Title 1, Laws and Statutes

(a) In preparing the acts of the Legislature for publication in the Mississippi Code of 1972 after the adjournment of each session and without altering the sense, meaning or effect of the acts, the joint committee is authorized to:(a) Correct the spelling of words;(b) Change capi…

(1) Except as provided in subsection (2) of this section, the Joint Committee on Compilation, Revision and Publication of Legislation shall distribute or provide for the distribution of the sets of the compilation of the Mississippi Code of 1972 purchased by the state as follows:…

From and after July 1, 1998, the manuscript of acts of the Mississippi Legislature that have been edited, compiled, annotated and indexed by the publishing company holding the contract with the Joint Committee on Compilation, Revision and Publication of Legislation shall be submi…

The sets of the Mississippi Code of 1972 purchased by the State to be distributed by the joint committee according to the designation in Section 1-1-11 shall be bound in a different color binding from that used in binding sets offered for sale to private purchasers. In addition t…

The Mississippi Code of 1972, except as expressly provided, shall take effect on the first day of November, one thousand nine hundred and seventy-three, and from that day it shall be received in use, and shall supersede all prior statutes and clauses therein revised, and hereby r…

The cost of the recodification of the laws of Mississippi will be provided by appropriations to implement the purposes of Sections 1-1-1, 1-1-3 and 1-1-5.

From and after the effective date of the Mississippi Code of 1972, subject to any express provisions relating thereto which may be found in the Mississippi Code of 1972, all acts or parts of acts, all sections or parts of sections of the Mississippi Code of 1930, and all sections…

The repeal of any statutory provisions by the Mississippi Code of 1972 shall not affect any act done, or any cause of action, or any right accruing or accrued or established, or any suit or proceeding had or commenced in any civil case, or any plea or defense or bar thereto, prev…

Nothing in Section 1-1-35 shall affect or defeat any claim, assessment, suit, appeal right or cause of action for taxes due prior to April 26, 1972, whether such assessment, suit, appeal, or claim therefor shall have been begun before said date, or shall thereafter be begun; and …

An offense committed, and a penalty or forfeiture incurred, previous to the time when the Mississippi Code of 1972 shall take effect, and an indictment or prosecution for any offense, or for the recovery of any penalty or forfeiture, pending at the time when the Mississippi Code …

Nothing in Section 1-1-35 shall be construed to defeat or affect in any manner whatsoever the prosecution of any person, association, firm or corporation, for the violation of any law occurring prior to the first day of November, 1973 in any court of record, the trial therefor, o…

All statutes and parts of statutes which are repealed or abrogated by, or are repugnant to any law repealed by the Mississippi Code of 1972, and which have not been re-enacted or consolidated therein, shall continue to be so repealed, and shall remain abrogated.

The repeal of any statutory provision which is revised and consolidated in the Mississippi Code of 1972, by virtue of which any appointment shall have been made or any office is held, shall not be construed to vacate the office, or in any way to affect the appointment, except whe…

Private and local laws not revised and brought into the Mississippi Code of 1972 are not affected by its adoption unless it is expressly so provided therein.

If any chapter, article, section, paragraph, sentence, clause, phrase or any part of the Mississippi Code of 1972 is declared to be unconstitutional or void, or for any reason is declared to be invalid or of no effect, the remaining chapters, articles, sections, paragraphs, sente…

Where any officer has received a set of the Mississippi Code of 1972 by virtue of his office and is required by law to deliver it to his successor in office, and the officer fails to deliver it to his successor, the successor may make application to the Joint Legislative Committe…

The Legislature finds and so declares that the code committee, comprised of the Attorney General, Secretary of State, chairmen of the appropriations committees and judiciary “A” and “B” committees of the House of Representatives and Senate has, to date, fulfilled its obligations …

In the enrollment of the Code of 1972, it shall be sufficient and legal to enroll the code either by clipping the text from the original code or from other sources and attaching the same on paper approximately 81/2 X 11 inches, and/or by writing the same in longhand or typewriter…

The enrolled draft of the official Mississippi Code of 1972 shall be deposited in the office of the Secretary of State, and shall be carefully preserved by that officer as the official code of the public statute laws of this state, adopted and declared to be such by Section 1-1-3…

The Joint Committee on Compilation, Revision and Publication of Legislation shall purchase such numbers of sets of the pocket part supplements and the replacement volumes, including index replacement volumes, as may be required to maintain in a current status the sets of the Code…

