When does a bill become law? I am confused by both of these NJ bills: A5217 and A1969 Both are nearly identical, and both indicate "Be it enacted". Are they now the law? They appear to modify existing law. Nevertheless, that they both appear on the legislative agenda, I wonder why the second was added to the session, even though the first was enacted. Unless "Be it enacted" is the formality to indicate the intention to enact this modification to law, and it doesn't actually become part of the law until something else happens - perhaps a 3rd or subsequent bill for a different session?
tl;dr: no, they're not law yet. Background The two bills are different. A5217 proposes to create a juvenile alternative to the current community service program, and A1969 proposes changes to the state's anti-bullying law. It looks like they've reassigned the number "5217." The correct version of A5217 is at this link. A bill becomes law when signed into law by the governor. To be delivered to the governor, the bill has to pass both houses of the legislature. In order to pass in one house, the bill has to survive a full vote there. To be voted upon, a bill typically has to clear its committee. Sometimes that entails getting adequate support (like sponsors). Bills include the language "Be it enacted" because each house has to vote on the precise language the governor will eventually sign. A5217 is still in progress, meaning that it has yet to pass the Assembly. It has been introduced, referred to the Assembly Law and Public Safety Committee, and got a third prime sponsor (on May 24 DiMaso joined Lopez and McKnight as a sponsor). The companion bill, S3447, has been introduced and referred to the Senate Law and Public Safety Committee. A1969 has been introduced and referred to the Women and Children Committee. It does not yet appear to have a Senate companion.
Probably not. I can't find the new text, but the existing law was probably just amended with a new category: &quot;hate speech&quot; based on race, religion, disability and &quot;homosexual leanings, lifestyle, or orientation&quot; was illegal – this new law seems to just tweak the categories. The Supreme Court has addressed the general law here in a race-based case, stating that expression of contempt is crucial to defining the crime (&quot;to threaten or insult, or promote hatred, persecution or contempt&quot; based on a protected category). The line that would be drawn is between reading the text, versus promoting hatred or contempt using the text as justification. You can't be prosecuted for hate speech in Norway by reporting the existence of racial etc. discrimination.
It looks to me like this is authorized under New York State's Executive Law Section 24. The text is long, but I think it addresses most of the points in your question. The law allows the chief executive of a local government (e.g. mayor of a city) to declare a local state of emergency "in the event of a disaster, rioting, catastrophe, or similar public emergency". Under such a state of emergency, the executive can promulgate local emergency orders, that can include provisions like travel bans, curfews, mandatory evacuation, etc. Violating such an order is a Class B misdemeanor (see paragraph 5). I didn't see any explicit requirement for the executive to weigh safety benefits against restriction of personal liberties. The executive just has to "find" (i.e. decide) that a disaster exists and imperils public safety. However, there are some safeguards. The local state of emergency is limited to 30 days (some orders can be extended for an additional 30 days); see paragraph 1. And the state legislature has the authority to terminate the state of emergency by a concurrent resolution (paragraph 8). Further good reading is a primer (PDF) written by the legal counsel of New York's Office of Emergency Management, giving a guide in layman's language for local chief executives on how to handle state of emergency declarations. I'm slightly puzzled as to why, in this case, the order was given by the governor, when it looks from the law like it should be the mayor's role to do so. It could be that the mayor took the appropriate legal action and just let the governor make the public announcement. Also, Executive Law Article 2-B (Sections 20-29) have many other provisions regarding emergencies. Section 28 gives the governor the power to declare a "disaster emergency", though it's not clear from that section whether this includes the power to issue similar emergency orders.
