Joseph Hrinik lives in Michigan (USA) where he retired after 40 years of diversified occupational health and safety experience in both the private and public sectors. He is currently researching regional and national forklift safety legislation and forklift training programs.
Occupational health and safety legislation is too often written in legal language. Every word, the
placement of the word, and the punctuation used is critical to the legal meaning. Legal wording must be read slowly, deliberately - and often repeatedly to gain a true understanding. Misinterpretations will creep in if it is read casually. What your mind may interpret is often not what the wording actually states.
Please read the following excerpt:An emblem, as prescribed in figure 3, shall be used on the rear of a vehicle used on a public road which, by design, moves at 25 miles per hour or less outside a building. Such an emblem shall not be used as a clearance marker for wide machinery or as a replacement for required lighting. Advertising or other markings shall not be placed on it.
(Figure 3 is an emblem for slow moving vehicles.)
1) Does the above legislation require that a slow-moving vehicle designed to travel at speeds of
25 miles or less have a slow-moving vehicle emblem on the rear of the vehicle when used on a
public road?
2) Does the above legislation require a slow-moving vehicle emblem on the rear of all vehicles
using a public road?
If you said yes to #1, go back and reread the legislation.
If you said yes to #2, congratulations! You can read legalese.
There is a wording mistake in the legislation which does not convey the original intent. The legal wording should have been "the vehicle, which by design, moves at 25 miles per hour or less".
The wording emphasised a public road, which by design, moves at 25 miles per hour or less.
Most public roads are outside public buildings and, by design, slowly contract and expand based on temperature. Since the road movement is less than 25 miles per hour, the above rule (as written) would require a slow moving vehicle emblem on all vehicles using a public road.
Technicality? Yes! Moral of the story: learn to read legalese.
Definition for legalese:
* "Legalese is the term given to the special technical terminology of any given language (usually English) in a legal document. Legalese is prone to having very long sentences with many carefully phrased clauses. The terminology is officially used to make documents less subject to unintended reinterpretation, but many argue that it also can have the effect of making documents hard to read for non-legal people."
* "Legalese is a term for legal writing that is difficult for nonlawyers to understand. For all the reasons discussed earlier in this article, legal writing tends to be very formal. This formality is manifested in long sentences, numerous modifying clauses, complex vocabulary, high levels of abstraction, and a general lack of sensitivity to the needs of the nonlegal reader."
Source: Wikipedia