The eminent jurist Learned Hand on the 1939 Internal Revenue Code:
In my own case the words of such an act as the income tax, for example, merely dance before my eyes in a meaningless procession: cross-reference to cross-reference, exception upon exception — couched in abstract terms that offer no handle to seize hold of — leave in my mind only a confused sense of some vitally important, but successfully concealed, purport, which it is my duty to extract, but which is within my power, if at all, only after the most inordinate expenditure of time. I know that these monsters are the result of fabulous industry and ingenuity, plugging up this hole and casting out that net, against all possible evasion. — quoted in Norman Bowley, “Winding Up the Family: Some Tax Implications” (1981) 12 Ottawa LR 3; 20 RFL (2d) 145
Now I don’t feel quite so bad for not understanding the restrictive covenant rules.
