business
Is there a better way to say &quot;Save as provided in this Constitution...&quot;
<p>I'm working on a NFP organisation constitution with a group of fellow members - we're very small. </p>

<p>There is a line "Save as provided in this Constitution...". And I'm thinking that whoever wrote that must have had 10 coffees or something, because it's woefully pretentious. </p>

<p>Any suggestions for simpler opening? Perhaps there is a legal reason for such language and it should stay?</p>

<p>There is no automatic translation of micro-snippets of legalese into plain English, and optimal best re-phrasing would have to take into consideration the entire sentence and intent of the statement / clause. This particular snippet is typically used to mean "Except as", so you <em>could</em> just make that revision. The problem is that this is probably bad drafting even from the perspective of ponderous legalese, since the "Save as" exception needs to be paired with a contrasting qualifier like <em>otherwise, elsewhere, expressely</em>. Here is a sample translation from legalese to ordinary English.</p>

<p>Original: "Save as otherwise provided in this Constitution, meetings of the executive officers shall be exclusively set by the chairman of the board". Plain English: "The chairman of the board may call meetings of the executive officers. Section X Subsection 1 and Section XII Subsection 4 specify the only other conditions for a meeting of the executive officers". Note that you don't have to wonder where "as otherwise provided" is spelled out. </p>
