Can the courts rewrite or amend a statute to avoid constitutional questions?
MultiRegion, United States of America
The following excerpt is from U.S. v. Munoz-Flores, 863 F.2d 654 (9th Cir. 1988):
Statutes should be construed to avoid constitutional questions; however, this tenet of statutory construction is not a license for the judiciary to overlook procedural errors by the legislative branch that violate the Constitution. Cf. United States v. Albertini, 472 U.S. 675, 680, 105 S.Ct. 2897, 2902, 86 L.Ed.2d 536 (1985) (judiciary may not rewrite language enacted by the legislature to avoid a constitutional question).
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