenough and Kittridge give us to how person has changed is,
in their words, thus
"the next process that we have to study, in which a word moves gradually away
from its first meaning by successive steps of alternate specialization and
generalization until, in many cases, there is not a shadow of connection between
the sense that is finally developed and that which the term bore at the outset."
7


To try and put this in the simplest of terms, we have a word with a meaning
which we will call (A) which is modified by a slightly different usage, which we
shall call (B). Thus,
"...a word may get a new meaning by the addition of a modifying idea (expressed or
implied) to the old one."
8

This is where can begin to see how person has changed, with a successive set
of different usages. Greenough and Kittridge show how person started off by
meaning a mask until it came to mean a parson (a member of the clergy), by
using this method of successive steps of usage. They provide an enlightening
method of showing the steps, which are laid out below.


7
Words and their ways in English speech by Greenough and Kittridge, (1902), Macmillan and Co, p. 259
8
Ibid, p. 265
9


1. A A mask
2. A+B character indicated by mask
3. B character or role in (play)
4. B+C one who represents a character
5. C a representative in general
6. C+D a representative of church in Parish
7. D Parson
9



From this illustration we can see the source of person as a mask (A) and because of
this usage in theatre, the character and the mask (A+B) joined themselves in
meaning. We in modern English often use the word mask to mean that someone is
concealing something, which is what the Greek actors did by assuming a character
with the mask. This then evolved in to person meaning a character or role(C), in
which the word persona we still retain this definition. However person morphs once
again into the one who represents the character (B+C) until we are left with just a
representative in general(C). Of course this meaning (C) can be used in many
different ways as we will see later in this work. But to follow on with Greenough and
Kittridge reasoning we now see person being used to mean a representative of church
in a parish (C+D) which naturally leads to a person being called a parson. We can see
this usage if we look into John Cowell's Law dictionary entitled 'The interpreter of
words and terms' (published in 1607) where if we look up the word person we see the
words 'See Parson'. So it was not but some 400 years ago that in English person
meant parson, not the human being as we know and recognise the word today.

Hopefully you are getting a clearer idea of the changing nature of the word person
and its interesting evolution. Yet the most important aspect we can take from
Greenough and Kittridge's work is that person at the core revolves around
representing something. For the mask represents a specific character, a character
represents a certain figure, be it real or mythical; a parson represents the church.
This we can see by Greenough and Kittridge's theory of the radiation of a word.

Of course the story does not end here we have another somewhat 400 years of
evolution of the person to explain away. We have seen the development from its
original meaning of mask to come to mean parson, so:

"...we no longer think of masks but of the real characters appearing in a play. After
all, an actor wearing a mask of the king was for the time being a king, and thus persona
came to mean the very opposite of mask viz., a man's real nature and character."
10


9
Words and their ways in English speech by Greenough and Kittridge, (1902), Macmillan and Co, p. 265
10
Ibid p. 268 10


There were subtle shifts in meaning, like we saw above, where the fiction has
become a reality, what was once unreal has now become real. Maybe this can be
explained by the word character. This was originally taken from the Greek word
Kharakter meaning an engraved mark, until the meaning was expanded by metaphor
to mean a defining quality.
11
Thus a character became to mean a defining quality
which was why it was used in theatre to signify the role an actor was playing, and of
course the mask was definitely a defining quality. This is an important aspect when
we think of somebody's character nowadays. For it could be a trait by which we
recognize someone, or the sum of traits that define a man, which we tend to call a
personality now (yet another intrusion of the pesky person). Now we can see that
personality is a set of defining qualities that creates an identity. As we all know, Ident
in Latin means same, and the -ify suffix comes from Latin verb to make, so it literally
means 'to make the same.' So when we identify with something we make it the same!
Sounds Strange I know, but look at what happens when a person asks for your
identification, is it not to make sure you are the same man that you claim to be. To
make the same, is the simplest definition and our identity is what we have created,
what we have made to be us.

Can we not argue now then that when person was in usage as a parson his
character or defining quality held some prestige? For was not the church at this time
wielding immense power? The house or office of the parson was called a parsonage,
which in turn is related to the word personage, which means someone with high
status or rank. Someone with high status or rank was usually associated to some title
or office they held, for example, a king or queen. Can we not extend, with some
liberty on my part, on Greenough and Kittridge's diagram to aid us in tracing our
flighty friend person?

1. A A mask
2. A+B character indicated by mask
3. B character or role in (play)
4. B+C one who represents a character
5. C a representative in general
6. C+D a representative of church in Parish
7. D a parson
8. D+E a parson with high rank or office
9. E someone with high rank or office
10. E+F high rank/office has status
11. F someone with status


11
http://www.etymonline.com
11



For example, in Booth's Analytical dictionary of the English language he states
that

"...the term personage is more applicable to one who is officially raised above the
multitude. It is, therefore, more select and better fitted than "person" to denominate
one of the higher orders of society. In the same sort of etiquette the plural, persons rises
above the word PEOPLE: the latter being always collective, while the former are separately
considered in the mind. "Twenty people
"
are a multitude; but the phrase "twenty persons'
suggests the idea that each may possess a different character."
12


The meaning of the person is subtly shifting and as we are beginning to see the
changes occurring before our eyes, we notice how the word aligns with its
historical use. The Meaning shown in E and F are to be taken seriously now, not
only for their meaning but for their historical use. For it should be known in
English history by everyone who reads this work that one thing we English are
known for is its repressive class system. During some turbulent historical times
the class system has oppressed the mass of the population for the benefit of the
upper classes. Those people who bore some form of status were persons,
gentlemen, officials, and the aristocracy, for example. This, however, we will delve
more into in the second part of this essay.
Although the word person has more usages in modern English we have for the
moment traced its historical meaning and evolution enough to be able to explain
its modern usage.



Modern usage of the word "person"


Now we must look to today and how person is utilized in modern English. As
mentioned when we began to look at the history of the word, our modern and
primary use of person is to mean a human being. That was what I was taught the
word meant and I am sure most can concur with my own empirical observation
regarding this. Below are some of the definitions of the word person taken from a
dictionary easily accessible to everyone.
13





12
Analytical dictionary of the English language by David Booth, 1835, Cochrane and Co., p. cvi
13
http://dictionary.reference.com/
12


perڄson -noun



1.
A human being, whether man, woman, or child: The table seats four
persons.
2. A human being as distinguished from an animal or a thing.
3.
Sociology. An individual human being, esp. With reference to his or her
social relationships and behavioural patterns as conditioned by the
culture.
4. Philosophy. A self‐conscious or rational being.
5.
The actual self or individual personality of a human being: You ought not
to generalize, but to consider the person you are dealing with.

6.
The body of a living human being, sometimes including the clothes being
worn: He had no money on his person.

7. The body in its external aspect: an attractive person to look at.
8. A character, part, or role, as in a play or story.
9. An individual of distinction or importance.
10. A person not entitled to social recognition or respect.
11.

Law. A human being (natural person) or a group of human beings, a
corporation, a partnership, an estate, or other legal entity (artificial
person or juristic person) recognized by law as having rights and duties.
12.

Grammar. A category found in many languages that is used to
distinguish between the speaker of an utterance and those to or about
whom he or she is speaking. In English there are three persons in the
pronouns, the first represented by I and we, the second by you, and the
third by he, she, it, and they. Most verbs have distinct third person
singular forms in the present tense, as writes; the verb be has, in
addition, a first person singular form am.

13.
Theology. Any of the three hypostases or modes of being in the Trinity,
namely the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. 13




We have thirteen definitions of the word person not one as generally
perceived, because if you ask most people what a person is you find that they will
give the first definition in our list. So how do we get from something meaning a
mask to meaning a human person, well this will be explained in the second part of
this work.

Let us look to our second usage which is 'a human being as distinguished from
an animal or a thing.' We can suggest here that the notion of person is used in the
sense of a defining quality, simply meaning not an animal or thing. The placing of
the words human being is irrelevant in the meaning, for if you are not an animal or
a thing (including nature under the class of things) then what are you?

Definitions 3 and 4 I will not discuss as they come under fields not entirely
relevant to this work.

The fifth definition given 'The actual self or individual personality of a human
being,' does not refer to the physical human being but to a something more
transient, more ephemeral. Our personality is not a fixed quality it changes over
time. Ask this question to yourself, "Am I the same as I was when I was a child, a
teenager, a young adult, a middle aged adult, etc." What would your response be?
I think most of us realize that we evolve and change our personality. The qualities
that define you come and go, sometimes they stay and are repressed, and
sometimes they evolve. The important point to take from this is the use of the
word personality.

Definitions 6 and 7 can be looked at together as they are related. The sixth
definition states that person can mean 'The body of a living human being,
sometimes including the clothes being worn.' This is a strange way to define
person but, if we look back to the previous section on the history and etymology of
the word person, we can see how this may connect to the original few meanings. A
body in religious terms is often seen as a mere vessel for the soul, self, atman,
whatever you want to call it. As Shakespeare says:

"All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have
their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts"
14



14
As You Like It by William Shakespeare, 1599, Act II, Scene VII
14

Many people in the past, and still do today, have viewed the body as a vessel, a
thing that embodies the soul, like the actor embodies the character he plays, which
again brings us to the notion of the person being a mask or character. As to the
clothes, well these can be recognised as part of the mask or character. All this
applies to the seventh definition of 'The body in its external aspect.'

The eighth definition 'A character, part, or role, as in a play or story,' should be
self explanatory by now so I will not comment on this.

The ninth definition, 'An individual of distinction or importance,' we can see by
looking at my extension of Greenough and Kittridge's diagram that person
developed into someone of status, thus an individual of distinction and
importance. You can now see how some of the definitions connect by subtle shifts
in meaning or radiate from the original meaning.

Looking at the tenth definition we might be puzzled by as to why person can
come to mean 'A person not entitled to social recognition or respect.' It would be
my supposition that this comes from the phrase persona non grata, where it was
first used by diplomats who were not welcome in the countries to which they were
sent. Of course the phrase was then extended to a person of some group who were
not welcomed by some action the performed and thus were stripped of any social
recognition or respect. But again this is just a supposition on mt part

The eleventh definition we will be looking at in part II of this work so it is not
expedient for us to review this definition here.

As for the last two definitions these have no bearing on the subject at hand, for
this work does not seek to clarify grammar or theology.

So now we have looked at some standard definitions and to some extent have
looked at them in parallel with the etymology of the word person. Hopefully we
have a better understanding of the how the word began and its evolution.

The only other thing we must mention here is from the family of the person,
which is another ubiquitous word and that is personality, which is mentioned
above. Although we will not be looking into it more thoroughly as was done with
the word person, it is something that is intimately related to the concept of a
person. We can see that this noun comes from the adjective of personal, which
simply put means pertaining to the person. Personality therefore is an expansion
on the adjective form, which again, simply put is the characteristics which pertain
to the person. Characteristic is used in the sense of defining qualities as we have
mentioned above.
15

The story does not end there though as another insidious concept must be
raised to explain modern usage; the issue of political correctness.

Political correctness, Language and the 'person'


Now it is not for me to judge the merits and pitfalls of political correctness, but
since the phrase contains the word 'political' one must be dubious of its intent. It
has been a trend in this movement of political correctness to turn the common
words into terms we must avoid using so as not to cause offence. Person is one of
these new terms of the political correctness movement. Person is used place of
words such as man or woman, boy or girl and even Human Being, to avoid using
such offensive language. Thus the word person is perfect for the advocates of
political correctness, for as we quoted before:

"Nothing can be more abstract: it is neither male nor female, neither young nor
old"
15


But what is the concept of political correctness and where did it come from?
There seems to be no single consensus on the definition of political correctness,
but some say it stems from the Frankfurt school and cultural Marxism and has its
birth around the era of the First World War,
16
whether this is true in is not for me
to debate. But a definition by Atkinson is quite illustrative:

"Political Correctness (PC) ... was a spontaneous declaration that particular
ideas, expressions and behaviour, which were then legal, should be forbidden by law,
and people who transgressed should be punished...It started with a few voices but
grew in popularity until it became unwritten and written law within the community.
With those who were publicly declared as being not politically correct becoming the
object of persecution by the mob, if not prosecution by the state."
17


This insidious concept of political correctness is without doubt a political tool
for as Orwell says:

"...the decline of a language must ultimately have political and economic
causes"
18


The decline of the English language can easily be recognised by the use of
political correctness as a tool to control the way people think and therefore act. As

15
Significant Etymology by James Mitchell, (1908), footnote, William Blackwood and Sons. P.237‐239
16
The Origins of Political Correctness An Accuracy in Academia Address by Bill Lind, 2000
17
Political Correctness by Philip Atkinson, http://www.ourcivilisation.com/pc.htm
18
George Orwell: 'Politics and the English Language' First published: Horizon. GB, London., April 1946 16

stated previously the use of the words man, women, boy, girl, female, male, etc, are
"politically incorrect" because of what they call sexism. So to avoid that this
wonderful little word person arrives to solve this problem. How convenient! Yet,
unknown by many, the word person has severe implications in law as you will soon
see in the next two parts of this work.
This introduction of politically correct words does not limit itself only to the
word person. Another example is the use of the word individual, which technically
is an adjective, but used as a noun it now refers to a person. Orwell describes this
as pretentious diction and he states that:

"Words like phenomenon, element, individual (as noun), objective, categorical,
effective, virtual, basic, primary, promote, constitute, exhibit, exploit, utilize,
eliminate, liquidate, are used to dress up a simple statement and give an air of
scientific impartiality to biased judgments."
19


You will see much of this pretentious diction in the English language today,
especially in the field of law. Orwell gives another astonish example of how
language can be subverted:

"Here is a well‐known verse from Ecclesiastes:
I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to
the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor
yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.
Here it is in modern English:
Objective considerations of contemporary phenomena compel the conclusion that
success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate
with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must
invariably be taken into account."20

Language is a potent force in human culture and the abuse of cannot be
condoned, for the sake of not offending someone. For what might offend one man
may pass over the head of the next. This can be highlighted by the eminent
philosopher of language, Ludwig Wittgenstein, when he says
"...the meaning of a word is its use in the language."
21



19
Ibid
20
Ibid
21
Philosophical Investigations by Ludwig Wittgenstein, 1953, Basil Blackwell Ltd, p. 20 17

This is an important concept and must be recognized in the context of this
work. As you have seen when the modern definitions were elucidated, there are
thirteen definitions, or better to say there are thirteen ways in which the word
person is used modern English. So one can suggest that dictionaries do not define
word or specify what a word is, rather it show its use in language. Now language is
a subtle creature where confusion arises easily, this has been explained by the
thinker Alfred Korzybski with his famous statement of which I am paraphrasing
'the map is not the territory and words are not the things they represent.' Or as
Korzybski states himself:

"If words are not things, or maps are not the actual territory, then, obviously, the
only possible link between the objective world and the linguistic world is found in
structure, and structure alone. The only usefulness of a map or a language depends
on the similarity of structure between the empirical world and the map‐languages. If
the structure is not similar, then the traveller or speaker is led astray, which, in
serious human life‐problems, must become always eminently harmful,. If the
structures are similar, then the empirical world becomes 'rational' to a potentially
rational being, which means no more than that verbal, or map‐predicted
characteristics, which follow up the linguistic or map structure, are applicable to the
empirical world."
22



What Korzybski is basically saying here is if some words do not conform to
how we naturally use them then confusion will arise which in turn can affect the
minds of people. I use a simple maxim taken from the works of Wittgenstein and
Korzybski and apply it when necessary, which is:

"The word is not the thing it represents but gets its meaning from its use"

In regards to political correctness, it is obvious language is being used for a
political agenda. Its use of the word person is obviously for some political gain, but
this will be seen in the next sections of this work. But from the point of view of
modern usage the word person is being used to outlaw such terms as Human
being, man, woman, girl, boy, etc. By replacing these words with person it is trying
to make is into abstract entities; one homogenous group.
Orwell predicted this control of language in his famous novel 1984, and it now
can be seen in the form of political correctness. For we must not forget that
language frames our thoughts which in turn influence our actions as Orwell clearly
pointed out in his novel, which I recommend highly to anyone who has not already
read it.

22
Science and Sanity by Alfred Korzybski, 5
th
Edition, Institute of General semantics, 1994, p. 61 18

Language, when abused and manipulated, infects the whole of society and to
isolate to certain fields, as that of law, and change the use of words can only be of
detrimental effect on people and the society they live in.





Conclusion of Part 1


So to sum up this first part of our work the word person is an abstract word, as
we have seen by its chameleon‐like changes of the centuries. We have seen that
we have this family of words; person, persona, personal, personality, etc. We have
seen the birth of the concept of a person and its evolution throughout quite a few
centuries. We have also seen the modern usages of the words as well as hwo
political correctness has cemented this abstraction in the minds of many, by using
the excuse of feminism, ageism or any -ism that applies. We now use the word
person as a neutral term.


Yet it still hasn't answered our original question. Why do we call a human being a
person? Don't worry as this will soon be addressed. This cannot be answered now
because what has been written so far is just a piece of the puzzle. The following
centuries leading up to now will begin to give us a clearer understanding.
However we must veer away from the world of etymology and general language,
and to do this we must undertake an examination of the word person as used in
English law.












19
















Part 2



Law and the "person"














20

Introduction

I think to begin this section, which is really the 'meat and bones' of the
confusion of the use of the word person. I will leave it to Salmond who says it
best in his work on jurisprudence.
"It is not permissible to adopt the simple device of saying that a person means a
human being, for even in the popular or non‐legal use of the term there are persons
who are not men"
23

This is where our confusion begins. Why is it not permissible to say that a
person is a human being? For in the first section the primary usage of person is a
Human Being yet now we are being told that it is too simple use it like this in law
To discover this conundrum we must delve into certain aspects of law. The
law is a complicated area for any layperson to understand which is why an
industry has arisen around it, and anyone not privy to the information this
industry has will be lost in a labyrinth of language that will tie your mind up in
knots. Many refer to this language as 'Legalese,' and see it as completely foreign.
Personally I do not hold this view since language is a complex entity and cannot
be pigeonholed so easily. So let us look first to the language of law to unravel the
ball of knots it appears to be before we move onto the topic of the person and the
law.


The Language of Law

First we must look at the language of the law as it is language that breathes life
into the law. Language is used to write the law; to discuss the law; to arbitrate
the law and finally to define the law. One cannot escape the fact that in these
days law and language are inseparable.
As mentioned previously it is said that legalese resembles a foreign language.
Why do people say this? Well because if one does not understand a language it
is foreign to them, or a better way of saying it is that it is unfamiliar or strange to
them. Legalese is better referred to as a technical language. Other technical
languages can be found in such fields as medicine, science, mathematics,
engineering, etc. However we do not refer to these languages in these specific

23
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p. 275 21

fields as foreign, just unfamiliar to the layman. It is this unfamiliarity that causes
all the problems when approaching the area of law. We expect what we read to
mean the same thing as we assume it means to everybody familiar with the
English Language, yet this is not the case. Everyday usage of one word can mean
something entirely different in the eyes of the law, and thus our problem begins.
It is through this problem that we have these people we call lawyers, the ones
trained in law, unfortunately a lot of these people are unaware of this technical
language as well; so more problems arise.
Why do we talk of such things as legalese? Well simply because the person in
law is a technical term and a highly controversial one at that. Of course it has
been argued that because there are law dictionaries then Legalese must be a
foreign language. But that is just not the case. I think many people think that
because there is a dictionary then a separate language must be associated with it.
A dictionary, as we commonly think of it, is merely a chronicle of a language, it
tells us what a word means and its various usages, if it has them. Without
language a dictionary would have no meaning. Yet this is just one type of
dictionary, another is a translation dictionary where the word in one language is
translated into a different language. Finally there are technical dictionaries,
which define words used in the specific field it is used for; a law dictionary is one
of these types.
We must not be fooled into believing that because we are ignorant of some
parts of our language, (and by ignorant I mean 'not know something') we cannot
say that it is a separate language altogether, this would be just too facile to
assume. We must remember our maxim:
"The word is not the thing it represents but gets its meaning from its use"

If one is not involved in the field of law then the language and expressions
will confuse the most intelligent man or woman. The use of specifically defined
usage can be explained by the above maxim. If you do not use the technical
language of law, it will appear foreign to you.
In this work we will view Legalese as a technical language, and will use the
appropriate resources for reference to legal terms and not ordinary usage. For, as
we have seen, the use of words in law can be far different from common usage.
Whether this is done deliberately or by necessity, we do not know. However
comparisons will be made between the technical terms and ordinary usage to
indicate the disparity between the same words. A separate work is indeed
needed on language and the law, but that is for the future.

22


The legal definition of 'person'

As you saw from Salmond's quote24
not all persons are human beings and it is
this division which causes many problems as you will see further on in this work.
It is this enigma of the word person in law that initiated research into this part of
our language. The legal definition is slightly different than would be the normal
assumption.
As the ordinary meaning of person, explained in the first part, has many
usages, in law we are met with two usages of the word. The legal definition is
dual in nature, changed by adjectives. The first definition or usage is what is
called a 'natural person' and the second a 'legal person,' so you see it is not as
simple as might think. After all you can't define something by using the same
word you're trying to define.
The natural person simply refers to a human being. By adding the adjective
'natural' it means a person who is of nature, and up until now that has only been
human beings. Although there is a current debate going on in different places to
give animals a legal personality; so would animals become a natural person? The
adjective 'natural' is more of a narrowing down of the definition of person to
specify mankind. This definition is plain and is probably why we refer to
ourselves as persons, but we are a long way off from explaining why this is the
case.
The legal person, sometimes called an artificial person, is a different matter
altogether and it will be the major aim of this work to show why. Simply put a
legal person is a corporation in modern parlance, or as the English calls it, a body
corporate. Now as you can see this is a big leap from calling a human being a
person to calling a corporation a person.
Another word which must be introduced is that of individual, once an
adjective now a noun, used to refer to a single human being, but also in law it
can mean a individual legal person. It entirely depends on the context.
Now you can see how the law divides the concept of the person into two
distinct entities. However to adopt these definitions is too easy to explain what a
person in law really is.
25
What we must do instead is forget the definitions the
dictionaries give us and delve deeper into the more general science of law, which
is called Jurisprudence.

24
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p. 275
25
A list of Defintions will be given in Appendix A 23

Jurisprudence and the 'person'

As explained above Jurisprudence is the science of the law, or sometimes
called the theory or philosophy of law. Its aim is to help explain what law is and
its varied constituents. So in this section we will see, from the view of
Jurisprudence, what a person really is under the eyes of the law.
First of all Salmond talks of the nature of legal personality26
before he speaks
of persons. Now if we remember from above on the subject of personality it was
said that personality was "the characteristics which pertain to the person." So
when we talk of legal personality we can assume this to mean the legal
characteristics that pertain to the person. It is then natural to find out what
these legal characteristics are in order to elaborate on why a person has these
characteristics attached to them.
Pollock states that,
"Law necessarily deals with duties and rights of persons"
27

or as Salmond says:
"So far as legal theory is concerned, a person is any being whom the law regards
as capable of rights and duties"
28

As two of the leading authors on Jurisprudence have said it seems that duties
and rights may be some of these defining qualities that might lead us to find out
the nature of what a legal personality is.
So we have first to uncover what are rights and what are duties before we can
proceed to attach these to our controversial person.

