Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/17-1618_hfci.pdf
Page Number: 154.0

10 

BOSTOCK v. CLAYTON COUNTY 

KAVANAUGH, J., dissenting 

Exactly right and exactly on point in this case. 

Justice Scalia explained the extraordinary importance of
hewing to the ordinary meaning of a phrase: “Adhering to
the  fair  meaning  of  the  text  (the  textualist’s  touchstone) 
does not limit one to the hyperliteral meaning of each word 
in the text.  In the words of Learned Hand: ‘a sterile liter-
alism  . . .  loses  sight  of  the  forest  for  the  trees.’    The  full 
body of a text contains implications that can alter the literal 
meaning of individual words.”  A. Scalia & B. Garner, Read-
ing  Law  356  (2012)  (footnote  omitted).    Put  another  way,
“the meaning of a sentence may be more than that of the
separate  words,  as  a  melody  is  more  than  the  notes.” 
Helvering v. Gregory, 69 F. 2d 809, 810–811 (CA2 1934) (L. 
Hand, J.).  Judges must take care to follow ordinary mean-
ing “when two words combine to produce a meaning that is
not  the  mechanical  composition  of  the  two  words  sepa-
rately.”  Eskridge, Interpreting Law, at 62.  Dictionaries are 
not “always useful for determining the ordinary meaning of 
word  clusters  (like  ‘driving  a  vehicle’)  or  phrases  and
clauses or entire sentences.”  Id., at 44.  And we must rec-
ognize that a phrase can cover a “dramatically smaller cat-
egory than either component term.”  Id., at 62. 

If  the  usual  evidence  indicates  that  a  statutory  phrase
bears  an  ordinary  meaning  different  from  the  literal
strung-together  definitions  of  the  individual  words  in  the 
phrase, we may not ignore or gloss over that discrepancy.
“Legislation cannot sensibly be interpreted by stringing to-
gether dictionary synonyms of each word and proclaiming 
that, if the right example of the meaning of each is selected,
the ‘plain meaning’ of the statute leads to a particular re-
sult.  No theory of interpretation, including textualism it-
self, is premised on such an approach.”  883 F. 3d 100, 144, 
n. 7 (CA2 2018) (Lynch, J., dissenting).4 

—————— 

4 Another longstanding canon of statutory interpretation—the absurd-
ity canon—similarly reflects the law’s focus on ordinary meaning rather