Maxim Maximalism

Nat’l Shooting Sports Foundation v. California, No. S239397 (Cal. Jun. 28, 2018).

Those who toil in the mines of California state law know that the Civil Code has included since its 1872 inception a part called “Maxims of Jurisprudence.” The maxims a bunch of little pearls of wisdom intended to aid in the application of the law. Stuff like “he who consents to an act is not wronged by it.” Civ. Code § 3515. It might seem a little silly to codify this stuff, but the maxims can sometimes prove useful in brief-writing, as they offer pithy aphorisms with convenient code sections to cite. 

But Plaintiffs in this case has gone too far. It is challenging a gun regulation that requires certain handguns to be able to stamp the gun’s serial numbers into a cartridge when it fires. They claim its impossible to do that. And, citing Civil Code § 3531’s maxim that “[t]he law never requires impossibilities,” they say that makes the gun law invalid.

Nonsense. Although the maxims are useful tools to interpret the law, they aren’t some kind of quasi-constitutional rules that can invalidate conflicting statutes. So while the law respects form less than substance, Civ. Code § 3528, nothing stops the Legislature from legislating stupid formalisms. And while the law disregards trifles, Civ. Code § 3533, the Legislature is perfectly within its authority to legislature all kinds of trifling stuff. And the maxim that the law won’t require the impossible merits reading ambiguous statutes not to require impossible stuff. Indeed, Justice Liu here suggests it can sometimes even merit the creation of implicit atextual exceptions. But a statute that creates an impossible condition is not void because it is supposedly at loggerheads with Civil Code § 3531. 

Of course, some kinds of laws for which it is impossible to comply might give rise to constitutional problems. But plaintiffs disclaimed making any constitutional challenge here. So they lose.

Court of Appeal reversed.