Rights, Duties and the 'person'

It must be said first that in law rights and duties go hand in hand, they are
not two separate things that can be divided and investigated without referring to
each other. So when we speak of a right there is a duty involved. But it must be

26
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p. 275
27
A first book of Jurisprudence, by Sir Frederick Pollock, second edition, 1904, Macmillian and Co. p. 108
28
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p. 275 24

also noted that rights always have duties ascribed to them, duties on the other
hand do not always have rights attached to them.
29

Before going more in depth in the area of rights and duties there is another
concept that must be considered first, and that is of wrongs. A wrong is as it
suggests, a wrong act; it is the same in law as in ordinary life; it's just the details
that differ, or as Salmond puts it:
"A wrong is simply a wrong act ‐ an act contrary to the rule of right and justice. A
synonym of it is injury, in its true and primary sense of injuria (that which is contrary
to jus), though by a modern perversion of meaning this term has acquired the
secondary sense of harm or damage (damnum) whether rightful or wrongful, and
whether inflicted by human agency or not."
30


These wrongs as they are known are of two types, moral and legal. A moral wrong
would be, for example, murder because it is immoral to kill another human being by
natural law theory. This is shown in our own system of common law. A Legal wrong
on the other hand does not conform to natural law and comes solely from the minds
of men. As Salmond says:

"A legal wrong is an act which is legally wrong, being contrary to the rule of legal
justice and a violation of the law. It is an act which is authoritatively determined to be
wrong by a rule of law, and is therefore treated as a wrong in and for the purposes of
the administration of justice by the state"
31


Maybe a good example of a legal wrong would be speeding tickets as it is a
controversial topic in England nowadays. There is nothing morally wrong with
speeding, unless it endangers lives; for there are some animals on earth which can
break the speed limits but I doubt they will be fined. There are many legal wrongs
which are not morally wrong, but the more laws a country has the more wrongs it
creates. A wrong is such that if anyone should commit a wrong a punishment will be
meted out by the state.
So here we have defined what a wrong is, but what connection does this have to
rights and duties? Well, a wrong was elucidated because a duty is simply another
way of saying "don't do wrong," so when you do something wrong, whether morally
or legally, you have failed to fulfill a duty. As wrongs are divided into moral and
legal, so too are duties. You have a moral duty, which is not to do a moral wrong,
and a legal duty, which is not to do a legal wrong. Of course this is a simplified
explanation for the layman to understand but essentially that is what is meant when
we talk of duties.

29
Elements of Law by William Markby, sixth edition, Oxford press, 1905. p. 92
30
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p. 180
31
Ibid, p. 180 25

Now we must turn to rights which are slightly more complicated in nature. But
Pollock gives a glimpse of what a right is:

"Right is the correlative of duty. As duty is a burden imposed by law, so right is
freedom allowed or power conferred by law."
32


Or as Thomas in his book, 'A treatise on Universal Jurisprudence' states:

"A right is that quality in a person which renders it just for him to possess certain
things, or to do certain things, consistently with the laws"
33


Rights following along with duties and wrongs are also divided into moral rights
and legal rights. A breach of a moral right would result in a moral wrong, and a
breach of a legal right would be a legal wrong. This shows us how rights and duties
are connected, and the fact that a right involves some form of freedom, yet with
conditions attached (the duty).
All these rights, wrongs and duties are divided up into moral and legal categories
which make it even more confusing for the ordinary man who knows nothing of law.
Understanding what has just been written is not an easy task, and what has been
presented to you is in a highly condensed form to make it intelligible to the layman.
So why are rights and duties the defining qualities that make up the legal
personality that Salmond attributes to a person? Well I think Salmond says it best of
all:

"All that is right or wrong, just or unjust, is so by reason of its effects upon the
interests of mankind, that is to say upon the various elements of human well‐being,
such as life, liberty, health, reputation, and the uses of material objects. If any act is
right or just, it is so because and in so far as it promotes some form of human interest.
If any act is wrong or unjust, it is because the interests of men are prejudicially affected
by it. Conduct which has no influence upon the interests of any one has no significance
either in law or morals."
34


There we have it! As Pollock stated the law only deals with the rights and
duties of persons, and as Salmond said only a being that is capable of rights and
duties is a person.
It is now important to analyse this definition that the scholars of
Jurisprudence have given us. We will use Salmond's definition as a starting point
for our analysis. The first term he gives us is 'a being', and of course when we
hear that we think of something that exists, which does not necessarily mean a
human being, as a human being is but one type of being. Another way to

32
A first book of Jurisprudence, by Sir Frederick Pollock, second edition, 1904, Macmillian and Co. p. 61
33
A Treatisse of Universal Jurisprudence by John Penford Thomas, second edition, 1829, p. 21
34
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p. 72 26

describe a being is by the word entity, which is more of a neutral term, for it can
apply to corporeal and incorporeal things at the same time. Thus we can see
how there is a division between natural persons and legal persons as both can be
called entities but not beings.
The next part of the definition is 'capable of', which if we look in any
dictionary means "having the ability or capacity for."
35
Now having the ability or
capacity for something implies the choice to use the aforementioned. For having
something and using it are two different things. For example, everyone has the
ability or capacity for violence but it is their choice to use it or not.
So to try and give a more accurate definition to what a legal personality is and
its defining qualities, in regards to the in law, would be to say that it is 'an entity
with the ability or capacity to have rights and duties.'
36
So according to the
theory of jurisprudence something or somebody must have these defining
qualities to be defined as a person in law.
So now we must turn to what the law defines as persons, namely the natural
person and the legal person and see if we can match them up to our definition of
legal personality. We will also look into these concepts with more depth to gain
a better understanding of what they are. For to truly understand these concepts
and how they apply to the common man will benefit greatly to finding out if a
person really is a human being.

Natural persons vs. Legal persons

Let's begin with natural persons as this is the least complex of the two to
analyse. As mentioned above a natural person is said to be a human being, but
can we really say this? When we use the adjective 'natural' we are adding more
information to the preceding noun; the noun being person. If we look to any
dictionary (I use the one provided by the internet because most people will have
access to this) then we see that natural as an adjective means 'existing in or
formed by nature.'
37
So if we use our definition of legal personality and combine
it with the meaning of natural we have:
'An entity existing in or formed by nature with the ability or capacity to have
rights and duties'

35
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/capable
36
This is the defintion that will be used to describe a legal personality in law from now on
37
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/natural ‐ primary definition used out of the 30 or so definitions 27

This can be said to be the true meaning of natural person. Now as you can see
a human being is not mentioned in the definition, but can be implied from it as
we exist in or have been formed by nature. Yet are we the only things formed by
nature on the planet? No, of course not, but if you remember our last quote by
Salmond, rights and duties are created by human interests and it is only the law
that recognises human interests. Under the definition above everything in
nature should be a natural person, but this is not the case. Yet there are some
interesting cases when we turn to the issue of animals, pets or work animals, for
example. When we have a pet, for illustration a dog, do they not have rights and
duties ascribed to them? For we give the dog a right to security i.e. we protect its
well being by housing and feeding it and its duty is not to harm us in return and
to give us company. In this scenario we are the sovereign and the dog is the
person, so we ascribe rights and duties to the person. And in a nutshell this is
how things work in Britain now.
So what we can say about the natural person is that it may include human
beings is but not limited to them by definition. For if we are to take our meaning
of natural person to be consistent with what the law says, it would indicate that
we, human beings, are but one group under a vast class of things.
Now we turn to the legal person, a more thorny issue at best. As mentioned
earlier, the modern conception of a legal person is a corporation. Again this is
just too simple of a device to adopt when talking of legal persons. Let us first
adopt our definition of legal personality and apply it to the legal person. First of
all we must find a definition of legal used as an adjective, turning to the
dictionary used throughout this work we see that legal means 'permitted by
law.'
38
Therefore we can assume a legal person to be;
'An entity permitted by law with the ability or capacity to have rights and duties'
This would seem to be a more accurate definition of what a legal person is. Yet
by its definition its vagueness is apparent. What is an entity permitted by law?
This usually means a corporation, which is too vague of a device to contemplate,
so yet again it is incumbent on us to look into the nature of what a corporation
is.

Corporations as Legal Persons

Corporations are known as either legal persons or artificial persons. Here we
must turn to Blackstone's commentaries on the laws of England to have a better
idea of what a corporation is. But first it is prudent to point that although

38
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/legal 28

companies can be corporations, not all corporations are companies, so please
keep this in mind as we elucidate the concept of a corporation. Firstly as
Blackstone says:
"The first division of corporations is into aggregate and sole. Corporations aggregate
consist of many persons united together into one society, and are kept up by a
perpetual succession of members, so as to continue forever...Corporations sole consist
of one person only and his successors, in some particular station, who are incorporated
by law, in order to give them some legal capacities and advantages, particularly that of
perpetuity, which in their natural persons they could not have had."
39


So we have two divisions of what a corporation is; aggregate and sole.
Corporations aggregate are what we are more familiar with and is probably why we
call a company or business a corporation, but as we shall see this is more of a modern
phenomenon. The concept of a body corporate, as this is how a corporation
aggregate is more commonly known in Britain, is a much older phenomenon. As
with our contentious word person we can attribute the idea of a body corporate to
the Romans. Its first uses came in the form of universities and colleges as Blackstone
expounds.

"They were called universitates, as forming one whole out of many individuals; or
collegia, from being gathered together"
40


After this the church also adopted this form of organization, which still goes on
today. For example, public corporations are what we refer to as municipal
government, which tend to be towns, cities and boroughs, or as Arnold says


"A municipal corporation, therefore, is a civil corporation aggregate, established for
the purpose of investing the inhabitants of a particular borough or place with the power
of self‐government and with certain other privileges and franchises."
41


A corporation sole on the other hand,
".... consist of one person only and his successors, in some particular station, who are
incorporated by law, in order to give them some legal capacities and advantages,
particularly that of perpetuity, which in their natural persons they could not have
had."
42



39
Commentaries on the Laws of England in Four Books by William Blackstone, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Co., 1893, p. 467
40
Ibid, p. 468
41
A Treatise on the law relating to Municipal Corporations in England and Wales by Thomas Arnold, Third edition 1863, p. 3
42
Commentaries on the Laws of England in Four Books by William Blackstone, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Co., 1893, p. 469 29

The best example of this would be our very own Queen, or the Crown as the
corporation is known as. In fact the queen comprises of several corporations sole.
Some officials also have same status of corporation sole, such as secretaries of state
and other government officials. I would go as far as to say the prime minister could
have similar status but that cannot be proven at this time.

This idea of corporation sole is not widely known and as Salmond says:

"The chief difficulty in apprehending the true nature of a corporation of this
description is that it bears the same name as the natural person who is its sole member
for the time being, and who represents it and acts for it... Nevertheless under each of
these names two persons live. One is a human being, administering for the time being
the duties and affairs of the office. He alone is visible to the eyes of laymen. The other is
a mythical being whom only lawyers know of, and whom only the eye of the law can
perceive."
43


So here we have two variations of corporations both endowed with legal status and
are thus called Legal Persons, however they do have some dissimilarities to the
natural person. One of these is immortality, for natural persons die, but legal persons
do not. This was instigated to facilitate longevity of the corporate entity, otherwise
the death of the individual members of a group, would mean the death of the
corporation.

Unfortunately the field of corporations is too wide to go into any depth here but
what has been said should clarify the issue somewhat. What it does show is that a
legal person is, as our previous definition says, an entity permitted by law with the
ability or capacity to have rights and duties. Now these legal persons generally have
the same rights as natural persons with a few added perks.

So far we have defined what a person is under the eyes of the law and the duality of
its nature into natural and legal. We now know that rights and duties are
fundamental part of what makes up a legal personality and subsequently a person. So
would it not be pursuant of us to find out what our rights are.


The Rights of a 'Person'

This subject is too deep for a perfect analysis of the rights of a person. But we will
look at what some commentators on law have to say about the subject. Also you will
find the human rights acts laid down by law in appendix B.
Blackstone in his commentaries divides the absolute rights of an individual i.e. In
this case a natural person into three principal categories which are

43
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p.288 30


1. The right of personal security
2. The right of personal liberty
3. The right of private property

The first right as Blackstone says is:

"The right of personal security consists in a person's legal and uninterrupted
enjoyment of his life, his limbs, his body, his health, and his reputation."
44


As to the second right of:

"Personal security, the law of England regards, asserts, and preserves the personal
liberty of individuals. This personal liberty consists in the power of locomotion, of
changing situation, or moving one's person to whatsoever place one's own inclination
may direct, without imprisonment or restraint, unless by due course of law."
45


The final right according to Blackstone is

"The third absolute right, inherent in every Englishman, is that of property: which
consists in the free use, enjoyment, and disposal of all his acquisitions, without any
control or diminution, save only by the laws of the land."
46


Now of course this was written in 1753, but they do cover what our basic rights are
and most other rights elucidated in appendix B will fall under these three categories.
Of course this is just a cursory glance at what Blackstone writes to be more thorough
I suggest the reader to read his commentaries which can be easily found in the public
domain.
Another author we have used extensively here also has some definitions of what
our rights are. Salmond's list is as follows.
47



1. Rights over material things
2. Rights in respect of one's own person
3. The right of reputation
4. Rights in respect of domestic relations
5. Rights in the respect of other's rights
6. Rights over immaterial property
7. Rights to services.

44
Commentaries on the Laws of England in Four Books by William Blackstone, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Co., 1893, p. 128
45
Ibid p. 134
46
Ibid, p. 139
47
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p.188‐190 31



These are what Salmond suggests our rights are, whether this is true or not it is
not my place to argue that. Only to elucidate what some authors have to state on
the subject. As with Blackstone, Salmond's book can be found in the public
domain if you want to have a deeper understanding.

So these are our rights, and our duties are not to commit wrongs in accordance
with these rights. All this is what we say a person has in the eyes of the law. Now
we must move on to how the person has evolved in the eyes of the law so we can
connect with the first part of this work and the original question; is a human being
a person?



A 'person' in the history of law


Remember the first quote in this part of the work by Salmond48
where we
cannot say that a person means a human being, hopefully the work up until now
has shown part of why this is true. This section will deal more with how this
specifically applies to man. But let's begin by a curious quote from Salmond:

"...in the law this want of coincidence between the class of persons and that of
human beings is still more marked. In the law there may be men who are not
persons; slaves, for example, are destitute of legal personality, in any system which
regards them as incapable of either rights or liabilities."
49


So in the past it has been a fact that certain human beings were not
considered persons under the eyes of the law. So by logical deduction anyone seen
not possessing rights or liabilities was not a person. A liability here just means
someone whom is responsible for committing a wrong i.e. he is liable (legally
responsible) for that act of wrong.

Slaves as being the prime example of human beings not considered persons.
Slavery has a long history and is too complicated to go into here. But considering
when slavery was legally abolished it is not so long ago compared to the length of
human history. I say legally abolished because although slavery is against the law
of all nations that does not mean that the practice has stopped, especially in

48
"It is not permissible to adopt the simple device of saying that a person means a human being, for even in the popular or non‐legal
use of the term there are persons who are not men". Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes,
1907, p. 275
49
Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven and Hayes, 1907, p. 275 32

developing countries. In England there has been a long history of slavery dressed
up in a variety of names. For example:

"English people was divided after the Conquest
50
into two classes, the free and
the serf."
51


The serf was owned by his lord and was basically a slave, of course this
practice of serfdom eventually faded by the aid of the church and the common law
of the land (by custom). It also helped that these serfs were countrymen and
therefore were afforded the rights that an Englishman held. However the next
form of slavery was one of race. After the British Empire conquered a lot of the
world many of those who were conquered became legal slaves. This was then
taken over to America until the time of Abraham Lincoln and the emancipation of
the slaves. Yet even though they were emancipated a lot of their rights were
withheld which led to the civil rights movement in America.

Another group of human beings have also had their rights restricted at various
times in History and they comprise of half the population at any given time;
namely women. For a long time women were denied many of the rights of men.
As was the case with the early catholic church under canon law, as Hecker states:

"The canon law reaffirms woman's subjection to man in no uncertain terms. The
wife must be submissive and obedient to her husband. She must never, under
penalty, of excommunication, cut off her hair, because "God has given it to her as a
veil and as a sign of her subjection." A woman who assumed men's garments was
accursed; it will be remembered that the breaking of this law was one of the charges
which brought Joan of Arc to the stake."
52


And as Hecker states in 1914

"The attitude of the Roman Catholic Church towards women's rights at the
present day is practically the same as it has been for eighteen centuries. It still insists
on the subjection of the woman to the man, and it is bitterly hostile to woman
suffrage"
53


Of course, times have changed and the rights of women have improved
dramatically. For example it was less than 100 years ago that women fought for
and won the right of suffrage (the right to vote). The subjugation of women has
always and still is a contentious issue. Like so many topics, we have touched on

50
Being the Norman conquest of 1066
51
The British citizen: His rights and priviliges, a short history, 1885, E. & J.B. Young, p. 69
52
A short history of women's rights, By Eugene Hecker, Second edition, 1914, G.P. Putman's sons, p. 106
53
Ibid p. 117 33

only the surface of such immense issues, but they are used to illustrate that a
person is not what it purports to be.

Today women are considered to be natural persons under the eyes of law with
the equivalent rights that men hold. But this has been through a process of
evolution like the word person itself.

Throughout history there has been through some form of suppression of a
man or woman's rights, and this is no less true today. Yet it is unclear if the
suppression of some rights strips the man of his legal personality altogether, if so
then he would no longer be a person in the eyes of the law; but this is merely a
supposition on my part.


Is a Person a Human Being in Law?


It is now we must begin to answer the question that was the impetuous for
this work. We have seen the history and etymology of the word person, so we now
know where it comes from and what it was used to up to a certain point. The point
that left us was that a person was meant as someone with status like an official or
personage. We then looked at the modern usages of the word, of which there are
many. A lot of the meanings could be explained by the referring to the etymology
of the word, others had no relevance to the present inquiry. But nothing explained
why a person is a human being.

After this we had to look into law to find the next piece of the puzzle. What
was discovered was not so simple. For there are persons who are not human
beings, and there have been human beings who were not regarded as persons.

A more specific meaning of the word person was given by looking into the area
of Jurisprudence, which we will restate here.

Person - An entity with the ability or capacity to have rights and duties

Law however has seen it necessary to divide this definition by either saying the
entity is formed by nature or permitted by law, so we are left with the division of
natural person and legal persons. Yet human being is still not apparent by this
definition, and as was shown for thousands of years there have been an ineffable
amount people who had no rights, therefore these slaves in the eyes of law, were
not considered persons. It was only people of status that were considered persons.
Thus we have the connection between where we left our etymological study how it
has been relevant to look into the law. Now since only people of status were
persons with the according rights and duties, those, by deduction, who had no 34

rights, were not considered persons. It is only in the last 150 years or so that, at
least in the western world, that all people have slowly gained all the rights a
human being should have. This naturally makes them persons in the eyes of the
law, which is why we can suppose that person (natural at least) means a human
being. Yet this is technically not true if we follow the logic of language rather than
the twisted logic of the law.

Let me try and explain. The first thing that should strike the reader is that
noun person is used in a specific way. If we can compare it to another word this
might clarify things, for example the word mammal. Now a human being is a
mammal, but not all mammals are human beings. Do you see the difference? A
mammal describes a class of things and not the things themselves; it is a type of
category like furniture, liquids, plants, etc. A person is a class of things, or a
category, nothing more. Now if we describe ourselves as a person, you only
describe yourself as a member of a class of things. You could just as well say you
are a mammal; a biped; an organism. If we take the example of the class of
furniture then we can point to a chair and say it's a chair which is the most specific
noun to describe it, but it is also furniture.

The problem is that we use the word person like we use the word chair; you
see a man and women before you and you call him or her a person, a gender
neutral term, and the word sticks. Another example to illustrate the point is that
of water. Now water is a liquid, but when frozen it is a solid, when it boils it
becomes gaseous. In different states it falls under different categories. This is
similar to the person, when it is natural, something formed by nature; when legal,
something permitted by law.

So basically comes down to this. A human being has the capacity to be a
person if it fulfils the criteria i.e. having the ability or capacity for rights and duties,
but it is not a human being per se. Just as an animal can be a mammal if it fulfils
the criteria of being,

"any vertebrate of the class Mammalia, having the body more or less covered
with hair, nourishing the young with milk from the mammary glands, and, with the
exception of the egg‐laying monotremes, giving birth to live young."
54


But not all animals are mammals. Again we must refer to our maxim, "The
word is not the thing it represents but gets its meaning from its use," thus we see
that the word person is used differently in law than in ordinary modern usage. It's
just that it seems not many involved in the field either know this or are willing to
tell everyone this.


54
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/mammal 35

So in the eyes of the law a person is not a human being, it never has been and
doubtfully will ever be. It is simply a class of things; nothing more nothing less. If
we really want to be pedantic, person really holds its original use, a mask. For
rights and duties, supposedly are given to us by our sovereign power, be it God,
Allah, the state or yourself. You put on these rights, like a mask, which shows
other people what you are, to be able to move around in a world full of other
people wearing similar masks. To highlight this development we can use
Greenough and Kittredges's diagram and extend it more.

1. A A mask
2. A+B character indicated by mask
3. B character or role in (play)
4. B+C one who represents a character
5. C a representative in general
6. C+D a representative of church in Parish
7. D a parson
8. D+E a parson with high rank or office
9. E someone with high rank or office
10. E+F high rank/office has status
11. F someone with status
12. F+G s/one with status has rights
13. G anyone with rights
14. G+H any entity with rights


To sum up this section, we have found a main part of the puzzle, debatable or
not, that gives at least some clarity to the matter. In the third and final part of this
work we will see how this applies to the common man by looking into some laws
of England, seeing how they are interpreted and how this all applies to the person.

The next section will be the more demanding because we must delve more
into the language of the law, which always produces a headache. This,
nevertheless, is necessary to see how this one little word affects your life so
profoundly.




36









Part 3
The Laws of Britain













37

Introduction

To put this section into context we will first begin by giving a small
introduction to what the actual law of England is. From this basic understanding
of how the law works will be of great utility, for the following sections is where
we will go deeper into actual laws, how they are interpreted and what relevance
this has to the person. This part will be the most technical of the three because
we have to begin to introduce legal terms and explain their usage, so patience is
required from the reader.

The two divisions of English law

It is said there are two divisions of law in England. The first being the more
ancient system we know as Common Law and the second being the more
modern Statute Law. So it is to these two divisions a cursory overview must be
given, which we will start with the older of the two divisions: Common Law.

Common Law

Common law is generally known as the unwritten law of England (Lex non‐
scripta) for as Ruegg says:
"It originally consisted of a collection of unwritten maxims and customs, which were
supposed to have existed immemorially in this country."
55


So Common law is generally known as customary law as it derives its authority
from the customs of the nation over time, which was never formally written
down, like an act of parliament. A good example of this would be murder, for
there is no written rule that murder is forbidden, but as a custom, and this being
part of common law, it is forbidden to murder anyone. Blackstone divides these
customs into three types


55
An Elementary Commentary on English Law by Alfred Ruegg, 1920, George Allen & Unwin Ltd, p. 12 38

"This unwritten, or common, law is properly distinguishable into three kinds:
1.General customs; which are the universal rule of the whole kingdom, and form the
common law, in its stricter and more usual signification. 2. Particular customs; which,
for the most part, affect only the inhabitants of particular districts. 3. Certain particular
laws; which, by custom, are adopted and used by some particular courts, of pretty
general and extensive jurisdiction."
56


These customs or laws were determined by judges, which why the common law is
often referred to as Judge made law, or case law where precedents are set down as a
guide for future generations to follow, as Ruegg says.

"Whether a custom, general or particular, is a part of the Common law of England,
can only be finally declared by the judges, whose decisions when pronounced are
afterwards binding upon themselves and all inferior courts."
57


Of course this is not to say that everything is not written, but they do not include
acts of parliament, for as Hale says:

"...when I call those parts of our laws leges non scripta, I do not mean as if those laws
were only oral, or communicated from the former ages to the later, merely by word; for
all those laws have their several monuments in writing, whereby they are transferred
from one age to another, and without which they would soon lose all kind of certainty...
But I therefore stile those parts of the law leges non scripta, because their authoritative
and original institutions are not set down in writing in that manner or with that
authority that acts of parliament are."
58


So Common Law is the oldest system of law of England and continues today. Yet
how does this connect to the other division of law we have today? Well to see this
then we must look into the birth of the Parliament as they are the brach which write,
enact and enforce statutes. Blackstone writes about the beginning of parliament,

"I hold it sufficient that it is generally agreed, that in the main the constitution of
parliament, as it now stands, was marked out so long ago as the seventeenth year of
king John, ad 1215, in the great charter granted by that prince"
59


That isn't to say that before this time nothing of the like existed, but with the
writing of the Magna Charta a general summons was issued to various personages by
the king. Thus parliament was born and over it long history, which is of such a great
volume to go deeply into here, we arrive at the state where we are today. Common

56
Commentaries on the Laws of England in Four Books by William Blackstone, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Co., 1893, p. 67
57
An Elementary Commentary on English Law by Alfred Ruegg, 1920, George Allen & Unwin Ltd, p. 15
58
The history of the common law of england by Matthew Hale, 1820, sixth edition, Butterworths, p. 21
59
Commentaries on the Laws of England in Four Books by William Blackstone, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Co., 1893, p. 149 39

Law is a complex entity and cannot be summed up lightly, it advisable to read up on
the subject, where there are plenty of authoritative works in the public domain.

