I'm re-reading this entire thread for the third time and am finally beginning to understand the positions.
The above quote seemed to jump right out at me and wondered if the Mass. court didn't take the above quote a little too seriously? I posed a question on several threads in the past and strangely enough, not one person wanted to answer it. Maybe I can get the answer here.
The question was, can courts re-define words that are already legally defined and use their new definition to justify and render a decision?
If not, then the Mass. SC decision goes far beyond activism. It is stark usurpation of the power of congress to write the laws. I'd go further. It renders the constitution and the rule of law useless and replaces it with judicial tyranny.
Here's my logic. Marriage is reserved and defined as a union between two people of the opposite gender in the same way that the word, 'peach' defines a specific fruit.
Same-sex relationships might be called unions, if that is the wisdom of the day, but it must be called by a different name using the reasoning that a lemon cannot be called a peach, though both are fuits, of a sort.
Apart from the reason the decision was made, what would prevent the court from arbitrarily begin RE-DEFINING other words?
So what's the remedy, short of incorporating and implementing 2A?
I would say that the simple answer is yes.
It would be an over-reach for a court to come up with an entirely new definition, but to extend or modify an existing legal definition in response to changes in the law, technology, or society may be necessary.
"Copyright" used to apply only to printed works. Now it applies to unprinted websites. I can't tell you off the top of my head whether that change was instigated by the courts or by the legislature, but either way it was a necessary change. Within the scope of copyright cases, the term "fair use" has undergone several redefinitions.