The Joint Committee on Compilation, Revision and Publication of Legislation may contract with a reputable and competent company to perform any services necessary to update any computer tape, disc or other technological medium furnished with the Mississippi Code of 1972, and to pr…

The dean of the law school of the University of Mississippi may make requisitions to the Joint Committee on Compilation, Revision and Publication of Legislation for the Mississippi Code and supplements thereto to exchange with other states for similar publications and make the sa…

The Joint Committee on Compilation, Revision and Publication of Legislation shall provide for the publication of sufficient volumes of the Mississippi Code and supplements thereto and advance sheets as necessary to meet the requirements of Sections 1-1-11, 1-1-57, 1-1-58 and 1-1-…

The Mississippi Code of 1972 shall cover all sections of and amendments to the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of Mississippi; all operative and effective sections of the Mississippi Code of 1930 and amendments thereto; all operative and effect…

(1) The Mississippi Code of 1972 Annotated, as amended, modified and revised from time to time, that is published by the company with which the Joint Legislative Committee on Compilation, Revision and Publication of Legislation has contracted under Section 1-1-107(a):(a) Is the o…

(1) Copyrights of the Mississippi Code of 1972 and the notes, annotations, and indexes thereof, shall be taken by and in the name of the publishers of the compilation who shall thereafter promptly assign the same to the State of Mississippi and be owned by it. (2) All parts of an…

This chapter is applicable to every statute unless its general object, or the context of language construed, or other provisions of law indicate that a different meaning or application was intended from that required by this chapter.

The term “felony,” when used in any statute, shall mean any violation of law punished with death or confinement in the penitentiary.

All substances, chemicals and compounds commonly known as commercial fertilizers, and all manures, whether natural or artificial products, except animal excrement, cotton seed, and unmixed cotton seed products.

The term “food,” when used in any statute, shall embrace every article used as food or drink by man.

Words in the masculine gender shall embrace a female as well as a male, unless a contrary intention may be manifest.

The term “infamous crime,” when used in any statute, shall mean offenses punished with death or confinement in the penitentiary.

The term “infant,” when used in any statute, shall include any person, male or female, under twenty-one years of age.

The term “insurrection,” when used in any statute, means an armed assembly of persons having intent to resist or subvert lawful authority.

The term “intellectual disability,” when used in any statute, means a disability characterized by significant limitations both in intellectual functioning and in adaptive behavior, originates before the age of eighteen (18) years, and refers to persons who were, are and continue …

The term “land,” when used in any statute, shall include all corporeal hereditaments whatever, and any interest therein, whether an estate for years or a different estate.

Wherever the phrase “minimum education program,” “minimum program,” “minimum foundation program,” “Mississippi Adequate Education Program,” “adequate education program,” or “MAEP” shall appear in the laws of this state, it shall be construed to mean the “total funding formula” cr…

The term “minor,” when used in statute, except as otherwise provided by law, shall include any person, male or female, under twenty-one (21) years of age. If a statute refers to the ability to enter into a contract affecting personal property or real property, “minor” shall mean …

The term “month,” when used in any statute, means a calendar month, unless a contrary intention be expressed.

The term “bond,” when used in any statute, shall embrace every written undertaking for the payment of money or acknowledgment of being bound for money, conditioned to be void on the performance of any duty or the occurrence of any thing therein expressed and subscribed, and deliv…

Except as otherwise provided in Section 27-109-1, all rivers, creeks and bayous in this state, twenty-five (25) miles in length, and having sufficient depth and width of water for thirty (30) consecutive days in the year to float a steamboat with carrying capacity of two hundred …

Words used in the singular number only, either as descriptive of persons or things, shall extend to and embrace the plural number; and words used in the plural number shall extend to and embrace the singular number, except where a contrary intention is manifest.

The term “oath,” when used in any statute, shall include the word “affirmation,” in all cases where by law an affirmation may be substituted for an oath.

The term “offense,” when used in any statute, shall mean any violation of law liable to punishment by criminal prosecution.

The term “person,” when used in any statute, shall apply to artificial as well as natural persons; and when used to designate the party whose property may be the subject of offense, shall include the United States, this state, or any other state, territory, or country, and any co…

The terms “capital case,” “capital cases,” “capital offense,” “capital offenses,” and “capital crime” when used in any statute shall denote criminal cases, offenses and crimes punishable by death or imprisonment for life in the state penitentiary. The term “capital murder” when u…