What we can say is that it is from common law that our next division of law derives
its authority, namely Statute law.


Statute Law


Statute law is referred to as the written law (Lex Scripta). Since Ruegg puts it best
we will let him give a concise explanation.

"Statute law ‐ Since Parliamentary government was fully established Statute law
means the Acts of Parliament passed by the House of Lords and House of Commons,
and assented to by the King. These Statutes have always necessarily been in writing or
print, and thus collectively are called the Lex Scripta."
60


So basically Statutes are acts of parliaments, of which there have been thousands
of in its long history, although many have been repealed, or revised. However a
statute is not simply an act of parliament. It is known that universities use statutes as
the rules of their organisation, so it is not the sole domain of Parliament to have
statutes.

The first written document to pass laws was the Magna Charta of 1215, this is
debatable whether it is a statute, but it was the first form of written law. Subsequently
a different version of the Magna Charta was put on the statute rolls, but not the
original, which is one of the founding documents of the unwritten English
Constitution.

Nowadays it would seem to the common man that Statute Law is the law of the
land but one must make a distinction here between the law and a law. The law is
what we think of as common law, whilst an act of parliament is a law, usually given
the force of law. Statute Law was introduced to provide a remedy for a mischief that
common law did not provide.

To make this is easier to understand an analogy might clarify things. Imagine a
mighty oak tree. Now the roots are the customs and traditions of England that have
developed over time. The trunk of the tree is the common law, which has grown
bigger and bigger as the roots (customs) grow stronger. Now the branches and leaves
can be compared to Statute Law. Simple enough, I hope! Now statutes come and go
as no parliament can be bound by the previous one, like the branches and leaves

60
Ibid, p. 11 40

which wither away and die when new shoots take over. The problem today is that
people take the branches and leaves to be the whole of the tree, ignoring the trunk
and the roots.

Statutes are the rules of society, which can be changed, and it is the law which
enforces, or not, these rules. Never mistake the rules for the entity which enforces
them. An example of this is that there is no statute for murder, for it has been an
immemorial custom that murder is wrong, therefore it is under Common law.
However, the "crime" of speeding is a statute law, enforced by common law, for
driving fast is a new phenomenon, which common law had no remedy for.

The problem with statute law is that it is open to abuse by corrupt people for
power, for if one can push through a law that is unjust, common law has to enforce it.
This is what we are seeing happening today as thousands of new offences have been
created since the seventies, to the point that every boy or child born in Britain will be
a criminal at some point in their lives, unwillingly or not.

It was initially this imbalance of statute law that prompted this enquiry into the
person.

This is a very simplistic overview of the two divisions of the English system of Law
and it would benefit the reader to delve deeper into the subject for a better
understanding, unfortunately this is beyond the scope of this work. What you do
have is a simple understanding of how the system works, which was necessary for the
proceeding part. For now we delve more into the world of statutes and see why it is
relevant to the person and to the reader.




Statutory Definition of the "Person"

If one has ever read a statute, then you will know that when you do so you enter a
labyrinth of language, consisting of twists, turns and dead ends. The language used by
the draftsmen of such documents is a science in itself, as is the reading of them an art
form. For this we have solicitors, barristers, lawyers, judges all to help us (please note
the irony in this). But why cannot the common man simply read the law and be able
to understand it? Simply because an industry would collapse, an industry that makes
a lot of money every year.

So what does the word person have to do with statutes? The answer is everything.
For statutes only deal with persons, the type we mentioned in the second part of this
work; either the natural person or the legal person. All the things the law deals with 41

lies under these two entities, so when one reads a statute a person will inevitably be
mentioned or implied. This is the reason that understanding what the word person
means is essential to the reader, because as will be shown a lot of vagueness arises in
these acts of parliament which control our lives.

How then does a statute define what a person is? To do this the government has
given us a hand in the form of the Interpretation act of 1978, this as the preamble (or
synopsis) of the act:

"An Act to consolidate the Interpretation Act 1889 and certain other enactments
relating to the construction and operation of Acts of Parliament and other instruments,
with amendments to give effect to recommendations of the Law Commission and the
Scottish Law Commission."
61


Basically it helps out by giving some instructions to how acts of parliament are
constructed. This is relevant to us because it also provides definitions of words used
often, person being one of them. So let us delve further into this act and the
construction and interpretation of statutes.




The Interpretation Act 1978


This 1978 act was a revision of the 1889 Interpretation act. It lays some clear
guidelines on the construction of statutes, and consolidates certain ubiquitous terms.
This was to aid the legislature in the drafting of future acts. An example of this is this
provision.

"Any Act may be amended or repealed in the Session of Parliament in which it is
passed."
62


Or,

"In any Act, unless the contrary intention appears, -

(a) Words importing the masculine gender include the feminine;
(b) Words importing the feminine gender include the masculine;
(c) Words in the singular include the plural and words in the plural include the
singular."
63


61
Interpretation Act 1978 (c.30), preamble
62
Ibid, Section 2 42


The most important section to us is the following:

"In any Act, unless the contrary intention appears, words and expressions listed in
Schedule 1 to this Act are to be construed according to that Schedule."
64


To see the entirety of the act of this act look to Appendix C, but the relevant
definition for us is hidden away in that schedule 1. The relevancy is that it defines the
word person and how it should be interpreted, it is as follows:

"Person" includes a body of persons corporate or unincorporate.
65


A small definition and concise definition, if we can even call it a definition, for it
defines itself using the word person in the definition. So can we even call this is a
definition? It looks more like guidance on how to use the word, not what it means.
We will compare this with the original "definition" of the 1889 act, which is as
follows:

"In this Act and in every Act passed after the commencement of this Act the
expression "person" shall, unless the contrary intention appears, include any body of
persons corporate or unincorporate"
66


So we see that the original 1889 definition was divided and put in different
sections.

First we should already be cognizant of the word person so no explanation is
needed here, but the second word to appear in the phrase is of definite importance
and that is the word include.

This is another contentious word in law and there has been great confusion in its
use. So it is necessary to clarify this word before we can go on with our
deconstruction. I think most people believe include means to become a part of
something, as I did at one point, but this is just the common usage. To give an
example of a dictionary definition include means

To confine within; to hold; to contain; to shut up; to enclose;.
67


What we see here is the real meaning, which is why we say that it means to
become a part of something, because the true meaning is 'to confine within.' So

63
Ibid, Section 6
64
Ibid, Section 5
65
Ibid, Schedule 1
66
Interpretation Act 1889 taken from Stroud's Judicial Dictionary
67
"include." Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary. MICRA, Inc. 01 Jul. 2009. 43

when someone includes you in an activity you become confined within that activity,
which is another way of saying to become a part of something.

In law the word include uses its original meaning, as in 'to confine within,' thus
when used in a statute it is not the same as ordinary usage. This is one of the
fundamental guides to statutory construction and interpretation, which are
expressed in a famous maxim;

Expressio unius est exclusio alterius (The express mention of one thing excludes all
others)

It must be understood that this is a guide to construction and not a rule to follow
obediently. Saying that it does provide light onto the word include. If we were to
follow the wisdom of the maxim and see the connection to the standard meaning of
the word include, we can gain a better understanding. Or as Bennion states:

"The expressio unius principle is also applied where a formula which in itself may or
may not include a certain class is accompanied by words of extension naming only
some members of that class. The remaining members of the class are then taken to be
excluded"
68


For example by applying the above maxim to the phrase "Person includes a body of
persons corporate or unincorporate" we could say that by expressing that a person is 'a
body of persons corporate or unincorporate,' which would only imply legal person and
naturally excludes the natural person. For if we remember in law the word person
refers to a certain class.

The other way of saying this is by using the standard definition of include, meaning
to confine within, to hold or contain, to shut up to enclose. The phrase 'Person
includes a body of persons corporate or unincorporate,' would be interpreted as that
person is only a body of persons corporate or unincorporate, for the usage is confined
within the word, enclosed by the very word include. Nothing else may enter it.

So by clarifying the word include then it can be implied that person in the
interpretation act would appear to exclude natural persons and only refer to legal
persons. Now this is interesting because if you look back to the 1889 interpretation
act, that phrase which was moved in the 1978 act, 'unless the contrary intention
appears,' would seem to indicate that if a statute referred to the natural person this
would be the appearance of the contrary intention. Therefore person from 1889 to
1978 and to date would have appeared only to refer to legal persons unless the phrase
natural person appeared.


68
Bennion on Statute Law by Francis Bennion, Published Longman, 1990, p.201 44

It has been argued that the word include is expansive, but this comes from the
common usage, for if you keep including things into something else expansion
occurs. Many legal scholars try to press forth this point that seems to go against the
very words they use. For example Wilberforce states that

"...it has been considered that the Legislature has intentionally given words a more
extended meaning than they would ordinarily receive. The interpretation clause
sometimes provides that a certain word shall " include" a variety of things, and it is
then held that this phrase is used by way of extension, and not as giving a definition by
which other things are to be excluded."
69


However In the very Interpretation Act of 1978, it specifically gives a list of
definitions under schedule 1
70
in the act. The title being 'Words and phrases defined,'
you will see many definitions because it will say something like "this means that."
But in three or four cases it uses the words include, like is the case with the word
person. Now if Wilberforce is right then by using the word include it does not give a
definition, yet schedule 1 explicitly states that these are words and phrases defined. If
it were a true defintion then our contentious phrase would look more like this:

"Person means a body of persons corporate or unincorporate."

Let us try and apply this idea of expansion to an ordinary sentence, e.g. 'dinner
includes roast beef and roast potatoes.' The word dinner is to mean a type of meal, so
really it is like our word person, a class of things and not a thing in itself. Therefore a
real defintion of the word dinner would be 'a meal eaten at night.' If we use the word
include then we are not defining the word dinner but describing the constituent
parts. So our example above basically states that dinner will consist of roast beef and
roast potatoes. It does not expand on the meaning but elucidates the contents,
therefore it only expands on what parts of a class of things are going to be used in the
meaning. Now there are many foods which could make up a dinner so the need to
elucidate the contents is necessary, but for the class of persons we only have two
constituents, namely natural persons and legal persons. By this reasoning then the
word include is not expansive but descriptive. So when we see the a word followed by
include we are dealing with a class of things and what comes after that is restricting
the use of the word to what is elucidated. If we were to use the reasoning of the
judiciary on the word include then a phrase like 'dinner includes peas' would mean
that dinner means every type of food plus peas.



69
Statute law by Edward Wilberforce, 1881, Stevens and son, p, 299
70
See Appendix c, Schedule 1 45

But there are times that the phrase 'includes but not limited to'
71
will appear in a
statute, which also seems to suggest that include is a word of limitation and not
expansion. Another way of saying what include means might be to say that 'include is
used with the intention of saying.' For we must reiterate our own maxim for meaning
which was:

"The word is not the thing it represents but gets its meaning from its use"

This small definition given to us by the 1978 Interpretation act seems full of
contradictions, for even if we look up the word definition we see that it means:

"The act of defining or making definite, distinct, or clear"
72


Now if we look once again to the 1978 acts definition would this be even called a
definition?

"Person includes a body of persons corporate or unincorporate"
73


Clearly by using the same word to define itself is surely not the essence of
clarity or distinction, not to mention the opposite of definite, which means:
"...clearly defined or determined; not vague or general; fixed; precise; exact"
74

Vagueness seems to sum up the 1978 acts definition of person. Now in every
act of parliament the word person is to be construed as how they have stated it in
the 1978 Interpretation act. So this vagueness spread through the thousands of
acts that the word person appears in multiple times. Could it not have been
easier just to say that person includes natural persons and legal persons? There is
another maxim of law that would seem to cover the state of affairs we see before
us, which is.
"It is a miserable slavery where the law is vague or uncertain.(Misera est
servitus, ubi jus est vagum aut incertum.)"
Is this not what we see before us, the law being uncertain and vague, and does
the current state of affairs reflect this? This is up to the reader to ascertain, for
where one person agrees another may not.
Let us now look into the rest of the phrase 'a body of persons corporate or
unincorporate' to conclude our deconstruction. The first word that strikes us
here is the term body, but since it is being used idiomatically in the term 'a body

71
Examples of this can be seen in such acts as the data protection act; freedom of information act;
72
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/definition
73
Interpretation Act 1978 (c.30), Schedule 1
74
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/definite 46

of persons' we must look towards the idiom rather than the separate words. For
then it would mean 'as a group; together; collectively'
75
or 'A group of individuals
regarded as an entity.'
76
So we have a group of persons and if we refer back to our
definition of person form the last part.
Person - An entity with the ability or capacity to have rights and duties
We seem to have a group of entities with the ability or capacity to have rights
and duties which is amended by the phrase corporate or incorporate. Now as
should be known by now that a body corporate can be either a corporation
aggregate or corporation sole.
Unincorporate just means they haven't been incorporated and thus can mean
associations, like charities or member interest clubs or things or their ilk. And
have separate characteristics, elucidated below
"An unincorporated association:
 is not a legal entity,
 is an organisation of persons or bodies (more than one) with an identifiable
membership (possibly changing),
 has a membership who are bound together for a common purpose by an identifiable
constitution or rules (which may be written or oral),
 is an organisation where the form of association is not one which is recognised in law
as being something else (for example, an incorporated body or a partnership),
 must have an existence distinct from those persons who would be regarded as its
members,
 The tie between the persons need not be a legally enforceable contract."
77



So by this deconstruction can we not give a more distinct clarification of the
definition of person in the 1978 Act. The original definition was:
"Person includes a body of persons corporate or unincorporate."
Our definition would go something like this:
"Person is used with the intention of saying that it refers to a group of entities
with the ability or capacity to have rights and duties, namely corporations'

75
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/body
76
Ibid
77
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/ctmanual/ctm41305.htm 47

aggregate and unincorporated associations (who do not possess any legal
personality)
Now this a lot more complex of an explanation but it gives you an idea of how
the interpretation act is trying to define the word person. Our definition was
meant to provide more clarity; well to some extent it clarifies what the 1978
Interpretation Act is trying to say. But we do not get much clarity for a
layperson's understanding. For this we can call it vague and misleading and the
consequences of this can be profound.
It is generally assumed that because the word person refers to a human being
as most people use it, but as we have shown this is not strictly true. In the
second part of this work we described the word person as a class of things in law.
Now it should be up to the 1978 Interpretation Act to say what it includes in that
class, and nowhere do you see a natural person. Of course, they will say it is
naturally implied because of ordinary usage. This is not the case in law, for the
ordinary usage of person is completely different from the legal usage. Of we were
to take their idea that person is implied, then how do we know when it refers to
the natural person or when it refers the legal person? Can you not see the
vagueness and generality of their use of the word person? Therefore it is a truly
miserable slavery we live under with such absurdities in these laws which control
our lives.
However to understand this absurdity we must look closer into how a statute
is constructed and therefore interpreted. For this lies at the heart of the problem
with our word person, because of the regularity it is used with we must
understand the framework it derives its context.
This, understandably, will be the most difficult part of this work as statutory
construction and interpretation is a very technical art form, yet an attempt will
be made to make it more intelligible to the reader. For if it is difficult for the
people whose job it is to draft these statutes, then for the common man it must
be nearly impossible. For as Bennion, one of the leading authorities on statutory
interpretation, says
"Modern statute law consists of a set of written texts which (in themselves) are
difficult to understand if you are a lawyer and impossible if you are not. Yet
misapprehension will not avail as a shield: ignorantia juris non excusat."
78


The Latin maxim he quotes means simply ignorance of the law is no excuse.
Which for us common folk simply means that it's not their fault if you don't
understand the law; you only have yourself to blame. So seemingly in the eyes of law
we must know the essence of what law is, every statute and know what it all means.

78
Bennion on Statute Law by Francis Bennion, Published Longman, 1990, p.10 48

If this was true then what need is there for the legal profession, for if we have to
know everything then they would not be necessary.


Statutory Construction and Interpretation

We must make a clear difference between the construction of a statute and
the interpretation of it. The construction of a statute is usually drafted by
someone of the legal profession expressing the will of parliament. The
interpretation is to aid those who adjudicate the law.
To go too deeply into the construction of statues is not too necessary in this
work, but some references from time to time will be necessary. The more
important and relevant to our argument is how the law is interpreted, thus we
will look into some general themes of how a statute must be interpreted.
The English language must be one of the languages of the world most open to
interpretation, and in essence this is highly subjective, which those who
adjudicate the law have found out. It is said that nine out of every cases that
reach the House of Lords, the highest court of appeal, deals with statutory
interpretation. So you can see this is an important topic, especially in the
context of this work. However because this has been such a problem some
guidelines have, over time, been developed to aid in the interpretation of
statutes, which we will give a brief sketch of now.
There are many aids that a judge can fall back on. The four primary ones are
succintly described below.


The Mischief Rule
One of the original purposes of Statute Law was to provide a remedy where
the common law did not cover. This rule lets the judge look at the former
state of the law to find out the mischief the statute was meant to remedy.
79




79
Backed by Heydon's Case [1584] EWHC Exch J36 (01 January 1584), Smith v Hughes (1960), Corkery v Carpenter (1951) 49

The Golden Rule
The golden rule states that if there is any ambiguity in the interpretation of a
word then to avoid absurdity the court must adopt an interpretation to avoid
this.
80


The Literal Rule
The literal rule81
was given by Lord Esher in the famous case of 'R v Judge of the
City of London Court (1892)' in which he said
"If the words of an Act are clear then you must follow them even though they
lead to a manifest absurdity. The court has nothing to do with the question
whether the legislature has committed an absurdity."
82

This basically sums up the literal rule quite nicely.

The Purposive Approach
The purposive approach83
is to find out the intent of parliament when it
drafted the legislation. It must me pointed out that this is one of the more
controversial aids to interpretation. For it has beeen said that:
"the purposive approach is one used by most continental European countries
when interpreting their own legislation. It is also the approach which is taken by
the European Court of Justice in interpreting EU law."
84


These are the four main guides by which judges interprate the law, however
there are more aids that the ajudicators can fall back on. For there are rules of
langauge, in the form of maxims, and external and intrinic aids. These other aids
are more specific than the general rules laid out before.
The rules of language are like the maxim 'Expressio unius est exclusio alterius'
we introduced before the other two popular ones area as follows:



80
Backed by Adler v George (1964), Re Sigsworth (1935)
81
Backed by Whiteley v Chappell (1868), London & North Eastern Railway v Berriman (1946)
82
http://www.peterjepson.com/law/legislation_cases.htm
83
Backed by Notham v London Borough of Barnet (1978), Royal College of Nursing v DHSS (1980), Jones v Tower Boot Co Ltd (1997)
84
http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/mod/reso...08918&direct=1 50

Ejusdem generis
This literally means 'of the same kind,' which means any general word used
after specific words it assumed that they are of the same class. For example if
something included lions and tigers and other dangerous animals, animals like
rabbits or cats would be exluded, as they are not dangerous animals.
85


Noscitur a sociis
This maxim is used to mean 'a word is known by the company it keeps,' of
course this is not the literal translation but its use in interpretation. Basically it
means if a word is ambiguous then one must look at the context in which it is
written i.e. the whole statute.
86


Along with the Expressio unius these make the three primary maxims of
interpretation
Next we turn to the intrinsic aids of interpretation, which apart form one
thing will be found in the statute itself. The one thing that is outside of the
statute is the Interpretation Act, which must be referred to. The parts in the
statute whic are aids are the following
 The long title - this is to show the general objectives of the statute.
 The preamble - this was supposed to elucidate the mischief that the
statute was to be the remedy for
 Interpretation sections - Most statutes have their own interpretation
sections and they must be looked out if a different meaning is intended.
 Other things such as headings and sidenotes and explanatory sections
(which is a recent occurence)
External aids on the other hand come from a variety of sources.
 Dictionaries - these are often used for finding the legal meaning of a
word.
 Works by eminent writers such as Blackstone, Coke, Salmond, et al.
Although these are not law itself they give a different but authoritive
perspective to the law.
 Other cases are also an important aid in the interpretation of an act for if
some judge has deemed a word to mean such and such, then many other
judges follow the reasoning and use the interpretation.

85
Backed by Allen v Emerson [1944] QBD, Evans v Cross (1938), Powell v Kempton Park Racecourse (1899)
86
Backed by Muir v Keay (1875), Inland Revenue Commissioners v Frere [1964] HL 51

 Hansaard - these are the words of the house of prliament written down
and are used to find out the intention of parliament. Before this was not
allowed but know it is more acceptable.
 Official reports - writings from such organiations such as the law
commision, the royal commision or other advisory bodies.

There are probably more extrenal aids but these cover the most important
devices used in interpretation.
So now we have seen the help that is given to those who have to interpret the
maze of words that make up a statute. This of course is a simplistic explanation
and the reader must take this on board, but there are plenty of works in the
public domain which go deeper into this subject. An overview is sufficient for
this work.
So how do we relate this all back to the person in law? Well what we have
seen so far is the origins and history of the the word, what the common usage of
the word means, how law uses the word and finally how statute law regards the
person. But the more contentious of what we have seen has to be how a person is
regarded in statute law, since the "defintion" is really no defintion at all. when we
refer back to how the law regards the person. So we now must look into the
connection between Statute Law and the person. So can we apply some of these
to the interpretation statute.

