Opinion ID: 1224377
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Ambiguity and clarification

Text: ¶ 30 Judge Bolton concluded that HB 2276 may be considered in determining the meaning of prior law so long as a court finds the prior law ambiguous. We disagree. Under some circumstances, a newly enacted statute may clarify ambiguities in an earlier version. See, e.g., State v. Sweet, 143 Ariz. 266, 271, 693 P.2d 921, 926 (1985) (amendment enacted one year after original version of statute was clarification rather than change); City of Mesa v. Killingsworth, 96 Ariz. 290, 297, 394 P.2d 410, 414 (1964) (amendment enacted one year after statute was used for clarification). This useful canon of statutory construction can assist with interpretation when both statutes were passed by the same Legislature or perhaps within a few years of each other. But to suggest that the 1995 Legislature knows and can clarify what the 1919 or 1974 Legislatures intended carries us past the boundary of reality and into the world of speculation. We refuse to cross that border. ¶ 31 Our previous cases support that conclusion. When an amendment is enacted after a considerable length of time and constitutes a clear and distinct change of the operative language, it is an indication of an intent to change rather than clarify the previous statute. O'Malley Lumber Co. v. Riley, 126 Ariz. 167, 169, 613 P.2d 629, 632 (App.1980) ( abrogated on other grounds by Hayes v. Continental Ins. Co., 178 Ariz. 264, 269 n. 5, 872 P.2d 668, 673 n. 5 (1994)). Given the passage of time and the significant additions to and departures from prior law, HB 2276 is more akin to a change than a clarification. See, e.g., Ormsbee v. Allstate Ins. Co., 177 Ariz. 146, 146-47, 865 P.2d 807, 807-08 (1993). The legislation may not, therefore, be given weight in interpreting the meaning of statutes enacted almost eighty or even twenty-fiveyears earlier.