This week lawyers are having trouble with precedent.

Sandy Springs, GA bans sex devices unless needed for a bona fide medical, educational, scientific, legislative, judicial, or law enforcement purpose. The plaintiff sued claiming she needs a vibrator because her M.S. prevents her from getting sufficient pleasure from her partner. The Eleventh Circuit upheld the ordinance. But that’s not the important point; unless you live in Sandy Springs.

A lawyer writing an article about the case, wrote that the Eleventh Circuit “was more or less bound by previous precedent . . . .” Is there another kind? Black’s Law Dictionary defines precedent as “a decided case that furnishes a basis for determining later cases . . . .” Hence precedent—by definition—must be before, i.e., previous to, the case to which it applies.

Precedent is giving lawyers trouble this week. Earlier this week a lawyer wrote in an e-mail “there's some good precedence” in the appellate court. Precedence is “the order or priority in place or time observed by or for persons of different statuses on the basis of rank . . .” or “the act or state of going before something else according to some system of priorities.” And precedent we’ve already covered. Because the lawyer meant “precedents” she should have written “there are some good precedents . . . .” 

Things to remember: "precedent" and "precedent" are homographs, i.e., words that are spelled the same, pronounced the same, but have different meanings and they are also a more specific type of homograph the heteronym: heteronyms are words that are spelled the same, have different meanings, and sound different. "Precedent" is pronounced prə-seed-ənt and pres-ə-dənt and means preceding in time or order. "Precedent" is pronounced pres-ə-dənt and is a decided case that furnishes a basis for deciding a later case. Finally, there is "precedence" that is pronounced either pres-ə-dənts or prə-seed-ənts and I defined it above. Oh, and if you are going to Sandy Springs, check your bags because there are some things you can't by their; just kidding "buy there."