Statutory Interpretation and The Interpretation Act

So we have the following phrase:
"Person includes a body of persons corporate or unincorporate."
Can we now use some of the rules of interpretation and apply it to this
contentious little phrase. We have already applied the Expressio unius rule and
according to this our phrase excludes natural persons. We cannot use the
Ejusdem generis rule because of the nature of the phrase, but we can use the
other maxim of construction, Noscitur a sociis. With this maxim we must
consider the whole statute in the interpretation of the definition of person. As we
quoted above, which we will repeat again.
"In any Act, unless the contrary intention appears, words and expressions listed
in Schedule 1 to this Act are to be construed according to that Schedule." 52

As you can see that all statutes must abide by the defintion of person unless
the contrary appears. Now the schedule is entitled "words and expressions
defined," which would indicate that the phrase that follows the word is the
defintion. So by applying the Noscitur a sociis maxim any word under this
schedule is a defintion whether or not they use the word 'include' or 'mean,'
simply by the nature of the section.
Combine the Noscitur a sociis maxim with the Expressio unius rule and we
have our word person to mean that it only refers to a legal person.
If we turn to our interperative aids developed by the judges, namely the
mischief, golden, literal and purposive rules of interpretation.
Beginning with the mischief rule we can assume the interpretation act was
meant to solidify the interpretation of statutes to get rid of the mischief of badly
constructed statutes by giving some solid guidlines on the construction and
interpretation of statutes. The reason that person is included in the definition is
because there must have been controversy with the very word. We can see this
clearly by our investigation carried out in part 2 of this work, as the person in law
is not as simple as it seems. So it would seem to suggest that the inclusion of the
word and its defintion was to remedy the mischief that was being caused by its
misuse.
Now we must apply the Golden rule, 'if there is any ambiguity in the
interpretation of a word then to avoid absurdity the court must adopt an
interpretation to avoid this.' Well since the interpretation act was crafted to
avoid any ambiguity, it would seem to be the embodiment of the golden rule,
since statutes were meant to provide a remedy where common law provided
none. What other interpretation are we supposed to take if, as mentioned above,
the interpretation act states '"In any Act, unless the contrary intention appears,
words and expressions listed in Schedule 1 to this Act are to be construed according
to that Schedule.' All acts of parliament refer back to the interpretation act if
there is any doubt. So the golden rule seems to indicate that the definition of
person is the one to be found in the interpretation act.
If we now apply the literal rule to the defintion of person we just have to
accept the interpretation act's defintion. So what we have is that the word
person only refers to the legal person and bodies unincorporate. So any time in
any act, unless the contrary appears, even of it leads to absurdity it must refer to
a legal person. Of course this will lead to absurdity unless the legislature had
some intention with this strange definition. But as the interpretations says
'unless the contrary appears,' so we must find the contrary, which would be
mentioning the natural person. One of the most strange examples, of which
there are few, is in the human rights act. 53

"Every natural or legal person is entitled to the peaceful enjoyment of his
possessions"
87

Well this is one mention of the natural person, which in the human rights act
you might expčct to find. The strange thing is why is a legal person mentioned?
For they are not human. A conundrum indeed! So if the definition of person in
the interpretation included natural persons by implication then it would not be
necessary to say it. There are more instances of the natural person being referred
to, but they are few and far between.
When we turn to the purposive approach we must look to hansard to find the
intentions of parliament to see what they say about the interpretation act.
Unfortunatley there is very little reference to this clause in the 1978 act and only
indirect references to the 1889 definition. As Mr Edmund Robertson says in one
commitee session
"I have been asked, for instance, if a railway company is a public authority. I do
not know whether it is meant to be included in "public authority or persons."
"Person" would be included under the Interpretation Act, because railway
companies under that Act are incorporations, and "person" includes
incorporations. "Person," as I understand it, is either natural or artificial, and an
artificial "person" is an incorporation. But all other groups of human beings who
are not incorporated are simply collections of individuals"
88

Or as MR. A. G. Murray says in the same session.
"I think the word "person," in the singular, would be sufficient, because, with
the aid of the Interpretation Act, either in its natural sense or as relating to a body
corporate or incorporate, it would include every body"
89

And,
"The 19th Section of the Interpretation Act states that in every Act passed after
that Act the expression "person" includes any body or person corporate or
incorporate; and, so far as I know, there is no body which is not corporate or
incorporate."
90

These three examples show indirectly how the word person is interpretated by
some. The problem here is that purposive approach seeks to find the intention
of parliament but surely the act itself is the intent of parliament, or why would
an act be written in such a way. The purposive approach is a slightly more
contreversial approach as it seeks to imitate the continental approach to

87
http://www.statutelaw.gov.uk, Human Rights Act 1998, schedule 1, part 2, article 1
88
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/c...990612_HOC_158
89
Ibid
90
Ibid 54

interpretation, which are all, except us, civil law countries and so approach law in
an entirely different way.
In part two we looked to some of the extrinsic aids, by saying what leading
authorities have to say on the subject and the conclusion can be found there.
What we are left with by using some aids of interpretation is some very
contradictory views on what a person is in the 1978 Interpretation act. We have
deconstructed the interpretation act and from that it seems that person only
refers to the legal person. Also by applying some interpretative aids to the act
most of the evidence seems to point towards the same conclusion that unless the
contrary appears (as it does in the human rights act or the consumer credit act
91
)
person refers to a legal person.
I think the question is that lies before us is why is the natural person excluded
from the definition, if it is well known in the legal world that word person in
legal knowledge refers to two different types. Would it not be easy to put these
two simple words "natural person"in the 1978 interpretation act and clear up the
ambiguity? For at that time the differemce between the legal and natural person
was a well established idea in law. It does appear suspicious that such a simple
thing has not been amended and such ambiguity has been allowed to continue,
but this if this is the legislators will can there be a reason to leave the state of
affairs as they are?
So after all that has been seen it is now time to find out the answer to our
intial question, "Is a Human Being a person?"











91
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/ 55












Conclusion
Is a Human Being a Person?












56



Conclusion

Can we now begin to formulate an answer to our question? I think it would be
wise to summarise our findings before we can begin to even suggest an answer.
To show Greenbough and kittredge's diagram would help us give us a visual
summary first.

1. A A mask
2. A+B character indicated by mask
3. B character or role in (play)
4. B+C one who represents a character
5. C a representative in general
6. C+D a representative of church in Parish
7. D a parson
8. D+E a parson with high rank or office
9. E someone with high rank or office
10. E+F high rank/office has status
11. F someone with status
12. F+G s/one with status has rights
13. G anyone with rights
14. G+H any entity with rights

In the first part of this work we looked at the history of the word person from
which we found the original meaning was (A) in our diagram, simply a mask.
Over the course of centuries this meaning transformed in to a character or role
(B) which meaning or use we still retain in the word persona. This later
morphed into a representative (C) as a character was representative of
something. Our look into etymology then led us to see that at one point in our
history the word person was synonymous with the word parson. Since the word
person was related to parson and by extension parsonage and personage are
related. Thus with the meaning taking on a religious connatation, status was
introduced into the concepts (see E to F), this was naturally influenced by the
power of the church and state at that time.
Next we looked at law and this gave our definitions F to G+H as a person and
rights are intimately linked, one is irrelevant without the other. So by viewing
this diagram we can see quickly and easily the evolution of the word, but the 57

story doesn't end there, we are still left with our question of why we call a human
being a person. Well this would become defintion H if we carried on our
diagram, but we first must look at this more logically.
It is assumed that every Human Being has rights, naturally called Human
rights, and this can be see in Appendix B in the three documents of rights which
are applicable to us. And if we remember Salmonds quote above
"So far as legal theory is concerned, a person is any being whom the law regards
as capable of rights and duties"
From this we can say that because all humans have rights and since law
regards any being with rights as a person. Then logically all Human Beings are
persons, syllogystically it would look like this
All Human Beings have rights
Rights only belong to persons (Under law)
Thus all human beings are persons
So to finish our diagram let us add definition H to see the final picture of the
evolution of the word person.
1. A A mask
2. A+B character indicated by mask
3. B character or role in (play)
4. B+C one who represents a character
5. C a representative in general
6. C+D a representative of church in Parish
7. D a parson
8. D+E a parson with high rank or office
9. E someone with high rank or office
10. E+F high rank/office has status
11. F someone with status
12. F+G s/one with status has rights
13. G anyone with rights
14. G+H any entity with rights
15. H a human being

This would be seem the source of the concept that a Human Being is referred
to as a person, because of the evolution of a word throughout the centuries and
its adaptation into law. It was a slow process, full of iniquities, which has
brought into the language a word which means one thing in one sphere of life
and something different in another. Unfortunately these spheres, both law and 58

ordinary life, do not exist separately. So we have to make distinction between
these two spheres otherwise confusion is inevitable.
Common usage of the word person as a synonym of human being has no
inherent difficulties, it is the laws adaptation of the word that has created the
confusion and thus the necessity of this work. The creation of the person as a
vehicle for rights was a slow process and whether this process is still continuing
we cannot say, but we can say that a concept hundreds of years old is still being
applied today. It is quite easy to say that not all persons are human beings, but
rather difficult to say the contrary that not all human beings are persons, yet in
many periods of history this has been the case.
However as we found out in Part 2 of this work that the word person in law
actually referred to a class of things rather than a specific thing. Thus when we
refer to a human being as a person we are in fact refering to a class humans
belong to. An example of this would be similar to calling another human a
mammal. Technically it is correct that all humans are mammals, but not all
mammals are human beings, which is very much like the situation with the word
person. So when we read the word person in any legislation it is referring to a
class of beings in law, not the common usuage of the word, which has probably
been adapted from law and not the other way round.
So what is the answer to our question? Is a Human Being a person or not?
Unfortunately there is no straightforward answer, becuase we can both say yes
and no, it is entirely dependent on certain conditions. When a human being is a
person it is because they have the ability or capacity for rights, thus it is entirely
dependent on the connection between rights and duties and the legal
personality. Hypothetically speaking. if a human has no rights then they cannot
be considered a person. Technically speaking, since a person is a class of things
or beings then a human being is not a person and if we really want to be pedantic
we are not human beings as this too is a class. We are a man or a woman, a male
or a female, for this these are the true nouns for both sexes of our species.
It is because we have all these rights and duties attached to us that we are
considered to be persons under the eyes of the law. The long struggle for human
rights created, in law, a persona to which these rights belong, which we see
mirrored in the concept of the legal person. This fictional entity has no physical
existence yet it has the same rights and duties that every man and woman
possesses. But this legal person exists in law equally the same as the physical
man or woman, and since this is the case we can suggest that being a person has
very little to do with physical existence but some metaphysical existence that law
or society has created and maintains. If we were stretch this further it would
seem that the law is the one that confers these rights and legal personality,
neither being natural in its strictest sense. For we have seen in Appendix B the
three fundamental human rights documents have been written to give all 59

humans rights and because of this all men are persons. But can a human being
reject these rights and duties and thus strip himself of his legal personality? Or
is the process auotmatic the moment we are born?
What we have found out in this work is the central link between rights and
the person, which in turn must be linked with the society and law a man lives in.
However we must make a division between the common usuage of the word
person, which is entirely different from the technical meaning in law. This is the
point that must be understood and absorbed that words in different contexts are
used in different ways. It is the hope of this work that people understand the
difference and what this distinction implies in everyday life.
In Britain we have looked at the law and how the word person is used, but it
is filled with ambiguity and confusion which the law abhors, which will naturally
affect the common man. Whether this is intentional or unintentional it is not for
me to say, but if one is aware of the difference in its use then it is a useful piece
of knowledge for us to have when dealing with that are of life i.e. the law. It
cannot be more strongly emphasised how the law affects our lives overtly and
covertly. From birth we are under the eyes of law and it follows us to our death,
so to not put importance of the effect of some of the smaller points of law that fly
under the radar, just like our controversial word person, is unexcusable. As you
should have seen by now in this work how the effect of one word has had on the
evolution of our society, we should realise the effect it is producing now and in
our daily lives.
It is up to the reader the importance that is put on this word, but hopefully
you have a greater knowledge of our little friend and how it is used both in
ordinary life and in law. What you do now with this information lies on the
shoulder of the readers. Bibliography

 Significant Etymology: by James Mitchell (1908), footnote, William
Blackwood and Sons
 The theatre, its development in France and England, and a history of
its Greek and Latin origins: by Charles Hastings (1901) Duckworth & Co
 Words and their ways in English speech: by Greenough and Kittridge,
(1902). Macmillan and Co.
 Roman Britain by H.M. Scarth, London, S.P.C.K
 http://www.etymonline.com
 Analytical dictionary of the English language by David Booth, 1835,
Cochrane and Co.
 As You Like It by William Shakespeare, 1599
 The Origins of Political Correctness An Accuracy in Academia Address
by Bill Lind, 2000
 Political Correctness by Philip Atkinson,
http://www.ourcivilisation.com/pc.htm
 George Orwell: 'Politics and the English Language' First published:
Horizon. GB, London., April 1946
 Philosophical Investigations by Ludwig Wittgenstein, 1953, Basil
Blackwell Ltd
 Science and Sanity by Alfred Korzybski, 5th
Edition, Institute of
General semantics, 1994,
 Jurisprudence and the law by John Salmond, second edition, Steven
and Hayes, 1907,
 A first book of Jurisprudence, by Sir Frederick Pollock, second edition,
1904, Macmillian and Co
 Elements of Law by William Markby, sixth edition, Oxford press, 1905
 A Treatisse of Universal Jurisprudence by John Penford Thomas,
second edition, 1829
 http://dictionary.reference.com  Commentaries on the Laws of England in Four Books by William
Blackstone, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Co., 1893
 The Common Law, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., 1882, Macmillan and
Co.
 A Treatise on the law relating to Municipal Corporations in England
and Wales by Thomas Arnold, Third edition 1863
 The British citizen: His rights and priviliges, a short history, 1885, E. &
J.B. Young
 A short history of women's rights, By Eugene Hecker, Second edition,
1914, G.P. Putman's sons
 An Elementary Commentary on English Law by Alfred Ruegg, 1920,
George Allen & Unwin Ltd
 The history of the common law of england by Matthew Hale, 1820,
sixth edition, Butterworths
 The Judicial Dictionary, by F.Stroud, 1903, Second Edition, Sweet and
Maxwell Ltd
 Bennion on Statute Law by Francis Bennion, Published Longman, 1990
 Statute law by Edward Wilberforce, 1881, Stevens and son
 http://www.statutelaw.gov.uk
 http://hansard.millbanksystems.com
 http://www.opsi.gov.uk/



Appendix A

From Ballentines Law Dictionary, third edition





From Black's law dictionary first edition

PERSON. A man considered according to the rank he holds in society, with all the rights
to which the place he holds entitles him, and the duties which it imposes. 1 Bonv. Inst. no.
137.
A human being considered as capable of having rights and of being charged with duties;
while a "thing" is the object over which rights may be exercised.
Persons are divided by law into natural and artificial. Natural persons are such as
the God of nature formed us; artificial are such as are created and devised by human laws,
for the purposes of society and government, which are called "corporations" or "bodies
politic." 1 Bl. Comm. 123.


From Black's law dictionary Fourth edition


Continued On next page


PERSON - PERSONAL
New York. 1 S.Ct. 108, 119 U.s. 111l. 30 LEd 342;
ancl I llIItUIOI')' rtqulreme.'rt of suoh conditionl
if not In roIJnkl with ua ",Vlh Am.lllln .. m;
~mblna ConooL S. M. " M. Co. v. PeMIIYI<'lU1if.
8 S.CL 73'1. 125 U.s. 1~1. m. 31 L.Ed. cso.
II may i~oludl p&MnoWJpo. In .. Jullo)l, D.
c.ra" 22 F .supp. 9'/. 99. AI.o nrm .. sal< '""
teL Jouptt R. Peebles Sol\I Co. v. Slale Iloan:l o.f
Phorma.OY. 127 OhloSL 513. 189 N.Ģ. 447. 448-
''P",""",'' ON II ~ klll
-.1 ... 1 "".- 10 • I ...... btl... It.,,j~oI po._ I ...
cllillo ... Iiol'
• ""_, • "'I ......... or tro,."" to whim.". II ..
.Cltlb.ta .". ...... ., Of ,.. ..... ""'\1 .. ~ tVl'''' '1'1>0
II" ........ I! ...uklal _. 10 _n,'" 01" '0 •
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1>0"""'" 00' .. _ -. Ho .. " • • I)_II. III
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10,"1011 .. ort. .. ro,", _, WIll M In",.1IM ""lOll.
","""r •• OP_ 'n 'hi ......... .-UIo, I, .. 01100 to
or"Id. 1 _ ... 1110] • •. Wor,..., 1 11< ...... nI .. , • ., ....
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,,_ "'I' ..... _ ",""Ill "'thin " •• '''tull. ""_
' ... '."."'" 01 "'. ' ...... lYft ...... "...",. to ,,,,,t,,,,,
....... 5trlbb'la. T . 1loU. S IW>\ .. V". 13:>. •
It. ........ riO""'" " • loW ...... l.O ... _ 00. '.
TrI
T. to ""It. ~ NT. 10."'- 11 Am. r_ '15" U. S •. JI'o', go
U,L.na, " 1.. .... '"", l\>1 _, .. WlW. tb ...... , • • Of.
,II'.". OfVYl4lor .... oIt:1'!"' ... 1n •• I11 .. , ....... Io • • r
• PU"''' _ .... '<10 '"'''' " .. Mr ".....,." ""
, .. "" •• , M .. " • • . $ .... , M '1'< .. '" ..... ,,", .....
_to, 0' .......... , ~ .... """ -"" _""
'.""" lil t 0"" ....,. ""'""" or .... " .. ," (l',.,.p "
."" .... "J. <8 1' ." .. ( .. , .. " • _ U.
I. •. crook,' DIll ...... ...... C .. ,~D.I .... " ... . "."" ....
.. ""'_ .... , ...... to '" ..... ~ .. 01 _mItUIII "
rIO, I, ""'lu"","'" WIth whl .. :ntII. 8 ..... , '!'!to
Bu', .I.C, _ Th ....... 01. l oeo<\
"'II'. S ..... 101 IH. M.' N.1. ft., I N.B. 1'-\ " """
!lop 11, . M ,,~ .... tbo . .. tu .. __ tho ow ... 0' ....
II ..... I .. IIIJWI .. to .. r _, II ...... .,.. I ... _.,
01 ""'" _ , Brower 0. C .... b, . II G:., •• 10 .... :It' OY'
....... tbo ""ull ...,., ........... "" rot .... ~l .. O! 0 ~
...... '" _".. bI' ''' • I ....... n _ hol l 1"..11-
Ŧ ... , to.!>ow , ... , tho do. had _r "'" ... I;OOL
r"'l t Q,II. 1(ŧ: .... ,",U lI(I" , • .,_ " tbo won
'" .. "'" "11!ot1 ........... ,. ~BI
0<1." .. 1I'04t • . H"""L '" Ml
Wh .... tbo ... tul ........ 'b' ... '.r _ ....... ~."' ..
h .. _" _" ...... 'ho 1Ar< ....... 11 to oppq
10 • luIII'. l>o(dl11c....... _. ilvIA." 00. _
A O!tUd .. _ ..... __ I, >01 • oonon. !)I.,,,,,,,,.
Nor ...... ..., .. 131 WOI. 14. ~ ..... 1\0,. ~2.' ""t .. I,..
fu ....... Mr
d
... , I"""" .... S .. loall. l(. 1111 Nou. -Kl.
tn th.U. , ... 8t_"" ... .,.."'. o
t._. "'" ,..f' "_""""II "'old. ""' ...... U"'"',_
.. "... o'>....toe " ........... , """"". _ ........... In4
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o! ..... _ oro Utr.I. """' ., ... , ,"*1.1 !Doh.d. pot ....
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• f thoU _tl'OlllIIc bOdl ... 01 _. lio... 11 tJ,llCA.
..
"'PI ,u"ltŦ or rutll"." Of w1>loIt tic "'~"" •• ~ d.u ..
on .
ho'"" ,''''' "lt lo.", .. "b.t I • ..,..,. .. U . ... """ ... .
"n. Polloclt. .·'m IIoolt of Jurltor. Uil. er ... N ... ..
.. . .... , ... of Lo", .". U.
PERSONA. lAL
In the clvil law. Cltaratter. in virtue 01 which
certain nibil btlon. to a man II!Id """1I1n dUI~1
a~ Im!>Olled UjlM him. Thill 0'"" nun may untt~
m.o.ny "~.,,... <"",_ .. . ) ,,", lor elample. Ib~
tMr.Ol",.. 01 loth ... a ..... a ln. Qt muter and lieN
I nt. Mitckeldltom.Law. I 129.
tn E:ccl."wlleal Law. Tile ~or 01 a cblll'Cb
Instituted and Induo:tli'd. lOT hiI OWD Ute. wu
~ll'
con<'enlual body, 10 whom the chun:h wu fort!vt' r
4pproprtolfd, wu termed .per, ..... 1m_alii."
,-"
I'FA'>ONA C01UlJ:II(;TA IEQlll'A~Anlfl. IN.
Tll llf:sf;F. J>JŦ)PIIIO. A periOrW """n..:tlon
[1!letolly •• unllod pt'f1On. unlol wllh a penonl
if equivalent to on~1 ...... n In le_l: ~amHI 01
blood II as e<><>d I conolde<&t\on .. one'l own In.
Ie ..... !. Bat."' ..... 72, Rif.
PI':JtSC)NA Dt'8IClNATA. A poroon pointed out
or d9O!'lDild u an individual, U 0\>P0I0!d 10 •
penon .-rtlllJted " • mem~r
ftlllnt • partlcuIAt dw-act ....
I'EIlSONA ~OOJ.l!SLE. "nw Plrwn or ~
allon 01 the cburdL
PEIiSONA I!;!jT HOllO CVM SfATV QVODAl l
OONSII)J:;RATU!. A penon If a tnln eurutlde ••
ed with 1'Ctel't~ 10 • lIel1&ln 'Iulu.. i!eine<'C.
Elem. l l, Ul 3. f 15.
1 'V.asoNA NON GRATA. In lnt ....... Uon.o1 law
and a lplomaUc Mace •• j)CfW(III not a=ptable (10.
"'UON pecull;u to him.ell) 10 tbe rourl or ~ov.
ornment 10 which It If propoled to Ilrrdlt him
In the characttr ol in amlwaador or mlnlfter.
PERSOl'fA REGIS MEno lTIJR f'f:RSOl'fA DlJ.
ell!. JO!nk.c"nl 1110. The j)Cn0lt of duke metres
In thaI 01 kIni .
PF.IISOl'fA. STANI)! IN I\Jl)IClo. C.paclt1 01
01 ~Or In court or In 'ud~m'nT: capacI ty to be
I PlIny to a:n lotion; capadty or ability 10 'l1li •
PJ\RSONABLE. Havl11ll the r lrbta and P~rI
of • per..,D; a~le to hold 01' ""'InIlID a plea IJt
rourt: at.o "lID1l:!!)' to take a:nY!hInJ: (raJ>ted or
.,-From the Judicial and Statutory definitions of words and phrases, second edition.


