The ethics of legislative drafting

Abstract

The article outlines the qualities required of Parliamentary Counsel. It notes that drafting is an extremely onerous, exacting and highly‐skilled task. What is clearly conceived in the mind may not be easily expressed with clarity and precision in words. Drafters are wordsmiths, and good policy may become a bad law as a result of the bad arrangement of words in a legislative sentence – creating an ambiguity, a vagueness, an obscurity, or even an absurdity. The author notes that Parliamentary Counsel must have a strong interest in substantive policy. Yet the classic theory is that Parliamentary Counsel do not initiate policy. They are only technicians whose function it is to translate policy into law. The author concludes that legislative drafting requires the cultivation of detachment as a necessary qualification. Legislative drafting cannot hold its audience captive. It can consistently captivate its audience to the ideals behind the policy decisions that motivate legislation. In these lie its purpose, its strengths, and its value.