Actually, in the context of a set of laws implementing a mechanistic regulatory scheme, no, I don’t. It makes about as much sense as the IRS “encouraging” you to file your return by April 15. Or the Board of Elections stating they’d “prefer” you to bring a photo ID when voting.
Fortunately, we have both a substantive legal rule, the void-for-vagueness doctrine, and a canon of statutory interpretation, the rule of lenity, that militate for dismissing the violation.
Because “the terms of a penal statute … must be sufficiently explicit to inform those who are subject to it what conduct on their part will render them liable to its penalties,” a statute is void for vagueness when it “either forbids or requires the doing of an act in terms so vague that men of common intelligence must necessarily guess at its meaning and differ as to its application” and that this “violates the first essential of due process of law.”
Similarly, the rule of lenity provides that when “construing an ambiguous criminal statute, the court should resolve the ambiguity in favor of the defendant.” (citations omitted).
This is also an excellent application of expressio unius, exclusio alterius, and also supports dropping the ticket.
I’m sure that seems like a good argument if you don’t know that “discourage” means “prevent” or “obstruct” or “hinder”, while “encourage” means “give support” and “inspire”, not “force an action”. The two words are not antonyms. And the Board of Elections can’t “prefer” you bring a photo ID as no ID is needed to exercise one’s franchise.
As for it being “in the context of a set of laws implementing a mechanistic regulatory scheme”, the meaning of the word “discourage” is the same as in everyday language; there’s nothing ambiguous about the word.
Failing to obey a traffic control creates dangerous situations; that’s why the solid line was there in the first place. Anyone operating a motor vehicle, in any state AFAIK, is required to do so in a manner which does not deliberately create dangerous situations.
In other words, your argument will fall flat and fail, because the driver in question did in fact cross a solid white line with his car.
Here in Texas our freeways exits dump you onto one-way frontage roads. Typically there is a double white line between the main frontage road lanes and the exit lane that drivers are not supposed to cross (and sometimes there are signs to remind drivers of that fact). Seems to me that Texas uses a single white line (often seen on curvy sections of multilane roads) to mean that crossing is “discouraged” and “requires special care” as quoted above but not explicitly illegal.
The above quote is from the online version of the Virginia Driver’s Manual. I wouldn’t argue the vagueness of “discourage” without reading the actual section of the code that covers this.
As Frylock noted, your argument about the definition of the words is less than convincing. Your assertion that “encourage” and “discourage” are not antonyms runs in the face of the morphological forms of the words: obviously they are antonyms! And as you note, “encourage” means to “support” or “inspire” but short of “forc[ing] an action.” Thus, to “discourage” would mean to advise against, but short of forbidding an action.
The argument in your third paragraph already assumes what is actually in dispute (whether driving over a single white line is forbidden) and makes the circular argument that driving over the white line is dangerous because it is illegal and is illegal because it is dangerous.
In short, if this is your best and final reply, I’m willing to submit the case to the jury at this point.
I bolded some parts but really, the meaning of the word is clear. Even if you go with arguably the least forceful definition (“to dissuade”), the meaning doesn’t change: it indicates that the action being contemplated is one that should not be undertaken.
Still, go try your argument in court. Record it on video and post it after your court date. I’ll bet a doughnut that it doesn’t get anyone out of a ticket.
ETA: You’re right, I should have noted that the two words are not exactly antonyms, since “dissuade” and “persuade” clearly are nearly perfect opposites.
Traffic violations don’t go to a jury. But like I said, please videotape the court proceedings when you do make this argument, and post them so we can see the result. I prefer cake doughnuts, btw.
I mean, does that strike you as the usual performative language we find in statutes? Ordinarily we see words like “shall” or “prohibited,” not “discouraged” or “urged.”
At any rate, I think it is fairly apparent that the statute is at least ambiguous (which means I don’t have to show that my interpretation is the only reasonable one, but that it is one reasonable interpretation of perhaps many, which interpretation would alter the outcome of the case). This means the rule of lenity applies in favor of CS.
I’d also point out that no attempt to meet Tim R. Mortiss’s point has been made either.
Right, I was using it as a figure of speech and not making a procedural point. (“I’m prepared to submit the case to the finder of fact” just doesn’t have the same panache.)
Additionally, for the literalists among us, since I am not an attorney in Virginia, I won’t be submitting this case to anyone.
What I meant to say, in a pointed but circumspect way, is that I don’t think you’ve mounted a really good case and if that was the best you could come up with, there was no point in beating a dead horse. (A decision I regrettably abandoned.) The jury I had in mind was readers of this thread, who I don’t think will be swayed by your argument that since discourage means to “hinder” (how does a statute hinder traffic anyway? Will the highway department put law books in the way?) or “dissuade,” then it is clearly illegal. And I will leave it to them, here on out, to determine who has the better of the argument. Hearings can’t go on forever, after all, and you’ve got to rest your case at some point.
To the best of my knowledge, and IANAL, no state or municipality provides jury trials for traffic tickets. Since you seem to have a gotcha up your sleeve, where do they do jury trials for ticketed infractions?
Why do you think that the statute is what discourages? It sure seemed to me that the it was the white line that was meant to discourage (a driver from crossing it).
Good try at being lawyerly to win the thread, but frankly your efforts are falling as flat as any of your arguments meant for the courtroom (about this situation) will. Heck, I can hear the “thud” all the way over here in Nevada.
Sorry, did not mean to be pushy, just wondered. In my state, Ohio, any city can have a traffic offense a misdemeanor of the 4th degree or above, which entitles a defendant to a jury trial.
Although most cities mirror state law on traffic offenses, minor misdemeanors, I have seen some that do not.
In Ohio we do not classify traffic violations as infractions. Although a city can have red light camera violations listed as infractions under Home Rule, the state does not classify any offense as infractions.
Again, sorry if I seemed pushy. I was just wondering how other states laws are.
What is this 82-1-6 quoted? Were you cited under a Municipal ordinance or state law?
As far as the word discourage as discussed, the DMV manual is not law, the wording of the statute is. Statutory construction outlines a word or phrase, unless defined by law or has a particular meaning in a specialized context, will be given it’s everyday ordinary meaning.
Where is “discouraged” mentioned in the statute/ordinance?
I don’t know how you can think that a statute saying X “is discouraged” means to use the term in the sense of “to hinder by placement of obstacles.” (All the other “hindering” senses you cited referred to hinderment by disuasion, which is more like the opposite-of-encourage sense of ‘discourage’.)
Just saying “we discourage this” doesn’t constitute placement of an obstacle. It means “we would, given the chance, atttempt to dissuade you.” And absent any further comment, it also means “but we’re not going to actively prevent you from doing it.”
This is just a plain fact about how “discouraged” is used in English.
“X is discouraged” in a set of rules has less force than “X is forbidden.”
You’re discouraged from posting bad arguments on the dope. But are you forbidden? Are you hindered from doing so? Are any obstacles put in your way? No. Rather, people try to dissuade you from doing so.
In WA, for example, I405 has a solid white line separating the HOV lane. At some points there is a double white line and a sign saying it’s illegal to cross the double, but mostly just a single white line that everyone crosses.
I got a ticket for it in DC once - moved from the main lane on 14th street, to the right turn lane, a few yards too soon.
On the Beltway there are a number of stretches with solid white lines, with signs that say “stay in lane”. These tend to be ignored by drivers. Of course, Beltway drivers are all insane (I don’t necessarly except myself from that :p).