PERSISTENCE-PERSIST 981 PERSON
PERSISTENCE-PERSIST
To satisfy the provl80 of the Act of 1792
{3 Smith'" Laws Pa. p. 73). "perslMtence," tn
tbe settlement of pubUc land to IIBve Ita for-.
tl'ittlt't, "must meaD something real; not
m"rely the wlshfng or e,en atteropUng to do
an act Impossible, or so dangeroull that DO
mun rould be expected to attE'mpt It." Such
Imn'I!lO only c1tspf'1l11e8 with the forfE'iture In·
rurred, according to the law, by not making
a settlement aDd continuing It, wltbtn aDd
during the time prescribed by the enacting
(']81111(', and requires that It murt be made 8fI
soon aA the prevention ceaMlB. Huldekoper v.
HUrrns, 12 Fed. Cas. 6848, pp. 840, 843, 1
Wa!lh. 100, U8.
PERSON
See Artlacl.l Peraou; Colored Pel'8ODj
Credible l'erson; Disorderly Penson;
EdjjtLn, Person; From tbe PenlOn;
Great Mau)' Persona; Guardian of the
Person; Injury to FenlOn and Proper-
ty; In Pel'soD; I..arcen)· from the
Persoll; Natural Person: No Person;
Plea to the PerflOll; Poor l'erson;
Private Person; Proper Person; Pru-
dent Person; Qualilled PersoDS i Suit·
able ('ertlOn; Suspicious l'erllOu;
Tblrd Penon; Wblte Pel'8OD; With
EveI')' Other PertlOD.
All persons, see All.
AOJ' other ptl'8OD, see Anf Other.
Any peraon, see Any.
Any person Interested, eee Any.
Every per80n, Mee Every.
EXp08ure 01' tbe person, Bee Exposure.
Other pel'AAns. see Other.
Such Plel'8On, see Such.
As used In the statute llmlting actioD8
upon the penal jjtatutcs, wbere tbe peualty
goes to tbe state, or county, or "person" su'
Ing for the M8.me, the word ''person'' meaws
tllmply any person who sues aa a common Ln-
1'ormer and not oue bIn-Inc a special Interest
by l"f"aBOD ot any Injury or jlrlevllnce. Nf"
bnll'lka Nat. Rank v. Wal!lh, 59 8. W. 952.
05-1, 68 .-\ork. 431:1, S2 Am. st. Rep. 301.
The word "person," as ulled In Act Cong.
July I, 1000, c. 1362, , 22, 32 Stat. 6f3 pro-
viding that, if al11 person wbose naDle all-
pears on the ron~ Ilhall die before receiving
hilS allotment the land to whlcb he would
Jun-e been entitled shall be aliotted In hili
lIUlUe, etc., Includes ulemUer., cltlzenlJ, and
tre-t."(lUlcn. Hon('ock v. : :Uutuai Trust Co.,
lO:{ I'a(!. 666, Ci6D, 2-1 OkJ. :mI.
eo .. tra .... plu...J.
The word '''iJerl4On,'' 88 proTided by Ky.
St_ f 467, OlaT extelld aud be applied to per-
N)Il~. Commonwealth ,'. Adams ExpreH8 Co.,
97 R W. 386, 387, 123 Ky. 710.
The word "perMn," n!3 used In Laws
1001, p. 61, ('. 62, ,I, Im)"lOfllng an inberitance
tax upon property paSllIna: by will or the
statutes of Inberitance to any penon in trust
or otherwise, tboulh Importing the siugular,
Includes the plural. DiXon ". Rickets, n
Pac. 9-17, 9t9, 26 Utah, 215.
Tbe word "pef80n," as used In the' stat·
ute& relating to railroad comml88lonel'8, In-
dudes persons (Gen. St. 1901, • MWn. Kan-
8llS City, Outer Belt '" Electric R. Co_ v.
Board of Railroad Com'n, Sf Pac. 1M, 756,
78 Kan. 168.
Re". St f 1024, provldee that when there
are !leveral chargetl agaLnat any person tor
the same act or transaction, or for two or
more connected acts or tr&.nsactloDl!, or 1'or
two or more acta or tranaactlona in the same
claM 01' crimea or otl'enRelJ, which may be
properl,- joined, Instead of bftYln,it several 111-
dl('tmentl, the whole may be joined in one
Indlctruent in .everal t'OUDte; and, If t",-o
or more indictments are found, in IRIcb CStIE'
tbe court may order them to be consolidated.
Held, that under eectlon 1, provldlDg that
word,; importing the sillĢular number may
apilly to several persoDIi or things, &e<:tlOIl
10'2-1 waa not limited to IndictmenUJ agaiOlll
a IJingle penon, bat embraced. coDllOlIdated
Indlctmente against sneral defeudantl.
l!:manuel v. United States, 196 Fed, 817, 320,
116 C, C. A. 137.
Be". st. c. 28, I 68, relating to wayll, pro-
videa that wben 8. way Is changed In Irade
by a road cowmltl::doner or "perSOIl authoriz-
ed," to the Injury of aD abutting owner, be
may apply Ln writing to the Illunlctpal omt'erl!
tor all a!l!lel'ltlmeut of damagee occulonNl
thereby to be paid by tbe town. Chapter 5.1,
I 19, relating to street railroads, pro"ldes
that such rond shall be constructed and main-
tained In such manner and upon SUCh gradeN
us tbe municipal omcer8 ot the towns where
they are located may direct, and when, In
the Judgment of 81lcb corporation, It shall be
nece!'l8llry to alter the gradf) of any road the
alteration shall bf) made at the expense of
the corporation In at'COrdance with the dlre('-
tlOD!'! of the munir\pal omcel"llJ. Held, that
the two f!eCtiOIlS should he construed togeth-
er, aDd under Rev. St. c. I, I 2, rule8 2 and
14, by whlcb thf) word ''Pf>rson'' may include
a corporation and fillnjlu)ar words InClnde
plural, wh('re a grade WR8 e8f:abl1shed by
municipal officers lit the request ot a rail-
road l'Ompany, It must be deemed to have
been done hy a "perllOD authorized" within
tbe mE'oning of section 68, nod though sec·
flon 68 provid~ thot thE' damages "hall be
ollsessed hy the munlclpnl officers to be paid
by the town, sud N>f' t1on I!), that the altenl-
tions shall be at the ex[lt!ulIe of the corpora-
tion, yet the word "expentle" tn sectiou 10
will Include the unlllngE'!! to landowllerM,
which, If paid by the tOWll, are a part of the
expense of the alteration, and Sf\! recover-
able by the tOWD from the rllilroad corpora-
PI!:RSON 982 PERSON
tton. Borley T. InhabUants of South Thom-
aston, 74 AU. 734, 136, lOtS Me. SOL
OoJutrwed. .. wttae ..
Under Bankr. Act July 1, 1898, c. MI, 1
fl, 30 Stat. 566, providtoa: that certaln acts
committed by aOJ' "person" before a referee
In bankruptcy 8hall constitute a contempt ot
court, the word "person" 18 not limited to the
bankrupt, but extends to a wltne88 gullty ot
perjury betore the reteree. In re Bronstein,
182 Fed. 349, 358.
Code Clv. Proc. 1 870, provides for the
examinatIon of a party, and aect10n 871 an-
thorizes the examlnatlon ot a ' 'person not a
party" to the action. Held, that the word
"person" In eeetlon sn mean8 a person who
can testify as a wltnese: and hence 8uch lee-
tlOD did not authorize the examination ot
olDcen of a corporatlon before tri8l, where
the corporation was Dot a party. Chartered
Bank of India, Australia, and China v.
Nortb Rher Ins. Co., 121 N. Y. Supp. 399,
400, 1~ App. Dlv. 646.
Baakrapt
Bankr. Act 1898, I 29b, provides that a
"penon" shall be punished by Imprisonment
on conviction of havlng concealed property
belonging to his estate In bankruptcy. Sec-
tion 1, cl. 19, pro\'ldee that "persons" sball
luclude corporations, except where otherwise
specified. A careful readIng ot this clause,
tn connection with the terms ot section 29b,
convinces tbat It can bave no effect to extend
the terms or broaden the true Interpretation
ot the latter 8ubsectlon. All who are punlah-
able under this subsection 29b are persons
who are or who bave been bankrupts. Bence
1I0ne ot those whom the word "persons" Is
made to Include under aectlon 1, eI. 19-no
officers, partnerships, women, participants In
forbidden acta, agents. officers, or memLJers
ot any board. ot directors or trusteee-can be
&nitty ot the otrenae speclfl.ed in tb1a subsec-
tlOD, unleu they are eUher bankrupt. when
theJ conceal tbe property or bave beeD such
and have obtained tbeir dlllCharl88 before
that tlme. Present or pUt bankruptq' t. an
eesenUaI attribute of evef7 peraon wbo may
be an offender under this etatute. Field v.
United Statal. 131 Fed. 6, 1, tI9 C. O. A. ft68,
Bankr. Act July 1. 1898, c. &41, I 29b, 30
Stat. G54, provides that a person shan be
punished on couvictlon ot having l-oucealed,
whIle a bankropt, or after his dIscharge,
from his trustee, any ot the property Lelong-
Ing to his estate. Held, that though there
can be no oJfense unless the concealment is
accomplished wbile there is a persuo 10 bank-
ruptcy, or atter his discharge, not only the
bankrupt, but otbera aiding and abettJug III
tbe concealment, are punishable. Uuited
States v. Youoa: 6: Bolland Co., 170 Fed 110-
112.
B~ of penoaa
The provl.lons of eeetlOD 21M. Code a,.
Proe., direetlng that "each penon upon_bolD
a writ of certlorari1s aerved • • • 1D'QIl
IIlake a return," etc., 1a not In confUct w1th
tile view that the return ot a body or bol1d
IIlay be made by a .ID.Iljorlty of Ita membttt.
b
denote any person or legal entity to wbom a
writ Is dIrected. People ex rei. Lester t.
Eino, 68 N. E. 868, 810, 116 N_ Y. 513.
The use of the word ''person'' ill CoDlt.
U. S. Amend. It, providing that DO .... Ie-
sllall deprive an,- perSOD of ute, llbert7. or
p: roperty, without due procellB ot 111.., tD-
c!ludes the natural persona who compoe a
corporation, and wbo are the benelclaJ owa-
el rs of all Us property, the tecbnical aDd •
Blal title to whlcb Is in the corporation. SUtt-
v . . Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., .7 South. tII9.
9:~ 66 Fla. 617, 32 L. R. A. (N. 8.) 63:9.
In view ot Rev. 8t. 1009, 110,100, de-
Ing the word "persona" 88 Includlug • bod.!
o: t penona whether Incorporated or not, UD-
der sections 2528 and 8881, respectlvelJ'. pro-
v-tdIng that if any penon dlsobey an 1nJuc-
Uon, the drcn1t court to ",hleh It 18 returDed.
o: r any judge In vacation thereof. ahall I.IIW
an attachment for the contempt, aDd that
every court of record shall bave power tG
punish a8 for criminal contempt, peraora
g-ullty of willful dlsobedleD<'e ot any order,
tile clreuit court has power to punlsb a cor-
poration tor ch11 contempt. Fiedler v. Bam·
brick Bros. Conet. Co., U2 S. W. 1111, Illt
1162 Mo. App. ~.
.,..,....
Code 1897, I 2419, prod&. that it U1
o)mmon cartier or pel'8(ln, or _OJ' ODe ..
a. gent or employe! thereot, eball tranaport to
any penon within the state 8.DJ' IntoxicatiDI
liquors without ftrst being tnrn1abed with •
certificate that the con8lgnee 1a tbe bolder
o : t a permit to 1811 intoxicating liquors lD
Ute county to which the 8hlpment .. made-.
Irocb carrIer or person than on conrlet1Oll be
fined, etc. Held, that the WOM ''penon.'' u
used In sucb section, meane a public or pr!-
v. ate carrier, and did Dot Include 008 whO
tn-anaported eeven.1 Interatate abtpmentl or
liquor from the raUroad compaQ'. depot ..
the con81cnee'8 place of ree1dence .. a mer"I'
gratuity. State v. Wignall, 128 N. W. __
Q31, 100 Iowa, 660, M L. R. A. (N. S.) GOT_
0Jdl
The word ''penon," as 1l88d In • statate-
forbidding persona to walk aJooa: railroad
tll'aeka, should not be construed to lDduck
<.lb.Udren 80 young as to be tncapable of Ŧm-
tJrtbutory negl.l.gence, under the rule that
vvhere a statute ee:eka to cb.aDp aD ezlst:tna
Sltatua ot a portion ot a COIDIDQD1t:J. 1M
e tlange must be made in laquap 10 dear
S.8 to unm18takllbl1 ma.n1test such leclJIlati,..
purpose. Erie R. Co • .,. Swldenkl. Ufj Fed.
621, 524, 111 C. O . .A.. 11.
PERSON
01_
Tbe word "penou" In the utradttloD
treIlt;J between the UDited: Staa and Ita17.
eJltered Into in 1888 (15 Btat. 629) and
amended 1n ~ (24 Btat. 1001), proYidlD&'
tor the InlTilllder of pel'llOnB charged with
enumerated cr!IDeII, 11 ea1II.dently broad to
embrace dtlzeu ud nbJecte ot tbe con-
trarltq parUee, and a citizen of the United:
Stetee, who wbUe tn Italy commit. an ot-
tenll8, and who then lIeee to the Untted
States., :la within tbe tre-.t7 and may be ex-
tradited thereunder, thoup Italy hall alwaJ'l
eoDl'tnled the word to .. not to Include ita
elt1sena and IIDbJectI. lDI parte Chariton,
185 Fed. 880, 884.
eutoa .... 8'
8ect1on ~, Rev. St., reJatine to "el'8l7
pel'llOn" who aida in eft'ect1n1J the 1lI~1 eo-
trJ of import&. wh11e ordlnartlJ not Intended
to applJ to tho. lndJvldual. (custOmll otH·
t!'en) covered. by the precedtD& llectlon of the
law, does oot exclnde an oOleer of the eemoe
It the fads brlng him within the deftn1tion
of the "pel'flOO" at wbom tble prov1!flon 111
aimed, aDd lJ1Q theretore include a customa
weigher who aids In the way prohibited.
United Statetl v. Meecall, 164 Fed. 587, M8.
Dill ......... _ •• tate .t deetliUed
Ii-"·
A cor:pee II not a Mpel'llOn." That which
eonatituteI!J a person Is separated from the
body by death. Brooke v. Boston a: N. St.
Ry. Co .• 91 N. m. 760. 211 lila. 277.
A. '"Penon" inelude. a corporation and
a Jo1nt-atock company, but It does not In-
clude an estate, or where an action la
brought by the reprelJentative of an estat~ or
tnu;t .a Inch; for the estate or tbe trust,
and Dot the penon who repreeenta It, 111 real·
J7 the party. Cole v. Manaou, 85 N. Y. Supp.
1011. 42 MJ..ec. Rep. 149.
Prtmar;r Electlon Law (Left 1903, C.
4(1) • 18, anbd. I, Pl'OTldee that the penon
recelYing the greatest number of votes at a
primary .8 the candidate ot a party tor aD
oftlce ahan be the candidate ot that party for
such office, and h1a name BI aucb candidate
Bball be placed on tbe oftldal ballot at the
followloi: election. Reid, that. dead man La
not. "penon" wtthln the statute; BUCb word
meaning a HYing hUman belnc. State ex reI.
Bancroft v_ Frear, 128 N. W. 1068, lOn, 144
Wta. 79, 14.0 Am. St. Rep. 992_
Lawa 1904, No. 80, I 81, p1"01'1des that
certain eectiODil pertaining to taxe8 upon per.
SODII rece1vin, property pal!lB1ng from dece.-
dents sball al80 apply to all "peraons" dying
before the pasaage of tbe act. but whose e&-
tates ehall not have been at that time de-
creed or d1Btr1buted, etc. Held. tbat "per-
sona" retera to decedent. mentioned In that
lJeCt1on. and not to the beneftciaries. In re
Howard'a ERate, 68 AtL 613, 514, 80 Vt. .ag.
PlCB80N
Where a wile loaned her huaband IDODe,'
wblch w.. made paJ'able on demand. and
they both dJed: witbout the wite baving de-
manded, or reeetved the money, her e.tate
was a eredltor of h1I eetate, and a "peraon"
within Rev. St. 1898, t 8840, providing for an
order within wblch credltora shall present
their cle.lma and section 8844, providing that
every persoD haYing a claim, who allan not,
after notice given, exhibit It within the time
Umlted, allall be forever barred. BarrJ v.
Mlnaban, 107 N. W. 488, 491, 127 WIL 610.
Zapl.".,
A mere ticket taker at a theater It not
within Pen. Code, I 200, providing for the
punlllbment of any "person" who admit. to
any tbeater, museum, or Rknting rink, or any
place where wines or l1quol'1l are kept, any
cblld und.er the age of 16 years, unless accom·
panled bJ Its parent or guartliRn. People ex
reI. Jacques v. Sh(>rUf of Kings County, 100
N. Y. Supp. 387, 54 Misc. Rep_ 8.
FHa ...... • ..... t
A torwardlng a~ent ia a "penon" within
the meaning of Interatate Conuuerce Act Feb.
4, 1887, Co 104, I 2, 24 Stat. 379, torblddlDl"
preferences and discrimination In rates. In-
terstate Commcrce Commission v. Delaware,
L. & W. R. Co., 81 Sup. Ct. 392, soo. 220 U. B.
23, fiG L. Ed_ 448.
Iataat o • .tao..
A child of Immature and tender yettl'll la
a "person," within Rev_ Codes N. D. 1905, •
7686, authorizing an action tor the deatb of a
"peJ'lJOO" by tile wrongful act ot another_
&beret' v. Bcblaberl, 122 N. W. 1000, 1006. 18
N. D. 421, 24 L. R. A. (N. 8.) 520.
Under the bantruptq act provldlns that
anJ Datural peJ'lJOn mBJ be adjudged ao In-
voluntary bankrupt, the word "person" does
not tnclude an Infant. In re Kehler, 153 Fed.
2M,281.
BBnkr. Act Ju111, 1898, c. 1541, 11, aubd.
11, 30 StaL 1544, provides that "debt" shall
Include any debt, demand, or claim provable
in bankruptcy; section 4 declares tbat any
"person" wbo "owes debts," except a corpore.-
tion, 8ball be entitled to the beneflt8 of the
act as a voluntary bankrupt; and aect.lon as
declaretl that debts ahflll be a ftxed liability,
abaolutelJ owing at tbe time of tbe flUn, ot
the pet1UOD, ete. Held, that the worde "OW88
debts" mean an obligation for wblcb a debt-
or 1.8 legally liable, and beDCe Ute bankroptey
act Includes an infant, wbere he OWeil debta
for wblch h1ll property Is legally chargeable.
In re Walrath, 175 Fed. 243, 244-
laJaaWtaat
An InhabItant ot tbe province of Ben-
goel, In tbe PhlUpplne 18landa, W8B. "per-
son," within OrgBJllc Act July 1, 1902, Co 1369.
providing tbat 00 lawl ahall be enacted In the
IlIIaooa which ahall deprlve anJ "pereoo" of
Ute. Uberty, or property witbout due pr~
PER80N
of law; or deny to any . penon therein tbe
equal protection of the laws. carino"f". In-
lIolar Government of Pblllppine Ialands, 29
Rup. CL 384, 336, 212 U. S. 449, 63 L. Ed. 694.
L ... tt • .
Under tbe bankruptcy act providing tbat
any natural person may be adjudged an in·
voluntary bankrupt, the word "person" does
not Inelude a lunatic. In re Kehler, 168 Fed.
283.237.
_01
Where defendant u!l(>(} loud and offen-
tlve language In a coDl'ersation with a vtuftjfe
marshal, as one ot a crowd engtlged In diR'
turbing tbe peace, and the marsbal neglected
to restrain defendant or pre>;erve order, he
was 1I0t. "person" whose pen<>e culd be dill-
turbed, wltbln a 1'IlInjre ordillan<'e pro\'ldlug
that, If any person IIhall n1l1fully disturb the
peace of any otber IJenwn b)' loud aud un-
ulNa! noise, loud and olTenslve com'el'>iatiou,
etc., be shall be atljudl/'d gullt~· of a mlHde-
lU('auor. ymage of Salem v. Cot!ey, 88 S. W.
772, 113 Mo. App, 6715,
Koare.td •• t
"In tbe statutf'l'l authorizing ls~unnN" of
garnl~hmeut on th(l appllcatloll of nuy 'rwr-
lIOn,' tbe word 'pel'lŦ)n' hlt~ b(>(>n lipid to In·
clude all Indl"f"lduuls, uOllr(':
as resldente, CQr!)()J'at10118. untl s(j\·prell/:lltleR."
DlRCOnto GeflellS<'hatt v. l:whrf'lt, 106 N. W.
821, 828. 127 WLs. 601, 15 I •. R. A. (N. S.)
104(j, llG Am. St. Rep. 100.1 (dll!.l:
Ion by CaSllOday, C, J.).
The U8e of tbe .. 'ord "perK()D," In Laws
1003. p. 126. c, 105, UIIIl'lIdlult R('\·. Rt. 1898,
c. 2948. by adding tbe Ilro"hdoll that If there
be Done of sucb pel'8OUB In the state. and the
detpudllot corporation ba~ or holtlM U8e1! out
all bavlng ao oWce or place of buaduet-ltl III the
!ltate, or does [lusloes". tben sen'ice may be
made upon the per!K)n doing fluch blllllne~'1 or
In coorge of 8111.'11 oftl<'e or pilwc of bu~luP'l!l,
the word "peMion" ~howlI that tll(> I.cglslutnre
In,t('nded to relll -h a claslI not ('o\·t>n'tl by the
word "ag('uti''' ns{>() eist>where tn tilt> !l('cUOU,
but it Is not hroad euough to Include one
UlE'r('iy temJlonlrliy In the IItntC'. to whom
tbouJ:h not colllI('('tt>ll with tbe hll:
Intnlstt'Ci for roUt><'tion a btIJ due a furel!,;11
roflJOrntion. I1oll('flop ~nll. &. ~fII1. Co. v.
T('Ilf'rllay J:l;tM'I Pipe &: Tank Co., 88 Pac. 9,
11, :11 nah, 326.
O.o.r of _ ...... U-
The president ot a corporation I .. a '"per-
son," wit bin Compo La .. 'ff. t 4Mŧ. dpclarlnl
tilat any pel'l!lOn, agent, mana~er, or derk of
a corporation, with wbom any llIoney IIbaJl be
d('IKlldted or tntnL'Ited, wbo Kban appropriate
It to his own UlM!, Mball be f(UIIty ot embt>zzle-
lUeot. Ktate v. Weber, 100 l'ac. 411, 41:!, 31
Xe\'. 3815.
Baut. Act July I, 1!?98, C'. 5-'1, t I, cl.
T.30 Stat. 544. proTide. that tbe tenu "court"
PERSON
sball include a referee, and clanae 19 tlHt.m
that the word "perSOD8" tDClndM corpon.tlQIbI
Uld otllcera. By sectlon 2, cl. T, bankrupt(1
caorts are invested with aucb Jur1MIlctfoe ID
law oud 10 equity 811 wUl enable them to f'l'
erd(((' original Jorl8dJ.ct1oD in lJankruptcr ~
ceedings to caUtle the estates of bainkrurt'" to
be collectl"d, reduced to Dloney aDd dbJtrtbut·
ed, and to detE.'rmine rontro\'erBiM in noll·
tiOD thereto, eX("e()t sa ot.benrl.e pro.ldM.
BOld ~'UaD 23. par. "a," confel'lJ jurll'dl
on. tbe rnlted States Circuit Courts 1D CPrtIln
ciJr('uDistall('('s over controTendH ~tWf'f'll
tl"lustees and adverae clalmanu ronl."ernla!'
property <'Iatlned by the truatee, ex('('pt a!' ttl
proc."ee(1iult8 10 bankruptc)', jurhtdktfon 1.Jl"f·r
",llI<'l1 r('!Cf " excJu8i"l'ely In bankruptC'y roortll.
nnd h,\' )larRjrraph "b" aults brought by tbE.'
tf'lu!lttt'. except tboee to ~"f"er property UD-
der e<'tions of tbe act. ('tIJn
be brougbt In the bankruptcy court anly h!
<'OnM'nt of the propo~ defE.'n,lant, lipid.
th. at a l'l'tert'e In bankrupt!'y bad ,urtlldl('tj"n
of • proeN!c:llnl to conl~1 tbe oIII('H'II( of •
corporation to pay over tbe pl'OCt'f'd.ll; of 1Ittrl:
sales al1E'1f'd to belong to tbe corporation. Ibd
allto to pay ao amount alli8eMed atra1nst: t!wlll
fo: r unpaid Abares. In re Korolt lira:. ('o~
19:2 Fed, a92, 394.
:P6.ri:aenlilp. ..... ..~, ...... ,.
jomt-.toolr. co_...,., or .... ti ..
.A. "!Jenoo" include. a 'olnt-stOt'tt ('\IW'
pany. Cole v, ltaneoo,. 86 N. Y. Sopp. 1011.
42 :MillC. Rep, 1.9.
A partnerflblp 18 an entity dhctllK't from
tbllt of Its membe"" and 18 I'f'COI(Uiud bt ta..-
ns a "Jleul.Jn." Clay, RobillalUD ok ('0. f.
nouglu. Couoh', 120 x. W, G-lS, 549, SS X",b.
36;3, AtlU. (AlII. I912R, 7156,
A partnership <'annot aue, for It I, DOt
a :08t1l1'81 or artU'Idal "peraon:' rhlUtpe"l'.
IIClimea, 61 Soutb. tt!5, 626. I~ A\.n. 200.
A partnprflhlp Is a '"penoou" In tb • .,0.
In "'hleb thllt term t8 ueed 10 the- tMel'll
balllluuptcy act (Act ('.ong. Ju~ 1. IHI8. ~. MI.
I 1, 8ulM;l, 15, 30 Stat. 60&4). In re E".r!·
body'a Grocery 1\ Meat Warket. 173 Ffd. W.!.
Laws 1A92, p. l-IK7, f'. 677, 15. dpftDf'(ll tboo
tE'r1l1 "1lt'n
joint flAAO("\aUon, "'8 well a!ll a natul'IIl J","r·
!W'In. People V. Taylor, 85 N. E. T.!D. ':Wl,
19'!! N. Y. 398.
The word ''per~lD'' ar "Jlf"r1M>Dl'I" aIlali I ...
hC'J:d to Inclnde ftrlll8, oompRnlf'l'l. aDd a._ ... .-i-
RUonA. Re\,pnue l..o.w (Acts lR9S.. No. 1';0. p.
340, t 91). Natloual nre Ins. Co. "f". BN.f"l1
ot AM('MOn, 46 South. 117, 118, 121 La. 10'\.
120 Am, St. Rep. 313; General EIt'drV .. ', ..
v. : 8ne.rd of AS!Il'fI(IOr .. 46 South. J.22, 123. 12l
La . . 116.
TIJf> word '"[K>l"SOn," 8. provided br Ky.
~t. t -1157, mfly e:xtE'nd and be appllfd r,.
hodlp~ politic and corporate, 8OdeC:ieII. (~
umnlUf'l'I, and thE' public teoorally. IS '-t"1I
u.s indl vlduala, ~I'I!IO", and Jolnt-etoct (.'Om-
PERSON PERSON
panlCII. CoUUUOII\\·H.lth T. AMma J!lxp. Co., to the state between lIareb let and. Septem-
97 S. W. S86, 387, 23 Ky. 720. ber 18t, moving perllOnal propert)o Into the
The word '"(Icl'8On," aa ulK!d In the stat- atate that acqlllrea a aitul tbereln before
n lf'S relotluJ.': to r.atlroad rommltJ81onera, In- September 1st, said property ahatl be a~
clud" lŧlrtnenililP8 or jolnt-Btoet companies. ed and taX" thereon rollpcted tor the cur-
(ifoll. St. 1001, I ::1007. KaDf~as City. Outer rent year, nohtithfl tandlog one member ot
Belt .\ F.lect rtc R. Co. v. Board ot Ratlroad the tlrm was a re8ldent ot the atate betore
Com·n. 84 Pac. 75::1, 1::16, 13 Kan. 168. , the 18t day ot Ma rch, and the other member
WaI, and ball been at all timetl, a reeldent
ot anotber "tate. Blrtn. A Carroll v. BIni,
121 Pac. 1080, 1081, 81 011:1. 286.
Under tbe bankruptcy act ot July I, 1898,
a partnership Is Imloh'f'o t it the partner-
IIhlp property Is inautnclent to pay the flrlll
debu, because It Is a "per-soo" (secUon 1
1101 , c. 5011, 80 Stat. 501::1), because any "per·
son" Is Insoh'ent unde r that act whose prop-
crty Is Insufficient to pay Ita debu (section 1
[Uil, e. MI. 30 Stat. M4), and the only Prol)-
lluder Coll!!t . art. 9, 118, glvllll'C the Cor·
llOmtion Commlg,'doll power to regulate all
Intn.\C ml-'l !loll COlll llOlllel' doing bu~lne88 In tbe
"tate In all mntttoril relating to the perform-
IIl1l~ ot their lmhllc duties and their cbargee
tbf'retor, Anti section" 34, providing that tbe
term "tl'allallllllllioll company" Rhall Inl.'lude
Iny compa ny or other perMOD bolding or op-
prating tor hire any telegraph or telephone
line, and tbat the terw "person" aballinl.'lilde
Indlviduale, palrtnershlps, and corporations,
tbe Corporation Comml9ll10n b ... 8upervLAlon my a partnership baM or can aPllly to Ibf
ot • telepbone campou)' owned solely by IlD I debt!'! Is tbe ftrm property. and tbe unly
! debta It OWeR are tbe ftrm debtll. In re
Individual and operated tor hire In aU mat- l8erten8baw, 1::11 I'ed. 36.1, 368, 8 C. C. A. 61,
tf'rs relating to tbe perforlllftoce ot ita pub- 11 L. R. A. (N 8) QG.
lie dutlel' and chant·eII. Hlne v. WadUnpon, I . . ocv, nn. s. .
109 Pac. 301, 26 0"1. 380. Neither the judicial ~rnltlon by tbe
_ room ot a state ot the partnership entity,
La"" 1001, p. 19, c. 3, making It un- nor tbe provlllllon8 ot the bankruptc)' act.
lawtul to pennlt minorA In Mloona, etc., 111'0- whlcb define a partneM!hlp to be a .. ..
\'ldeM I~tlon 7l that the ""OM "person," 88 within tbe meaning ot the art, and a~r:~ u!led tn tbe act , .flball be deemed to mean it to be adjudged a banlilrupt (BaBkr. Act JIl-
firm or COr(l()rlltion, all WE'll 8S natural per- I,. I, " 1898, c. !:WI, H la L19J, 68, 80 Stat. M-:I,
lIOn, and the person managIng tbe business ::141), work a change ot the establlsbed. rule
ot such firm or l'Or poratlon ShRII be ua~, l~ to tblng the IlUbetantlve rilhts of creditonl
the penalties preeertbed by tblt! a~_ Jerrl- ret!pectlvely, ot the partnenblp and ot Ita
tory v. Church, 91 Pac. 120. 721, 14 N. M_ 226. I Individual members. In re 'I:elter, 184 Fed.
Wblle It la true that I8Cf:lon 69 ot the 1 224, 226, 100 C. C. A. 366.
Ban.lr:rupt Act contalos the onlJ.' provislou ot I ......... ___
the act expreaal,. detintng who may ftle a pe-
tition to have a debtor adjudged an lnvol. Lewa Del. vol. 1" p. ~28, c. 2!M, I 2 (Re'·.
uDtary bankrupt ADd tbat that IJrovl8l.0n Is Code 1862, amended In 1898, p. 930), make" It
l'OnOned to cretiuorfl, IUld IeCUOD ::I, read a crime tor any pe:tIOn to administer to or
wltb aect10D 69, aeews to C(lDHue the right to advltle a pregnant "olna~, with iutent to pro·
creditors, Jet .ectlon 48 declarea that aOJ' cure a mllcarr1age, or to aid, aMllilt. or coun·
"per80n" owlDa: debts excel)t a l'Orponltion, tiel auy person 80 !utendlng to procure a
sball be entitled to tb~ benetlt ot this act &8 wlacarrlage." Beld, that the word "penon,"
a VOIUDt&r1 bankrupt, and eeetion 1 dedaree in the quoted dauae, meana ItOIDe peraoD oth-
that tbe ,, 'ord "per80uII," unletB lncowd.atent er than the pregnant WOID8D, and au In-
with the contut, ahaU IDelude partnership&. dktment under such danae, cbargiq: det'eDd-"
lD. re J . M. Ceba.II08 ,I; Co., 161 l! 'ed. 445 448. anta with hartng counseled a pregnant woo
• man wbo wae intending to lirocure her own
An untnoorporated allsoctation Is not a miBCorria"e, ill bad. Stllte v. Parm (Del.) 60
"Pf'l-son," and bas not the power to sue or be At!. 971, 918, ::I Peunewlll, 5::16.
RUed: but when It baH been orpnized and
l"Ontln<.'ted tor " proftt It ,viII be treated as a
partnership, and Ita members held liable all The worde '
J)Ul'tUt'"'- SlAughter ,.. American Baptist ! cludee corporations. 10 re Charge to Grand
l'ublt('ltt!OD Soclety (Tex_) 160 8. W. 2'.24, 2'26' 1 Jur1, 161 l!'ed. tI:U, 8t6: Cole v. Yauaon, 85
Th
-> " "In U 2 ., N. y, 8upp. 1011, 42 Misc. Rep. 149.
e WOn. llenon, sec on ,art._,
ot the general re\'enue I\ct npIJrO\'ed !lIa rch A cotl.>oratioll by both the cI"n and com-
10, 1000, pro"ldln; that "8 Iler::lOn wovlng In- mon law Is a~ "persoll," an artlnetal per-aon.
to tbtM .tate trom tl.lIotber state hetween Vavoust ". City of Alamf'da, 8i PIlC. 760,
Murch 16t D " nd liclltE'Ulhcr 1st IIball URt bls 761, 149 Cal. 00, f'i" L. R. A. (N, S.) M6, 9
Jlerl!lOu.o.l I'ropert)' IIcqull'hlg an actual altua Ann. CftA. &17.
tberetn before September lst I\nll tbe same A corporation fa Included to the term
.hull be aMessed aDd I l\aC'ed npon the tox "perROn" as used 10 tbe IItututes. Ooldzler
roll nJld the taxes thereon collected, etc.," ". Ccut rul n. Co. ot ::'Iiew J erlley, 88 N. Y.
lncludea a drm; and where a firm. IDovea in- Supp. 214, 215. ~ Mile. Rep. 667 (cltt.ng
PERSON
prl, ..... te corporations not poueeaed by indh1.d-
uan or Pl-rtner'llblps," a atate I.a a pereoD,
and under I8Ctlon Mb (6) I, entitled to prtor-
ity tor a debt due It trom the eetate ot a
bankrupt wbleb 11 gt.en priority by 1m own
In.alYene, law. In re Western Implement
Co .. 166 Fed. G76, 682.
Law. ~, p. 370, e. 175, tn amendment
of Code Ct.: Proc. 1 1391, authorbdDg an
execution agalnst the wages or aalal"J ot the
judgment &!btor, and makin, It the duty ot
&.D3' peraon or corporation, municipal or oth-.
e!'Wlse, to whom the execution shall be pre-
sented, and who sball be indebted to the judg·
rueut debtor, to pay over to the omeer tbe
amount of the debt, doee not autborize the
iMuance ot an execution agatnst tbe salal"J
ot a state oflleerj the ,tate bein, neither a
pel'llOn nor a corporation nor a municipal cor-
poration. Osterboudt T. Keith, 117 .e. Y.
8upp. 809, 810, 133 App. DI •. 83.
'l'be cbamperq act (1 BeT. 8t. p. 739 [W
EeL] p. 2, c. I , tit. 2. 1 U7) provide. that
"e.ery grant ot land aban be abeolute17 .old,
It at the time of tbe del1.er1 thereot, web
l.o.nda eball be 10 the actoal poseetI81on ot a
pereon c1a1m1nc under a title adTerae to that
ot the JI'Ultor." 8ect1oo G of the lltatutory
conetruct.ion law (Law, 1892. p. 1487, Co 677)
provldet: that " the term 'person' Includes a
corporation and a Joint-etock a88Odation,"
and wben oeed to deelgnate a pttrtJ wboae
propert, may be the mbJeet ot any otl'enae,
the term "pel"lOO" aleo includes tbe JJtate.
H eld, that the etate could therefore onll'
be included as a "pereon" when the statute
relates to any ot III property which may be
the IUbJect ot an otl'eaee, aad bence the
Champerty act dOe! DOt apply to the P08881-
,Ion of the .tate, and that, if the to~t
oomml8ldon Could be resarded aB in actaa.l
PQMe8IIion tor the lJtate, it wonId not render
the statute applicable a. It 11 no more a ' 'per-
8On" thin 18 the state. Saranac Land & TIm-
ber Co. T . Roberta. 109 ~. Y. Supp. 547, l2!5
App. DlT. 333 j Id., 88 N. E. 753, 760. 195 N.
Y. 303.
a...-Valt.a .tau.
The United State. Ia not a "penon" with-
In the mee.ntng ot Bankr. Act Jnly I, 1898. C-
MI, , st, 80 Stat. 563. Title Guaranty "
SuretY 00. Y . Goaranlee TItle • Trut Co.,
174, Fed. 38(), 387, 98 O. C. A. 606.
.. teet __
Under Gen. 8t. 1902, I 2067, autborlzlnc
pel"1lODB Intereeted In alterlDJ; bighw&7B to re-
monstrate ag,lDet the report of the oommlt-
tee aB8t'8B1ng bene8te and damages, and em-
powering the conrt to order a jury and "grant
reUet to the person or penOns matiDl' web
appUcation," wben constr'ned In connection
with eectton 20'1'0, proYiding that, If the re-
port of the JUI"f Bball not Increase the dam-
-aM allowed Or dJm1n18b the a8llet:Brnent ot
beDe8t.e, the court shall order tbe appllcabt
for the JU7. to pa7 the COIIt. ot tile appUca-
PEnSON CAUSING EXCAVATI0~
tIoD, etc., the court. In proceedlnp to __
damacee aDd benetlt. tor the dlaace of tile
crade ot a h1a:bway, m&.7 DOt order a ,...,.
to make a re&lHIIImeat of damaa- aDd lIeIIf.
tit. on the application ot the town b7 ita.
lectmen; tbe eelectmen not be1q ref'eaed to
by the word. ''perlOn or peraou." 1n die
quoted clause. Selectmen ot Town of MO D t·
TWe Y. Alpba )(lIle Co., 81 AU. 1051. 1062. as
Conn. 1.
Wo ...
A woman Ia a "pel'8On" witbID. tile c..
tempIaUOD ot Colllt. U. B. AmeDCL 14., f I,
and entitled to the equal protectlOD 01. the
lawL Carrithers Y. City ot Sbel.b7nlk-. llU
B. W. 1ft, 746, 126 Ky. 169, 17 1. B. A.. IX
S.) ill (dtl.ns Santa Clara Count7 •• South-
ern Pae. R. Co .• 18 Fed. ~.
1' ... 0. AOOILLIiVED
Bee Aurteved.
..... O • ............ufG O~ -..00 .. Aa
OWR:z:a
See Owuer of Reeord.
1'BaSO. AlUI.IVIRO IX 'nIB a_liD
8TATB8
TarUr Act Jul, ~, l891'. Co It. I t. FIft
Ust:. par. 887, 80 BtaL 202, pro'richa f. '"per-
tonal etrecta of perIODS arrtYin, in the l"Dit-
eel Statea," witb a prol'iao relatlnl to "rHl-
dentB ot the Unltecl 8tatal returDIDJ" (l'0III
abroad." Held. that the tint proTbioa is
only tor 1mm1p-ant., and that the pl'O'fU.O
conef:roe AmerIcana only. United 8tatea ".
Bernaylt 168 Fed. 192, 194., 86 C. C. ~ 5!.
I'IZIUO ......... IID
Bee. al." AI8eBL
Assignor'll In a common·law - lUIdpment
tor the t-eneftt ot credlton to the ~ in
trust to pay preterred claim, locludiD&: tax ....
are the ''persons ueeeeed" tor taxea wl.tbiD
ReT. Law. 1002, Co 13, 182. author1.z1o&". tu
collector to collect a tax b, ad:1OI1 aplO!Il
the "perton8 asaetlBed," and tbe, &re prop-
erl, made partJ..M defendant In an attl~D
for taxea ... the penone primarU, llabk-
therefor. Boston Y . TurDer, 87 N. E. s:u.
637, 201 Mau. 190 (c1t1n1 Rldru Y . B~
28 N. ID. ~, 1M Ma-. ..ao).
PEBaO. AU'l'IIO.JZJI!D
Bee Authorised b1UWj Aatbodaed IV-
- .... 0. .":arJOIAJ.oI.T I."."
U ......
Bee ~da1l1 Interested.
PBaaO. BBKIIFJ'I'IID
... -" PBIUJO. o.&U8orO D ........
See Cauee (nrb).
PIa8O. OAVIIDI'G -.s:04'YA'I'JCd'
See Qa .. (~), From Stroud's Judicial Dictionary, first edition