Are laws written logically and rigorously? No. Laws are not consistently written to any consistent stylistic standards. Whatever legislators approve becomes the law even if the law is poorly drafted. While some legislative bodies, such as the Joint Tax Committee of the U.S. Congress and the legislative services department of many state legislatures encourage good, or at least consistent, drafting practices, these standards are routinely ignored in the course of the legislative process. This is particularly true in the United States, since it does not have a &quot;House of Revision&quot; akin to the House of Lords or the Canadian Senate, that is concerned primarily with the quality of legislative drafting, and also does not have law that are drafted by the secure majority of a Prime Minster in most parliamentary systems. Instead, in the U.S. there is constant haggling and negotiation on a bill by bill basis at every step of the legislative process right up through a conference committee reconciling different versions of a bill that arise between two houses of a bicameral legislature. As a result, the key drafting priority is to secure support of a majority of legislators in two houses of the bicameral legislature and then avoiding a veto of the final product, and that objective is pre-eminent over the objective of good drafting. Frequently, in the U.S., legislation is intentionally drafted ambiguously in order to secure its passage with different legislators essentially making &quot;bets&quot; on the courts interpreting the language which is known to be ambiguous in the manner that they prefer. Sometimes legal language that is very precise and logical is interpreted to mean something completely different than what it literally says. For example, consider the 11th Amendment to the United States which says: The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State. This is an amendment to Article III, Section 2, Paragraph 1 of the United States Constitution, which says: The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;—to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls;—to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction;—to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party;—to Controversies between two or more States;—between a State and Citizens of another State,—between Citizens of different States,—between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects. But, what the 11th Amendment actually means is that states retain sovereign immunity in most cases. The governing principle in interpreting legislation is not logic but legislative intent. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. summed up the situation famously when he said: The life of the law has not been logic: it has been experience.
Is it legal to redefine a term against common sense in a contract? Generally speaking, yes. What matters is that the contract be clear enough for the parties to be aware of the terms and conditions to which they are committing. Both of the scenarios you outline seem lawful. They are binding to the extent that the definitions &amp; language therein duly inform the parties of the substance of the contract. Definitions in a contract are most pertinent where the meaning of a term is intended to supersede and replace the commonplace meaning thereof. A contract would become null and void if the substance of that contract contravenes legislation. If legislation outlaws not only the effect of a clause but also its meaning, then the [un-]lawfulness of that clause is not altered simply by crafting definitions of terms. In other words, laws or legislative intent cannot be elluded by relabeling concepts in a contract. Whenever lawful, the attempt to trick a party with tactics (such as the use of uppercase you mention) is likely to be voidable by that party. The rationale is the same: The draftsman's attempt to confuse the user contravenes the contract law tenet that the parties knowingly enter the contract at issue. Notice that in the preceding paragraph I wrote "whenever lawful" rather than "although lawful". The reason for that choice is that, in some contexts, the draftsman's tricky attempts might constitute a deceptive practice and thus be in violation of the law (for instance, consumer protection laws).
Is this interpretation correct? YES Encounters such as this should normally fall within the non-statutory stop &amp; account which covers police-initiated conversations with members of the public to ask general questions about their activities when there are no reasonable grounds to suspect an offence. The terminology varies from Force to Force, but can be summarised as: What are you doing? Why are you in the area? Where are you going? What are you carrying? There is no legal requirement or obligation to answer any of these questions, and the police cannot lawfully detain anyone to ask them - unlike the statutory powers under Stop &amp; Search and Arrest covered by the OP.
This appears to be a fairly straightforward construction. Section 9(2) and 18b share a number of requirements, so 18b points back instead of repeating them. But not all requirements are shared. In particular, requirement 3 (covering pensions) does not apply to newly-graduated students. That's not strange since students are not paid wages. Also, they're not subject to the 5 year residence permit requirement. As for "sentences 2 to 6 shall apply accordingly.", this covers waivers to these requirements.
Since this apparently amends the law giving colleges and universities the power to adopt and enforced various regulations, what it really means is that if such an institution adopts a rule in violation of this law, it may not legally enforce that law. It might also give an affected student a right to sue if such a rule is adopted and enforced. As a comment by ohwilleke mentions, such a law might well authorize a court to issue an injunction forbidding the institution from enforcing the kind of rule prohibited by the law. Note that it is not at all uncommon to have &quot;or else&quot; provisions in different sections of the law. For example Section 123 of the (hypothetical) New France state code might prohibit having a faked driver's license, section 124 prohibit obtaining a license through false or misleading statements on nthe application, and section 458 say &quot;anyone who violates sections 123, 124, 125, or 126 shall be fined up to $2,000, or imprisoned for up to 1 year, or both, as a court may think just&quot;. Thus it is not always easy to find what penalties, if any, apply to a code section.