To follow-up on my colleague Walter Olson’s earlier post on the Paul Krugman piece on King v. Burwell, what struck me was Krugman’s flexible approach to statutory interpretation.

Here he is in today’s piece:

Last week the court shocked many observers by saying that it was willing to hear a case claiming that the wording of one clause in the Affordable Care Act sets drastic limits on subsidies to Americans who buy health insurance. It’s a ridiculous claim; not only is it clear from everything else in the act that there was no intention to set such limits, you can ask the people who drafted the law what they intended, and it wasn’t what the plaintiffs claim. …

…

if you look at the specific language authorizing those subsidies, it could be taken — by an incredibly hostile reader — to say that they’re available only to Americans using state-run exchanges, not to those using the federal exchanges.

As I said, everything else in the act makes it clear that this was not the drafters’ intention, and in any case you can ask them directly, and they’ll tell you that this was nothing but sloppy language. …

So, don’t worry so much about the specific language; instead, look at the drafters’ intent and the surrounding context. Got it.

On the other hand, here’s Krugman from January of 2013, writing about the idea of a platinum coin:

Enter the platinum coin. There’s a legal loophole allowing the Treasury to mint platinum coins in any denomination the secretary chooses. Yes, it was intended to allow commemorative collector’s items — but that’s not what the letter of the law says. And by minting a $1 trillion coin, then depositing it at the Fed, the Treasury could acquire enough cash to sidestep the debt ceiling — while doing no economic harm at all.

So in this situation, you should stick to the “letter of the law,” and not worry so much about the drafters’ intent.

Hmm, how to reconcile those two Krugman assertions about the proper approach to statutory interpretation? That’s a tough one. Wait, I got it! We’ll call this the Krugman canon of construction: “Interpret statutes in whatever way makes them consistent with your policy preferences.”