PERSON.-Prim4 facie the word 41 Person," in & public statute,
.includes a Oorporation 88 well as a Datul'lll perBOn. (per· Selborne, L.· C.,
Plw.rmauulical &ell. v. Lond. J: Provin.;al Supply Aun., 49 L. J. Q. B.
786 ; ~ App. Ca. 8~7 : VI. os. 2, 19, Interp. Aot, 1889).
U The word I Penon' may very well include both a natural peraon (a
human being), aud an artificial penon (a corporation). I think that in. an
Act of Parliament, uoleea there be BOmething to tbe contrary, probably.
(1 would not like to pledge myself to that) it ought to be held to include
both. I have equally no doubt that in common talk, in the language of
584 PER
- - ---- . - - - . - --- - -
men (not speaking technically), · a • Person' dooo not inclnde a corporation.
Nobody in common talk, if he wcre asked who i. the richeat person in
London, wonld answer, The London and North Western Ry. Co. . It is
plain tbat in common speech' Person' would mean a natnral person. In
technical language it may include tbe other, but whioh meaning it h .. in
any particular Act, must depend on tbe context subject-matter. I do not
think tbat the preaumption that it inclndes an artificial person,_ Corpor-
ation,-(if 1M prewmption do.. ariH)-ia at aU strong. Circumstanoes,
and indeed very alight circnmstanoea, in tbe context might sbow wbioh way
the word is to be coustrued in an Act of Parliament. And I am quite clear
about tbis, that whenever you can ... the object of the Act requires that
• Person' shall have the more extended sense or the 1 .... extended eenee, then
you ahould apply the word in that eenee and oonotrne the Act accordiugly ..
(per Ld. Blackburn, lb.).
The case from which the de6niOiono just given have been taken aboWB
that .. Person" .. need in ... 1 and 15, Pharmacy Act, 1868 (81 & 82 V.
c. 121) does not include a Corporation. . .
The Attorney-General, acting IZ ojJieio, is not a .. Penon" within the
Statute of Limitation, 8 & 4 W. 4, c. 27 ; buL an action by him on behalf
of tbe poor of a pariah may be statute barred, .. Lh_ conatitute .. a claM
of persona" within s. 1 (A.·G. v. Magdalen Coli., 28 L. J. Cb. 844 ;
18 Boa. 228 ; Magda/m Coli. v. A.·G. , 26 L. J . Cb. 620; 6 H. L. 0a.189).
The Ecclesi .. tical Commro. are .. persons" within 88. I, 2 of the Act just
cited, except in C&868 where they claim (by virtue ofo. 67,8 &; 4 V. c. 118)
through an Eccleoi .. Lical Corporation (Ecdu;a&tical Commn. Y. &W',
49 L. J . Q. B. 771 ; 6 App. Ca. 786).
A Corporation ia noL a .. Person" within Lhe Mortmain Act, 9 G. 2,
c. 86, s. 1 (WalA
so .. Lo beoome & Commou Informer (St. lMnard. Shorodikh v. Franklin,
47 L. J. C. P: 727 ; 8 C. P. D. 8i7).
By Lhe Melbourne Harbour Trust Act a " Person" includes a Corpor.
ation, and this WB8 held to include Commiaoionera appointed under Lhe Act
(Union SlMmuhip 0,. v. X./b{Jurm Harb. CommT8., 68 L. J. P. C. 59 ;
60 L. T. 887; 9 App. Ca. 866).
So wbere trnoteeo of a Will had po,.er to grant 1 ..... to" any person or
persons" they ahould think fit, Chitty, J., held thatthis authorized them to
grant a leaee to a Limited Company (& Jef!eo
So where a Railway Act provided tbat .. auy person" acting in pursuance
of it ahould be entitled to Notioe of Action, iL was held the Compeny
iteelf was included (Boyd v. Lond . .t Croydon Ry., 7 L. J. C. P. 241 ;
4 Bing. N. C. 669; 6 So. 461) .
.. Person" in I . 20, 'l'mateo Act, 1860, does not mean person beneficially
enLitled (& INkIon, W. N. (72) 228) .
.. Persons belonging to a Ship; .. V. BELONGINU .
.. Person by whose act, &c.," Nuioance arieel; V. By WH08E ACT. Appendix B

Human Rights Act 1998
1998 CHAPTER 42

Rights and Freedoms
Article 2 Right to life
1 Everyone's right to life shall be protected by law. No one shall be deprived of his life
intentionally save in the execution of a sentence of a court following his conviction of a
crime for which this penalty is provided by law.
2 Deprivation of life shall not be regarded as inflicted in contravention of this Article
when it results from the use of force which is no more than absolutely necessary:
(a) in defence of any person from unlawful violence;
(b) in order to effect a lawful arrest or to prevent the escape of a person lawfully detained;
(c) in action lawfully taken for the purpose of quelling a riot or insurrection.
Article 3 Prohibition of torture
No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or
punishment.
Article 4 Prohibition of slavery and forced labour
1 No one shall be held in slavery or servitude.
2 No one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour.
3 For the purpose of this Article the term "forced or compulsory labour" shall not include: (a) any work required to be done in the ordinary course of detention imposed according
to the provisions of Article 5 of this Convention or during conditional release from such
detention;
(b) any service of a military character or, in case of conscientious objectors in countries
where they are recognised, service exacted instead of compulsory military service;
(c) any service exacted in case of an emergency or calamity threatening the life or well‐
being of the community;
(d) any work or service which forms part of normal civic obligations.
Article 5 Right to liberty and security
1 Everyone has the right to liberty and security of person. No one shall be deprived of his
liberty save in the following cases and in accordance with a procedure prescribed by law:
(a) the lawful detention of a person after conviction by a competent court;
(b) the lawful arrest or detention of a person for non‐compliance with the lawful order of
a court or in order to secure the fulfilment of any obligation prescribed by law;
(c) the lawful arrest or detention of a person effected for the purpose of bringing him
before the competent legal authority on reasonable suspicion of having committed an
offence or when it is reasonably considered necessary to prevent his committing an
offence or fleeing after having done so;
(d) the detention of a minor by lawful order for the purpose of educational supervision or
his lawful detention for the purpose of bringing him before the competent legal authority;
(e) the lawful detention of persons for the prevention of the spreading of infectious
diseases, of persons of unsound mind, alcoholics or drug addicts or vagrants;
(f) the lawful arrest or detention of a person to prevent his effecting an unauthorised
entry into the country or of a person against whom action is being taken with a view to
deportation or extradition.
2 Everyone who is arrested shall be informed promptly, in a language which he
understands, of the reasons for his arrest and of any charge against him.
3 Everyone arrested or detained in accordance with the provisions of paragraph 1(c) of
this Article shall be brought promptly before a judge or other officer authorised by law to
exercise judicial power and shall be entitled to trial within a reasonable time or to release
pending trial. Release may be conditioned by guarantees to appear for trial. 4 Everyone who is deprived of his liberty by arrest or detention shall be entitled to take
proceedings by which the lawfulness of his detention shall be decided speedily by a court
and his release ordered if the detention is not lawful.
5 Everyone who has been the victim of arrest or detention in contravention of the
provisions of this Article shall have an enforceable right to compensation.
Article 6 Right to a fair trial
1 In the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge against
him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an
independent and impartial tribunal established by law. Judgment shall be pronounced
publicly but the press and public may be excluded from all or part of the trial in the
interest of morals, public order or national security in a democratic society, where the
interests of juveniles or the protection of the private life of the parties so require, or to the
extent strictly necessary in the opinion of the court in special circumstances where
publicity would prejudice the interests of justice.
2 Everyone charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved
guilty according to law.
3 Everyone charged with a criminal offence has the following minimum rights:
(a) to be informed promptly, in a language which he understands and in detail, of the
nature and cause of the accusation against him;
(b) to have adequate time and facilities for the preparation of his defence;
(c) to defend himself in person or through legal assistance of his own choosing or, if he
has not sufficient means to pay for legal assistance, to be given it free when the interests
of justice so require;
(d) to examine or have examined witnesses against him and to obtain the attendance and
examination of witnesses on his behalf under the same conditions as witnesses against
him;
(e) to have the free assistance of an interpreter if he cannot understand or speak the
language used in court.
Article 7 No punishment without law
1 No one shall be held guilty of any criminal offence on account of any act or omission
which did not constitute a criminal offence under national or international law at the
time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that
was applicable at the time the criminal offence was committed. 2 This Article shall not prejudice the trial and punishment of any person for any act or
omission which, at the time when it was committed, was criminal according to the
general principles of law recognised by civilised nations.
Article 8 Right to respect for private and family life
1 Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his
correspondence.
2 There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except
such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the
interests of national security, public safety or the economic well‐being of the country, for
the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the
protection of the rights and freedoms of others.
Article 9 Freedom of thought, conscience and religion
1 Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right
includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in
community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in
worship, teaching, practice and observance.
2 Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as
are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public
safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the
rights and freedoms of others.
Article 10 Freedom of expression
1 Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to
hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by
public authority and regardless of frontiers. This Article shall not prevent States from
requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
2 The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may
be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by
law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security,
territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the
protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for
preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the
authority and impartiality of the judiciary.
Article 11 Freedom of assembly and association 1 Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and to freedom of association
with others, including the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his
interests.
2 No restrictions shall be placed on the exercise of these rights other than such as are
prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national
security or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of
health or morals or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others. This Article
shall not prevent the imposition of lawful restrictions on the exercise of these rights by
members of the armed forces, of the police or of the administration of the State.
Article 12 Right to marry
Men and women of marriageable age have the right to marry and to found a family,
according to the national laws governing the exercise of this right.
Article 14 Prohibition of discrimination
The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in this Convention shall be secured
without discrimination on any ground such as sex, race, colour, language, religion,
political or other opinion, national or social origin, association with a national minority,
property, birth or other status.
Article 16 Restrictions on political activity of aliens
Nothing in Articles 10, 11 and 14 shall be regarded as preventing the High Contracting
Parties from imposing restrictions on the political activity of aliens.
Article 17 Prohibition of abuse of rights
Nothing in this Convention may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person
any right to engage in any activity or perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of
the rights and freedoms set forth herein or at their limitation to a greater extent than is
provided for in the Convention.
Article 18 Limitation on use of restrictions on rights
The restrictions permitted under this Convention to the said rights and freedoms shall
not be applied for any purpose other than those for which they have been prescribed.
Part II The First Protocol
Article 1 Protection of property Every natural or legal person is entitled to the peaceful enjoyment of his possessions. No
one shall be deprived of his possessions except in the public interest and subject to the
conditions provided for by law and by the general principles of international law.
The preceding provisions shall not, however, in any way impair the right of a State to
enforce such laws as it deems necessary to control the use of property in accordance with
the general interest or to secure the payment of taxes or other contributions or penalties.
Article 2 Right to education
No person shall be denied the right to education. In the exercise of any functions which it
assumes in relation to education and to teaching, the State shall respect the right of
parents to ensure such education and teaching in conformity with their own religious and
philosophical convictions.
Article 3 Right to free elections
The High Contracting Parties undertake to hold free elections at reasonable intervals by
secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the
people in the choice of the legislature.
Part III The Sixth Protocol
Article 1 Abolition of the death penalty
The death penalty shall be abolished. No one shall be condemned to such penalty or
executed.
Article 2 Death penalty in time of war
A State may make provision in its law for the death penalty in respect of acts committed
in time of war or of imminent threat of war; such penalty shall be applied only in the
instances laid down in the law and in accordance with its provisions. The State shall
communicate to the Secretary General of the Council of Europe the relevant provisions of
that law.




