Re: RE: spoon-discuss: RE: spoon-business: Proposal to create judicial system

["ID Scott, Science 99" <is9219@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 7 Dec 2001 13:17:07 +0100 =?iso-8859-1?Q?J=F6rg_Rathlev?= 
<joerg@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> > > "No Calls for Judgement shall be made regarding
> > "shall" -> "may". Restrictive, not predictive.
> 
> Hmmm. English is not my native language, but "shall not" seems to
> occur in US legalese in the same way as I used it, e.g. "No Bill of
> Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed."
> 
> Guessing based on your email address, you seem to come from the UK; is
> this maybe a British English vs. US English issue? Or is there really
> something wrong with my sentence?

"shall" does sugest prediction, but I think its meaning is heavily 
affected by context... and in this one, it also means "will" (and hence 
"may").

(I note that dictionary.com gives an archaic definition as: "To have 
to, must", which seems to fit.) 

cheers,
Iain