Art. 5056 Conjunctive, disjunctive, or both

When you read court rules or laws, small words like "and" and "or" actually matter a lot. This rule explains how to understand them.

The word "and" means all the listed items or conditions apply together. The word "or" means only one of the listed items or conditions needs to apply, not all of them. So if a rule says someone needs to do "A and B," they must do both. If it says "A or B," they only need to do one.

Sometimes a rule will list two options and then add the phrase "or both." When you see this, it means either option can apply by itself, or both can apply at the same time. This gives more flexibility than just "and" or "or" alone.

The main point of this rule is to avoid confusion. Courts, lawyers, and regular people need to know exactly what a law requires. By setting clear meanings for these words, this rule helps everyone read legal text the same way.