CONVENTION FOR PROTECTION OF
HUMAN RIGHTS AND FUNDAMENTAL FREEDOMS
Rome, 4.XI.1950

Text completed by Protocol No. 2 (ETS No. 44) of 6 May 1963 and amended
by Protocol No. 3 (ETS No. 45) of 6 May 1963, Protocol No. 5 (ETS No. 55) of 20
January 1966
and Protocol No. 8 (ETS No. 118) of 19 March 1985

The governments signatory hereto, being members of the Council of Europe,
Considering the Universal Declaration of Human Rights proclaimed by the General
Assembly of the United Nations on 10th December 1948;
Considering that this Declaration aims at securing the universal and effective recognition
and observance of the Rights therein declared;
Considering that the aim of the Council of Europe is the achievement of greater unity
between its members and that one of the methods by which that aim is to be pursued is
the maintenance and further realisation of human rights and fundamental freedoms;
Reaffirming their profound belief in those fundamental freedoms which are the
foundation of justice and peace in the world and are best maintained on the one hand by
an effective political democracy and on the other by a common understanding and
observance of the human rights upon which they depend;
Being resolved, as the governments of European countries which are like‐minded and
have a common heritage of political traditions, ideals, freedom and the rule of law, to take
the first steps for the collective enforcement of certain of the rights stated in the
Universal Declaration,
Have agreed as follows:
Article 1
The High Contracting Parties shall secure to everyone within their jurisdiction the rights
and freedoms defined in Section I of this Convention. SECTION I
Article 2
1. Everyone's right to life shall be protected by law. No one shall be deprived of his
life intentionally save in the execution of a sentence of a court following his
conviction of a crime for which this penalty is provided by law.
2. Deprivation of life shall not be regarded as inflicted in contravention of this article
when it results from the use of force which is no more than absolutely necessary:

a in defence of any person from unlawful violence;
b in order to effect a lawful arrest or to prevent the escape of a person lawfully
detained;
c in action lawfully taken for the purpose of quelling a riot or insurrection.
Article 3
No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or
punishment.
Article 4
1. No one shall be held in slavery or servitude.
2. No one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour.
3. For the purpose of this article the term "forced or compulsory labour" shall not
include:

a any work required to be done in the ordinary course of detention imposed
according to the provisions of Article 5 of this Convention or during conditional
release from such detention;
b any service of a military character or, in case of conscientious objectors in
countries where they are recognised, service exacted instead of compulsory
military service;
c any service exacted in case of an emergency or calamity threatening the life or
well‐being of the community; d any work or service which forms part of normal civic obligations.
Article 5
1. Everyone has the right to liberty and security of person. No one shall be deprived
of his liberty save in the following cases and in accordance with a procedure
prescribed by law:

a the lawful detention of a person after conviction by a competent court;
b the lawful arrest or detention of a person for non‐compliance with the lawful
order of a court or in order to secure the fulfilment of any obligation prescribed by
law;
c the lawful arrest or detention of a person effected for the purpose of bringing
him before the competent legal authority on reasonable suspicion of having
committed an offence or when it is reasonably considered necessary to prevent his
committing an offence or fleeing after having done so;
d the detention of a minor by lawful order for the purpose of educational
supervision or his lawful detention for the purpose of bringing him before the
competent legal authority;
e the lawful detention of persons for the prevention of the spreading of infectious
diseases, of persons of unsound mind, alcoholics or drug addicts or vagrants;
f the lawful arrest or detention of a person to prevent his effecting an unauthorised
entry into the country or of a person against whom action is being taken with a
view to deportation or extradition.
2. Everyone who is arrested shall be informed promptly, in a language which he
understands, of the reasons for his arrest and of any charge against him.
3. Everyone arrested or detained in accordance with the provisions of paragraph 1.c of
this article shall be brought promptly before a judge or other officer authorised by
law to exercise judicial power and shall be entitled to trial within a reasonable time
or to release pending trial. Release may be conditioned by guarantees to appear for
trial.
4. Everyone who is deprived of his liberty by arrest or detention shall be entitled to
take proceedings by which the lawfulness of his detention shall be decided
speedily by a court and his release ordered if the detention is not lawful.
5. Everyone who has been the victim of arrest or detention in contravention of the provisions of this article shall have an enforceable right to compensation.
Article 6
1. In the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge
against him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable
time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law. Judgment shall
be pronounced publicly but the press and public may be excluded from all or part
of the trial in the interests of morals, public order or national security in a
democratic society, where the interests of juveniles or the protection of the private
life of the parties so require, or to the extent strictly necessary in the opinion of the
court in special circumstances where publicity would prejudice the interests of
justice.
2. Everyone charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved
guilty according to law.
3. Everyone charged with a criminal offence has the following minimum rights:

a to be informed promptly, in a language which he understands and in detail, of
the nature and cause of the accusation against him;
b to have adequate time and facilities for the preparation of his defence;
c to defend himself in person or through legal assistance of his own choosing or, if
he has not sufficient means to pay for legal assistance, to be given it free when the
interests of justice so require;
d to examine or have examined witnesses against him and to obtain the
attendance and examination of witnesses on his behalf under the same conditions
as witnesses against him;
e to have the free assistance of an interpreter if he cannot understand or speak the
language used in court.
Article 7
1. No one shall be held guilty of any criminal offence on account of any act or
omission which did not constitute a criminal offence under national or
international law at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty
be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the criminal offence was
committed.
2. This article shall not prejudice the trial and punishment of any person for any act
or omission which, at the time when it was committed, was criminal according to the general principles of law recognised by civilised nations.
Article 8
1. Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his
correspondence.
2. There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right
except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic
society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well‐
being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of
health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.
Article 9
1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right
includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in
community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief,
in worship, teaching, practice and observance.
2. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such
limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in
the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals,
or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.
Article 10
1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom
to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without
interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This article shall not
prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema
enterprises.
2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities,
may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are
prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of
national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of
disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the
reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information
received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the
judiciary.
Article 11
1. Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and to freedom of
association with others, including the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.
2. No restrictions shall be placed on the exercise of these rights other than such as
are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of
national security or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the
protection of health or morals or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of
others. This article shall not prevent the imposition of lawful restrictions on the
exercise of these rights by members of the armed forces, of the police or of the
administration of the State.
Article 12
Men and women of marriageable age have the right to marry and to found a family,
according to the national laws governing the exercise of this right.
Article 13
Everyone whose rights and freedoms as set forth in this Convention are violated shall
have an effective remedy before a national authority notwithstanding that the violation
has been committed by persons acting in an official capacity.
Article 14
The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in this Convention shall be secured
without discrimination on any ground such as sex, race, colour, language, religion,
political or other opinion, national or social origin, association with a national minority,
property, birth or other status.
Article 15
1. In time of war or other public emergency threatening the life of the nation any
High Contracting Party may take measures derogating from its obligations under
this Convention to the extent strictly required by the exigencies of the situation,
provided that such measures are not inconsistent with its other obligations under
international law.
2. No derogation from Article 2, except in respect of deaths resulting from lawful acts
of war, or from Articles 3, 4 (paragraph 1) and 7 shall be made under this provision.
3. Any High Contracting Party availing itself of this right of derogation shall keep the
Secretary General of the Council of Europe fully informed of the measures which it
has taken and the reasons therefor. It shall also inform the Secretary General of
the Council of Europe when such measures have ceased to operate and the
provisions of the Convention are again being fully executed. Article 16
Nothing in Articles 10, 11 and 14 shall be regarded as preventing the High Contracting
Parties from imposing restrictions on the political activity of aliens.
Article 17
Nothing in this Convention may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person
any right to engage in any activity or perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of
the rights and freedoms set forth herein or at their limitation to a greater extent than is
provided for in the Convention.
Article 18
The restrictions permitted under this Convention to the said rights and freedoms shall
not be applied for any purpose other than those for which they have been prescribed.















Universal Declaration of Human Rights
PREAMBLE
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all
members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the
world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which
have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human
beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been
proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,
Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to
rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the
rule of law,
Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations,
Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in
fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the
equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and
better standards of life in larger freedom,
Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co‐operation with the
United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights
and fundamental freedoms,
Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest
importance for the full realization of this pledge,
Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL
DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all
peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society,
keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to
promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and
international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both
among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories
under their jurisdiction.

