Chapter Seven
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to the county, or to the state. For divorces, it is common for states to
require that a litigant, usually the petitioner, must have lived in the state
for a certain time period, such as six months. Some states are notorious for
having short periods and thus enabling a “quickie” divorce.
In many states, including Washington State, a judge may issue an order
preventing a divorce litigant from removing a child of the marriage from
the county or state of residence during the divorce. Such orders may cause
some anguish, such as the need to transport a child because of a medical
emergency. In some locales, it is often quite common, for instance, for a
mother to buy clothes outside of the county of residence. Vancouver,
Washington, lies just across the Columbia River from the larger city of
Portland, Oregon. Oregon has no sales tax, and as a result nearly all the
large retail stores are located only on the Portland side. Some Washington
State judges have interpreted the term “residence” to include incidental
trips outside of the county of residence for short durations for performing
such chores as purchasing clothes or visiting doctors. After all, the intent
of the litigant is not to remove the child permanently from the jurisdiction
of the court. Others have not.
This issue arose for the review group handling the respective plain
language court order form. I sat and watched a debate on the issue between
the most prominent family law lawyer in Washington State and the very
notable judge who is a family law judge and chairs the Washington State
Pattern Forms Committee (on which the attorney also serves). While each
had a different opinion, they both claimed that they had thought their own
opinion was correct for over twenty years. As Joseph Kimble and others
have noted, sometimes plain language translations bring out ambiguities in
legal terms that had previously gone unnoticed (Kimble 2012). Eventually,
the Pattern Forms Committee submitted the question to the Washington
State Legislature for clarification, or rather for direction to judges and
litigants.
Metonymy and frame issues
Legal terminology is rife with terms that can be explained as instances of
metonymy. Within the legal frame, legal practitioners are usually
extremely comfortable with their use. We often hear of such phrases as “a
501(c)(3) corporation” or a crime noted by its police listing number. I
offer one example that has particularly vexed self-represented litigants.
Then I pass on to some more general thoughts on frames.
In American law, the “party” (jargon term for person or other legal
entity involved in a lawsuit) filing papers to initiate a lawsuit with the