^ Top Article 1.
 All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed
with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of
brotherhood.
^ Top
Article 2.
 Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration,
without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion,
political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.
Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political,
jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person
belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non‐self‐governing or under any other
limitation of sovereignty.
^ Top
Article 3.
 Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
^ Top
Article 4.
 No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be
prohibited in all their forms.
^ Top
Article 5.
 No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment
or punishment.
^ Top
Article 6.
 Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law. ^ Top
Article 7.
 All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal
protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any
discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such
discrimination.
^ Top
Article 8.
 Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals
for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by
law.
^ Top
Article 9.
 No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.
^ Top
Article 10.
 Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent
and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of
any criminal charge against him.
^ Top
Article 11.
 (1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent
until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the
guarantees necessary for his defence.
 (2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or
omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international
law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed
than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.
^ Top Article 12.
 No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home
or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has
the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.
^ Top
Article 13.
 (1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the
borders of each state.
 (2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to
his country.
^ Top
Article 14.
 (1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from
persecution.
 (2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising
from non‐political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of
the United Nations.
^ Top
Article 15.
 (1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.
 (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to
change his nationality.
^ Top
Article 16.
 (1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or
religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal
rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.
 (2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the
intending spouses.
 (3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled
to protection by society and the State. ^ Top
Article 17.
 (1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with
others.
 (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.
^ Top
Article 18.
 Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right
includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in
community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief
in teaching, practice, worship and observance.
^ Top
Article 19.
 Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes
freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart
information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
^ Top
Article 20.
 (1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
 (2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.
^ Top
Article 21.
 (1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or
through freely chosen representatives.
 (2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.
 (3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this
will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by
universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free
voting procedures. ^ Top
Article 22.
 Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to
realization, through national effort and international co‐operation and in
accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic,
social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of
his personality.
^ Top
Article 23.
 (1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and
favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.
 (2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal
work.
 (3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration
ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and
supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.
 (4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his
interests.
^ Top
Article 24.
 Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of
working hours and periodic holidays with pay.
^ Top
Article 25.
 (1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well‐
being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical
care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of
unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood
in circumstances beyond his control.
 (2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All
children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.
^ Top Article 26.
 (1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the
elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory.
Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher
education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
 (2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality
and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It
shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or
religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the
maintenance of peace.
 (3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to
their children.
^ Top
Article 27.
 (1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the
community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its
benefits.
 (2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests
resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the
author.
^ Top
Article 28.
 Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and
freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.
^ Top
Article 29.
 (1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full
development of his personality is possible.
 (2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to
such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due
recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the
just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic
society.  (3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes
and principles of the United Nations.
^ Top
Article 30.
 Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or
person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the
destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.
Interpretation Act 1978
CHAPTER 30
ARRANGEMENT OF SECTIONS
General provisions as to enactment and operation
Section
1. Words of enactment.
2. Amendment or repeal in same Session.
3. Judicial notice.
4. Time of commencement.
Interpretation and Construction
5. Definitions.
6. Gender and number.
7. References to service by post.
8. References-to distance.
9. References to time of day.
10. References to the Sovereign.
11. Construction of subordinate legislation.
Statutory powers and duties
12. Continuity of powers and duties.
13. Anticipatory exercise of powers.
14. Implied power to amend.
Repealing enactments
15. Repeal of repeals.
16. General savings.
17. Repeal and re-enactment.
Miscellaneous
18. Duplicated offences.
19. Citation of other Acts.
20. References to other enactments. c. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
Supplementary
Section
21. Interpretation etc.
22. Application to Acts and Measures.
23. Application to other instruments.
24. Application to Northern Ireland.
25. Repeals and savings.
26. Commencement.
27. Short title.
SCHEDULES:
Schedule 1-Words and expressions defined.
Schedule 2-Application of Act to existing enactments.
Part I-Acts.
Part Il-Subordinate legislation.
Schedule 3-Enactments repealed. ELIZABETH II
Interpretation Act 1978
1978 CHAPTER 30
c.30 1
An Act to consolidate the Interpretation Act 1889 and
certain other enactments relating to the construction and
operation of Acts of Parliament and other instruments,
with amendments to give effect to recommendations of
the Law Commission and the Scottish Law Commission.
[20th July 1978]
B
E rr ENACTED by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and
with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and
Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament
assembled, and the authority of the same, as follows:-
General provisions as to enactment and operation
1. Every section of an Act takes effect as a substantive enact- Words of
ment without introductory words.
enactment.
2. Any Act may be amended or repealed in the Session of
Parliament in which it is passed. or repeal in
same Session.
3. Every Act is a public Act to be judicially noticed as such, Judicial
unless the contrary is expressly provided by the Act, notice.
4. An Act or provision of an Act comes into force- Time of
(a) where provision is made for it to come into force on a
commence-
particular day, at the beginning of that day;
(b) where no provision is made for its coming into force,
at the beginning of the day on which the Act receives
the Royal Assent.
B 2 c. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
Interpretation and construction
Definitions. 5. In any Act, unless the contrary intention appears, words
and expressions listed in Schedule 1 to this Act are to be con-
strued according to that Schedule.
Gender and 6. In any Act, unless the contrary intention appears,-
number
(a) words importing the masculine gender include the
feminine;
(b) words importing the feminine gender include the
masculine;
(c) words in the singular include the plural and words in
the plural include the singular.
References to 7. Where an Act authorises or requires any document to be
service by POSt. served by post (whether the expression "serve" or the expression
"give" or "send" or any other expression is used) then, unless
the contrary intention appears, the service is deemed to be effected
by properly addressing, pre-paying and posting a letter containing
the document and, unless the contrary is proved, to have been
effected at the time at which the letter would be delivered in the
ordinary course of post.
References to & In the measurement of any distance for the purposes of
distance. an Act, that distance shall, unless the contrary intention appears,
be measured in a straight line on a horizontal plane.
References to 9. Subject to section 3 of the Summer Time Act 1972 (con-
time of day. struction of references to points of time during the period of
1972 c. 6. summer time), whenever an expression of time occurs in an
Act, the time referred to shall, unless it is otherwise speciücally
stated, be held to be Greenwich mean time.
References to 10. In any Act a reference to the Sovereign reigning at the
the Sovereign,
time of the passing of the Act is to be construed, unless the
contrary intention appears, as a reference to the Sovereign for
the time being.
Construction 11. Where an Act confers power to make subordinate legisla-
tion, expressions used in that legislation have, unless the contrary
legislation.
intention appears, the meaning which they bear in the Act.
Statutory powers and duties
Continuity of 12.-( 1) Where an Act confers a power or imposes a duty it
powers and is implied, unless the contrary intention appears, that the power
duties.
may be exercised, or the duty is to be performed, from time to
time as occasion requires. Interpretation Act 1978 C. 30 3
(2) Where an Act confers a power or imposes a duty on the
holder of an office as such, it is implied, unless the contrary
intention appears, that the power may be exercised, or the duty
is to be performed, by the holder for the time being of the
office.
13. Where an Act which (or any provision of which) does Anticipatory
not come into force immediately on its passing confers power exercise of
to make subordinate legislation, or to make appointments, give
notices, prescribe forms or do any other thing for the purposes
of the Act, then, unless the contrary intention appears, the power
may be exercised, and any instrument made thereunder may
be made so as to come into force, at any time after the passing
of the Act so far as may be necessary or expedient for the
purpose-
(a) of bringing the Act or any provision of the Act into
force ;
or
(b) of giving full effect to the Act or any such provision at
or after the time when it comes into force.
14. Where an Act confers power to make- Implied
(a) rules, regulations or byelaws; or
(b) Orders in Council, orders or other subordinate legisla-
tion to be made by statutory instrument,
it implies, unless the contrary intention appears, a power,
exercisable in the same manner and subject to the same con-
ditions or limitations, to revoke, amend or re-enact any instru-
ment made undei the power.
Repealing enactments
15. Where an Act repeals a repealing enactment, the repeal Repeal of
does not revive any enactment previously repealed unless words repeal.
are added reviving it.
Without prejudice to section 15, where an Act repeals General
an enactment, the repeal does not, unless the contrary intention savings.
appears,-
(a) revive anything not in force or existing at .the time at
which the repeal takes effect;
(b) affect the previous operation of the enactment repealed
or anything duly done or suffered under that enact-
ment;
(c) affect any right, privilege, obligation or liability acquired,
accrued or incurred under that enactment;
(d) affect any penalty, forfeiture or punishment incurred
in respect of any offence committed against that enact-
ment;
B2 4 c. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
(e) affect any investigation, legal proceeding or remedy in
respect of any such right, privilege, obligation, liability.
penalty, forfeiture oc punishment;
and any such investigation, legal proceeding or remedy may
be instituted, continued or enforced, and any such penalty,
forfeiture or punishment may be imposed, as if the repealing
Act had not been passed.
(2) This section applies to the expiry of a temporary enact-
ment as if it were repealed by an Act.
Repeal and 17.-(1) Where an Act repeals a previous enactment and
re-enactment,
substitutes provisions for the enactment repealed, the repealed
enactment remains in force until the substituted provisions come
into force.
(2) Where an Act repeals and re-enacts, with or without
modification, a previous enactment then, unless the contrary
intention appears.-
(a) any reference in any other enactment to the enactment
so repealed shall be construed as a reference to the
provision re-enacted;
(b) in so far as any subordinate legislation made or other
thing done under the enactment so repealed, or
having effect as if so made or done, could have been
made or done under the provision re-enacted, it shall
have effect as if made or done under that provision.
Miscellaneous
Duplicated 18. Where an act or omission constitutes an offence under two
offences.
or more Acts, or both under an Act and at common law, the
offender shall, unless the contrary intention appears, be liable to
be prosecuted and punished under either or any of those Acts
or at common law, but shall not be liable to be punished more
than once for the same offence.
Citation of 19.-(l) Where an Act cites another Act by year, statute,
other Acts. session or chapter, or a section or other portion of another Act
by number or letter, the reference shall, unless the contrary
intention appears, be read as referring-
(a) in the case of Acts included in any revised edition of
the statutes printed by authority, to that edition;
(b) in the case of Acts not so included but included in the
edition prepared under the direction of the Record
Commission, to that edition;
(c) in any other case, to the Acts printed by the Queen's
Printer, or under the superintendence or authority of
Her Majesty's Stationery Office. Interpretation Act 1978 c. 30 5
(2) An Act may continue to be cited by the short title
authorised by any enactment notwithstanding the repeal of that
enactment.
20.-(1) Where an Act describes or cites a portion of an References
enactment by referring to words, sections or other parts from to other
or to which (or from and to which) the portion extends, the
enactments.
portion described or cited includes the words, sections or other
parts referred to unless the contrary intention appears.
(2) Where an Act refers to an enactment, the reference, unless
the contrary intention appears, is a reference to that enactment
as amended, and includes a reference thereto as extended or
applied, by or under any other enactment, including any other
provision of that Act.
Supplementary
21.-(1) In this Act "Act" includes a local and personal or Interpretation
private Act; and "subordinate legislation" means Orders in
etc.
Council, orders, rules, regulations, schemes, warrants, byelaws
and other instruments made or to be made under any Act.
(2) This Act binds the Crown.
22.-(1) This Act applies to itself, to any Act passed after the Application
commencement of this Act and, to the extent specified in to Acts and
Part I of Schedule 2, to Acts passed before the commencement
Measures.
of this Act. -
(2) In any of the foregoing provisions of this Act a reference
to an Act is a reference to an Act to which that provision applies;
but this does not affect the generality of references to enactments
or of the references in section 19(1) to other Acts.
(3) This Act applies to Measures of the General Synod of
the Church of England (and, so far as it relates to Acts passed
before the commencement of this Act, to Measures of the Church
Assembly passed after 28th May 1925) as it applies to Acts.
23.-(l) The provisions of this Act, except sections 1 to 3 Application
and 4(b), apply, so far as applicable and unless the contrary inten-
to other
tion appears, to subordinate legislation made after the commence-
instruments.
ment of this Act and, to the extent specified in Part II of
Schedule 2, to subordinate legislation made before the com-
mencement of this Act, as they apply to Acts.
(2) In the application of this Act to Acts passed or sub-
ordinate legislation made after the commencement of this Act,
all references to an enactment include an enactment comprised
in subordinate legislation whenever made, and references to the 6 C. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
passing or repeal of an enactment are to be construed
acoordingly.
(3) Sections 9 and 19(1) also apply to deeds and other instru-
ments and documents as they apply to Acts and subordinate
legislation; and in the application of section 17(2)(a) to Acts
passed or subordinate legislation made after the commencement
of this Act, the reference to any other enactment includes any
deed or other instrument or document.
(4) Subsections (1) and (2) of this section do not apply to
1946 c. 36. Orders in Council made under section 5 of the Statutory
1972 c. 22. Insiruments Act 1946, section 1(3) of the Northern Ireland
1974 c. (Temporary Provisions) Act 1972 or Schedule 1 to the Northern
Ireland Act 1974.
Application to 24.-(1) This Act extends' to Northern Ireland so far as it
Northern
applies to Acts or subordinate legislation which so extend.
Ireland.
(2) In the application of this Act to Acts passed or subordinate
legislation made after the commencement of this Act, all
references to an enactment include an enactment comprised in
Northern Ireland legislation whenever passed or made; and in
relation to such legislation references to the passing or repeal of
an enactment include the making or revocation of an Order
in Council.
(3) In the application of section 14 to Acts passed after the
commencement of this Act which extend to Northern Ireland,
"statutory instrument" includes statutory rule for the purposes
1958 c. 18 of the Statutory Rules Act (Northern Ireland) 1958.
(N.!.).
(4) The following definitions contained in Schedule 1, namely
those of-
British subject and Commonwealth citizen;
The Communities and related expressions;
The Corporation Tax Acts;
The Income Tax Acts;
The Tax Acts,
apply, unless the contrary intention appears, to Northern Ireland
legislation as they apply to Acts.
(5) In this section "Northern Ireland legislation" means-
(a) Acts of the Parliament of Ireland;
(b) Acts of the Parliament of Northern Ireland;
(c) Orders in Council under section 1(3) of the Northern
Ireland (Temporary Provisions) Act 1972;
(d) Measures of the Northern Ireland Assembly; and Interpretation Act 1978 c. 30 7
(e) Orders in Council under Schedule 1 to the Northern 1974 c. 28
Ireland Act 1974.
25.-(1) The enactments described in Schedule 3 are repealed Repeals and
to the extent specified in the third column of that Schedule.
savings.
(2) Without prejudice to section 17(2)(a), a reference to the
Interpretation Act 1889, to any provision of that Act or to any 1889 c. 63.
other enactment repealed by this Act, whether occurring in
another Act, in subordinate legislation, in Northern Ireland
legislation or in any deed or other instrument or document,
shall be construed as referring to this Act, or to the correspond-
ing provision of this Act, as it applies to Acts passed at the time
of the reference.
(3) The provisions of this Act relating to Acts passed after any
particular time do not affect the construction of Acts passed
before that time, though continued or amended by Acts passed
thereafter.
26. This Act shall come into force on 1st January 1979. Commence-
ment.
27. This Act may be cited as the Interpretation Act 1978. Short title. 8 c. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
SCHEDULES
Section 5. SCHEDULE 1
WORDS AND ExPREssIoNs DEFINED
Note: The years or dates which follow certain entries in this
Schedule are relevant for the purposes of paragraph 4 of Schedule 2
(application to existing enactments).
Definitions
"Associated state" means a territory maintaining a status of
1967 c. 4. association with the United Kingdom in accordance with the West
Indies Act 1967. [16th February 19671
"Bank of England" means, as the context requires, the Governor
and Company of the Bank of England or the bank of the Govecnor
and Company of the Bank of England.
"Bank of Ireland" means, as the context requires, the Governor
and Company of the Bank of Ireland or the bank of the Governor
and Company of the Bank of Ireland.
"British Islaniis" means the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands
and the Isle of Man. [1889]
"British possession" means any part of Her Majesty's dominions
outside the United Kingdom; and where parts of such dominions are
under both a central and a local legislature, all parts under the
central legislature are deemed, for the purposes of this definition, to
be one British possession. [1889]
"British subject" and "Commonwealth citizen" have the same
meaning, that is-
1948 c. 56. (a) a person who under the British Nationality Act 1948 is a
citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies or who under
any enactment for the time being in force in a country
mentioned in section 1(3) of that Act is a citizen of that
country; and
(b) any other person who has the status of a British subject
under that Act or any subsequent enactment.
"Building regulations ", in relation to England and Wales, means
1936 C. 49. regulations made under section 61(1) of the Public Health Act
1936.
"Central funds ", in an enactment providing in relation to England
and Wales for the payment of costs out of central funds, means
money provided by Parliament.
"Charity Commissioners" means the Charity Commissioners for
1960 c. 58. England and Wales referred to in section 1 of the Charities Act
1960.
"Church Commissioners" means the Commissioners constituted
1947 by the Church Commissioners Measure 1947.
C.A.M. No.2. •
Interpretation Act 1978 c. 30 9
"Colonial legislature ", and "legislature" in relation to a British Sci-i. I
possession, mean the authority, other than the Parliament of the
United Kingdom or Her Majesty in Council, competent to make laws
for the possession. [1889]
"Colony" means any part of Her Majesty's dominions outside
the British Islands except-
(a) countries having fully responsible status within the Common-
wealth;
(b) territories for whose external relations a country other than
the United Kingdom is responsible;
(c) associated states;
and where parts of such dominions are under both a central and
a local legislature, all parts under the central legislature are deemed
for the purposes of this definition to be one colony. [1889]
"Commencement ", in relation to an Act or enactment, means the
time when the Act or enactment comes into force.
for trial" means-
(a) in relation to England and Wales, committed in custody or
on bail by a magistrates' court pursuant to section 7 of
the Magistrates' Courts Act 1952, or by any judge or other 1952 c. 55.
authority having power to do so, with a view to trial
before a judge and jury; [1889]
(b) in relation to Northern Ireland, committed in custody or on
bail by a magistrates' court pursuant to section 45 of the
Magistrates' Courts Act (Northern Ireland) 1964, or by a 1964 c. 21
court, judge, resident magistrate, justice of the peace or (N.J.).
other authority having power to do so, with a view to trial
on indictment. [1st January 1979]
"The Communities ", "the Treaties" or "the Community
Treaties" and other expressions defined by section 1 of and Schedule
I to the European Communities Act 1972 have the meanings 1972 c. 68.
prescribed by that Act.
"Comptroller and Auditor General" means the Comptroller-
General of the receipt and issue of Her Majesty's Exchequer and
Auditor-General of Public Accounts appointed in pursuance of the
Exchequer and Audit Departments Act 1866. 1866 c. 39.
"Consular officer" has the meaning assigned by Article 1 of the
Vienna Convention set out in Schedule 1 to the Consular Relations 1968 c. 18.
Act 1968.
"The Corporation Tax Acts" means-
(a) Parts X and XI of the Income and Corporation Taxes Act 1970 c. 10.
1970;
(b) all other provisions of that or any other Act relating
to corporation tax or to any other matter dealt with in
Part X or Part XI of that Act;
(c) all the provisions of Part IV of the Finance Act 1965 and 1965 c. 25.
of any other enactment which, at the passing of the said
Act of 1970, formed part of or was to be construed with
the Corporation Tax Acts. 10 c. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
SCH. 1 " County court" means-
(a) in relation to England and Wales, a court held for a district
1959 c. 23. under the County Courts Act 1959; (18461
(b) in relation to Northern Ireland, a court held for a division
1959 c. 25 under the County Courts Act (Northern Ireland) 1959. [1889]
(N.I.).
of Appeal" means-
(a) in relation to England and Wales, Her Majesty's Court of
Appeal in England;
(b) in relation to Northern Ireland, Her Majesty's Court of
Appeal in Northern Ireland.
"Court of summary jurisdiction ", "summary conviction" and
"Summary Jurisdiction Acts ", in relation to Northern Ireland, have
the same meanings as in Measures of the Northern Ireland Assembly
and Acts of the Parliament of Northern Ireland.
"Crown Court" means-
(a) in relation to England and Wales, the Crown Court consti-
1971 c. 23. tuted by section 4 of the Courts Act 1971;
(b) in relation to Northern Ireland, the Crown Court constituted
1978 c. 23. by section 4 of the Judicature (Northern Ireland) Act 1978.
"Crown Estate Commissioners" means the Commissioners referred
1961 c. 55. to in secton 1 of the Crown Estate Act 1961.
"England" means, subject to any alteration of boundaries under
1972 c. 70. Part IV of the Local Government Act 1972, the area consisting of
the counties established by section 1 of that Act, Greater London and
the Isles of Scilly. [1st April 1974].
"Financial year" means, in relation to matters relating to the
Consolidated Fund, the National Loans Fund, or moneys provided
by Parliament, or to the Exchequer or to central taxes or finance, the
twelve months ending with 31st March. [1889]
"Governor-General" includes any person who for the time being
has the powers of the Governor-General, and "Governor ", in rela-
tion to any British possession, includes the officer for the time being
administering the government of that possession. [1889]
"High Court" means-
(a) in relation to England and Wales, Her Majesty's High Court
of Justice in England;
(b) in relaņon to Northern Ireland, Her Majesty's High Court
of Justice in Northern Ireland.
"The Income Tax Acts" means all enactments relating to income
tax, including any provisions of the Corporation Tax Acts which
relate to income tax.
"Land" includes buildings and other structures, land covered with
water, and any estate, interest, easement, servitude or right in or over
land. [1st January 1979]. Interpretation Act 1978 C. 30 11
"Lands Clauses Acts" means- SCH. 1
(a) in relation to England and Wales, the Lands Clauses Cbn-
1845 C. 18.
solidation Act 1845 and the Lands Clauses Conso'lidation 1860 c. 106.
Aots Amendment Act 1860, and any Acts for the time being
in force amending those Acts; [1889]
(b) in relation Scotland, the Lands Clauses Consc4idation 1845 c. 19.
(Scotland) Act 1845 and the Lands Clauses Consolidation 1860 c. 106.
Acts Amendment Act 1860, and any Acts for the time being
in force amending those Acts; [1889]
(c) in relation to Northern Ireland, the enactments defined as
such by section 46(1) of the Interpretation Act (Northern 1954 c.
Ireland) 1954. [1889]
(N.!.).
"Local land charges register ", in relation to England and Wales,
means a register kept pursuant to section 3 of the Local Land 1975 C. 76.
Charges Act 1975, and "the appropriate local land charges register"
has the meaning assigned by section 4 of that Act.
"London borough" means a borough described in Schedule 1 to
the London Government Act 1963, "inner London borough" means 1963 C. 33.
one of the boroughs so described and numbered from 1 to J 2
"Outer London borough" means one of the boroughs so described
and numbered from 13 to 32, subject (in each case) to any alterations
made under Part IV of the Local Government Act 1972. 1972 c. 70.
"Lord Chancellor" means the Lord High Chancellor of Great
Britain.
"Magistrates' court" has the meaning assigned to it-
(a) in relation to England and Wales, by section 124 of the
Magistrates' Courts Act 1952; 1952 C. 55.
(b) in relation to Northern Ireland, by section 1 of the Magis- 1964 C. 21
trates' Courts Act (Northern Ireland) 1964.
"Month" means calendar month. [1850]
"National Debt Commissioners" means the Commissioners for the
Reduction of the National Debt.
"Northern Ireland legislation" has the meaning assigned by
section 24(5) of this Act. [1st January 1979]
"Oath" and "affidavit" include affirmation and declaration, and
"swear" includes affirm and declare.
"Ordnance Map" means a map made under powers conferred
by the Ordnance Survey Act 1841 or the Boundary Survey (Ireland) 1841 c. 30.
Act 1854. 1854c. 17.
"Parliamentary Election" means the election of a Member to serve
in Parliament for a constituency. [1889]
"Person" includes a body of persons corporate or unincorporate.
[1889] 12 c. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
SCH. 1 "Police area", "police authority" and other expressions relating
to the police have the meaning or effect described-
1964 c. 48. (a) in relation to and Wales, by section 62 of the Police
Act 1964;
(b) in relation to Scotland, by sections 50 and 5 1(4) of the
1967 c. 77. Police (Scotland) Act 1967.
"The Privy Council" means the Lords and others of Her Majesty's
Most Honourable Privy Council.
"Registered medical practitioner" means a fully registered person
1956 c. 76. within the meaning of the Medical Act 1956. [1st January 1979]
"Rules of Court" in relation to any court means rules made by the
authority having power to make rules or orders regulating the practice
and procedure of that court, and in Scotland includes Acts of
Adjournal and Acts of Sederunt; and the power of the authority to
make rules of court (as above defined) includes power to make such
rules for the purpose of any Act which directs or authorises anything
to be done by rules of court. [1889]
"Secretary of State" means one of Her Majesty's Principal
Secretaries of State.
"Sheriff ", in relation to Scotland, includes sheriff principal. [1889]
"Statutory declaration" means a declaration made by virtue of
1835 c. 62. the Statutory Declarations Act 1835.
"Supreme Court" means-
(a) in relation to England and Wales, the Court of Appeal and
the High Court together with the Crown Court;
(b) in relation to Northern Ireland, the Supreme Court of Judi-
cature of Northern Ireland.
1970 io. "The Tax Acts" means the Income and Corporation Taxes Act
1970 and all other provisions of the Income Tax Acts and the
Corporation Tax Acts. [12th March 1970]
"The Treasury" means the Commissioners of Her Majesty's
Treasury.
"United Kingdom" means Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
[12th April 19271
"Wales" means, subject to any alteration of boundaries made
1972 c. 70. under Part 1V of the Local Government Act 1972, the area con-
sisting of the counties established by section 20 of that Act [1st
April 1974]
"Water authority ", in relation to England and Wales, means an
1973 c. 37. authority established in accordance with section 2 of the Water Act
1973; and "water authority area ", in relation to any functions of
such an authority, means the area in respect of which the water
authority are for the time being to exercise those functions.
"Writing" includes typing, printing, lithography, photography and
other modes of representing or reproducing words in a visible form,
and expressions referring to writing are construed accordingly. Interpretation Act 1978 C. 30 13
Construction of certain expressions relating to children I
In relation to England and Wales the following expressions and
references, namely-
(a) the expression "the parental rights and duties";
(b) the expression "legal custody" in relation to a child (as
defined in the Children Act 1975); and 1975 C. 72.
(c) any reference to the person with whom a child (as so
defined) has his home,
are to be construed in accordance with Part IV of that Act. [12th
Noveniber 19751
Construction of certain expressions relating to off ences
In relation to England and Wales-
(a) "indictable offence" means an offence which, if committed
by an adult, is triable on indictment, whether it is exclusively
so triable or triable either way;
(b) "summary offence" means an offence which, if committed
by an adult, is triable only summarily;
(c) "offence triable either way" means an offence which, if
committed by an adult, is triable either on indictment or
summarily;
and the terms "indictable ", "summary" and "triable either way ".
in their application to offences, are to be construed accordingly.
In the above definitions references to the way or ways in which an
offence is triable are to be construed without regard to the effect,
if any, of 23 of the Criminal Law Act 1977 on the mode of 1977 C. 45.
trial in a particular case.
SCHEDULE 2 Sections 22, 23.
APPLICATION OP Acr TO EXISTING ENACIMENTS
PART I
Acrs
1. The following provisions of this Act apply to Acts whenever
Section 6(a) and (c) so far as applicable to enactments relating
*0 offences punishable on indictment or on summary con-
viction
Section 9
Section 10
Section 11 so far as it relates to subordinate legislation made
after the year 1889
Section 18
Section 19(2).
2. The following apply to Acts passed after the year 1850:-
1
Section 2 14 C. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
SCH. 2 Section 3
Section 6(a) and (c) so far as not applicable to such Acts by
virtue of paragraph 1
Section 15
Section 17(1).
3. The following apply to Acts passed after the year 1889:-
Section 4
Section 7
Section 8
Section 12
Section 13
Section 14 so far as it relates to rules, regulations or byelaws
Section 16(1)
Section 17(2Xa)
Section 19(1)
Section 20(1).
4.-(1) Subject to the following provisions of this paragraph-
(a) paragraphs of Schedule I at the end of which a year or date
earlier than the commencement of this Act is specified apply,
so far as applicable, to Acts passed on or after the date,
or after the year, so specified; and
(b) paragraphs of that Schedule at the end of which no year or
date is specified apply, so far as applicable, to Acts passed
at any time.
(2) The definition of "British Islands ", in its application to Acts
passed after the establishment of the Irish Free State but before
the commencement of this Act, includes the Republic of Ireland.
(3) The definition of "colony ", in its application to an Act passed
at any time before the commencement of this Act, includes-
1889 c. 63. (a) any colony within the meaning of section 18(3) of the Inter-
pretation Act 1889 which was excluded, but in relation only
to Acts passed at a later time, by any enactment repealed
by this Act;
(b) any country or territory which ceased after that time to be
part of Her Majesty's dominions but subject to a provision
for the continuation of existing law as if it had not so
ceased;
and paragraph (b) of the definition does not apply.
(4) The definition of "Lord Chancellor" does not apply to Acts
passed before 1st October 1921 in which that expression was used in
relation to Ireland only.
(5) The definition of "person ", so far as it includes bodies
corporate, applies to any provision of an Act whenever passed
relating to an offence punishable on indictment or on summary
conviction.
1973 32. (6) This paragraph applies to the National Health Service
1973 c. 37. Reorganisation Act 1973 and the Water Act 1973 as if they were
passed after 1st April 1974. Interpretation Act 1978 c. 30 15
5. The following definitions shall be treated as included in Schedule
1 for the purposes specified in this paragraph-
(a) in any Act passed before 1st April 1974, a reference to
England includes Berwick upon Tweed and Monmouthshire
and, in the case of an Act passed before the Welsh
Language Act 1967, Wales; 1967 C. 66.
(b) in any Act passed before the commencement of this Act
and after the year 1850, "land" includes messuages, tene-
ments and hereditaments, houses and buildings of any
tenure;
(c) in any Act passed before the commencement of the Criminal 1975 c. 21.
Procedure (Scotland) Act 1975, "the Summary Jurisdic-
tion (Scotiand) Acts" means Part II of that Act.
PART H
SUBORDINATE LEGISLATION
6. Sections 4(a), 9 and 19(1), and so much of Schedule 1 as defines
the following expressions, namely-
British subject and Commonwealth citizen:
England;
Local land charges register and appropriate local land charges
register;
Police area (and related expressions) in relation to Scotland;
United Kingdom;
Wales,
apply to subordiifate legislation made at any time before the com-
mencement of this Act as they apply to Acts passed at that time.
7. The definition in Schedule 1 of "county court ", in relation to
England and Wales, applies to Orders in Council made after the
year 1846. 16 c.30 Interpretation Act 1978
Section 25. SCHEDULE 3
ENACrMENTS REPEALED
20 Geo.
c.42.
33 Geo.
c. 13.
43 & 44 Vict.
c. 9.
47 & 48 Vict.
c. 62.
52 & 53 Vict.
c. 63.
53 & 54 Vict.
c. 21.
59 & 60 Vict.
c. 14.
S.R. &O. 1923
No. 405.
15 & l6Geo.5.
No. 1.
17 & 18 Geo. 5.
c. 4.
22 &23 Geo. 5.
c. 4.
11 &l2Geo.6.
c. 7.
11 &l2Geo.6.
c. 56.
15&l6Geo.6
& 1 Eliz. 2.
C. 55.
4 & 5 Eliz. 2.
c. 76.
5 & 6 Eliz. 2.
c. 6.
8 & 9 Eliz. 2.
c. 55.
9 &lOEliz.2.
c. 16.
10& llEliz.2.
C. 1.
10& 11 Eliz.2.
c. 30.
The Wales and Berwick
Act 1746.
The Acts of Parliament
(Commencement) Act
1793.
The Statutes (Definition
of Time) Act 1880.
The Revenue Act 1884.
The Interpretation Act
1889.
The Inland Revenue
Regulation Act 1890.
The Short Titles Act 1896.
The Irish Free State (Con-
sequential Adaptation
of Enactments) Order
1923.
The Interpretation
Measure 1925.
The Royal and Parlia-
mentary Titles Act 1927.
The Statute of West-
minster 1931.
The Ceylon Independence
Act 1947.
The British Nationality
Act 1948.
The Magistrates' Courts
Act 1952.
The Medical Act 1956.
The Ghana Independence
Act 1957.
The Nigeria Indepedence
Act 1960.
The Sierra Leone Inde-
pendence Act 1961.
The Tanganyika Inde-
pendence Act 1961.
The Northern Ireland Act
1962.
The words from "and to be
the date" to the end.
The whole Act.
In section 14, the second para-
graph, that is the words from
"Any reference" to "Ex-
chequer and Audit Depart-
ments Act 1866" in the
second place where that Act
is referred to in the section.
The whole Act except para-
graphs (4), (5) and (14) of
section 13 in their application
to Northern Ireland.
In section 38(1), the words from
"and" to "of this Act ".
Section 3.
In the Schedule, the entry
relating to the Interpretation
Act 1889.
Section 1.
In section 2(2) the words "Act
passed and ".
Section 11.
Section 4(2).
In section 1(2) the words
"other enactment or" and
the words "passed or ".
In Schedule 5, the amendment-
of the Interpretation Act 1889.
Section 52(3).
Section 4(1).
Section 3(1).
Section 3(1).
Section 3(1).
Section 27.
Chapter
or Number
Short Title
2.
3.
Extent of Repeal
The whole Act. Interpretation Act 1978 c. 30 17
10& 11 Eliz.2.
40.
L0&llEliz.2.
C. 54.
10&lIEIiz.2.
c. 57.
1963 c. 33.
1963 c. 54.
1964 c. 46.
1964 c. 48.
1964 c. 86.
1964 c. 93.
1966 c. 14.
1966 c. 37.
1967 c. 4.
1967 c. 66.
1967 c. 77.
The Jamaica Indepen-
dence Act 1962.
The Trinidad and Tobago
Independence Act 1962.
The Uganda Indepen-
dence Act 1962.
The London Government
Act 1963.
The Kenya Independence
Act 1963.
The Malawi Independence
Act 1964.
The Police Act 1964.
The Malta Independence
Act 1964.
The Gambia Independ-
ence Act 1964.
The Guyana Independ-
ence Act 1966.
The Barbados Independ-
ence Act 1966.
The West Indies Act 1967.
The Welsh Language Act
1967.
The Police (Scotland) Act
1967.
The Mauritius Independ-
ence Act 1968.
The National Loans Act
1968.
The Income and Corpora-
tion Taxes Act 1970.
The Fiji Independence
Act 1970.
The Sheriff Courts (Scot-
land) Act 1971.
The European Com-
munities Act 1972.
The Local Government
Act 1972.
In section 62 the words from
"and in any other enact-
ment " to " this Act) ".
Section 4(1).
Section 4(1).
Section 5(1).
Section 4(l).
Section 3(5).
Section 4.
In section 50, the words from
"and in any other enactment"
tO " this Act) "; and in
section 51, in subsection (4),
the words from "and in any
other enactment" to "this
Act) ".
Section 4(1).
Section 1(6).
In section 526, in subsection
(1) the words "and in any
other Act "; and in sub-
section (2) the words "and in
any Act passed after this Act."
Section 4(1).
In section 4(3) the words from
(which " to " the said
section 28 ".
In section 1(2) the words from
"and except" to "Northern
Ireland) ".
In section 269 the words from
"in every Act" to "that
date)" in the second place
where those words occur.
Chapter Short Title Extent of Repeal
or Number
SCH. 3
Section 3(1).
Section 3(1).
Section 3(1).
In section 1, in subsection (1)
the words "and any other"
and in subsection (6) the
words from" and section 15"
to " that is to say ".
Section 4(1).
Section 4(1).
1968 c. 8.
1968 c. 13.
1970 c. 10.
1970 c. 50.
1971 c. 58.
1972 c. 68.
1972 c. 70. 18 c. 30 Interpretation Act 1978
SCH. 3
Chapter
or Number
Short Title Extent of Repeal
1973 C. 14. The Costs in Criminal
Cases Act 1973.
In section 13(1) the words" and
in any other enactment pro-
viding for the payment of
costs out of central funds ".
1973 c. 27. The Bahamas Independ-
ence Act 1973.
Section 4(1).
1973 c. 32. The National Health Re-
organisation Act 1973.
In section 55(2), the words from
the beginning to "that date;
and ".
1973 c. 37. The Water Act 1973. In section 2(3) the words "and
any other enactment ".
Section 38(2).
1975 c. 21. The Criminal Procedure
(Scotland) Act 1975.
In Schedule 9, paragraph 6.
1975 c. 72. The Children Act 1975. Section 89.
1975 c. 76. The Local Land Charges
Act 1975.
In section 4 the words "and any
other statutory provision ".
1976 c. 63. The Bail Act 1976. In Schedule 2, the amendment
of the Interpretation Act
1889.
1977 c. 45. The Criminal Law Act
1977.
In section 64(1) the words from
"and, unless" to "this Act)".
1978 c. 12. The Medical Act 1978. In Schedule 5, in paragraph 48
paragraph (b) and the word
"and" immediately preced-
ing that paragraph. -
1978 c. 15. The Solomon Islands Act
1978.
Section 7(1).
1978 c. 20. The Tuvalu Act 1978. Section 4(1).
Printed in the UK
For The Stationery Office Limited under the
authority and superintendence of Carol Tullo, Controller of
Her Majesty's Stationery Office
and Queen's Printer of Acts of Parliament
1st Impression August 1978
7th Impression February 1998
Dd 5065225 2/98 173 1/2 19585 Job no. ON 068
LONDON: The Stationery Office Limited
ISBN 0-10-543078-1
9 780105 430780

[Anon21456]

Re: The Controversial Person by GM Fletcher

Excellent post ! Everyone should read it completely and take an hour or two to reflect on what they just read (sarcasm inside).

[Diarmuid]

Re: The Controversial Person by GM Fletcher

http://www.wattpad.com/219396-the-co...by-gm-fletcher

Thanks Sapiens, for posting this and recent Material; much appreciated

[Diarmuid]

Re: The Controversial Person by GM Fletcher

Thanks Sapiens, for posting this and recent Material; much appreciated

Hi Sapiens

Thanks again - this poses more questions then it answers I think :p.

Firstly the notion of a corporation or a legal person is a thought object, it does not exist in the physical world a cooperation can consist of buildings employees etc.. but these physical manifestations of the company are not the company itself; the corporation is a shared thought object among the minds of men. This meeting of the minds or common understanding allows for the perpetuity as eluded to below.

".... consist of one person only and his successors, in some particular station, who are
incorporated by law, in order to give them some legal capacities and advantages,
particularly that of perpetuity, which in their natural persons they could not have

As such the object must be construed, either partially or fully by each for its existence, it is the passing and shared understanding of the concept , the idea, which gives the entity its perpetuity, for its continued existence, we as individuals must continually rebirth the entity / definition, though shared understanding. Which at least for me throws up a major conundrum, how can a thing, which is born of the minds ability to manifest it, be classified as the same as the mind.

For a classification system to work I suppose, such as biotic, abiotic mammals, fish, etc.., there must be a shared common base for their classification, how is it that a fiction that is only manifested by the minds ability to do such a thing be classified as the same as that which manifested it. The poet is not the poem, the author not the story. One would reasonably classify the poem and the story together or the poet and the author but surely not vice versa.

As has been seen widely from corporate abuse of the environment and people generally, it is near impossible to ascribe duties or penalties to a thing which has such an ephemeral quality the definition offers a shield of limited liability, and in fact seems to be the reason for such classification to those who would perpetuate such crimes , I believe the equating of the fiction to that of the real has been a great travesty for the world.