What is “each” system?

The case of Nexstar Broadcasting v. Time Warner Cable presented the appeal of the denial of a preliminary injunction, sought by an operator of TV stations (and creator of content) against a large cable company.  No. 12-10935 (May 30, 2013, unpublished).  The dispute focused on whether the defendant could relay signals, originally created by the plaintiff, out of local broadcast markets.  The key contract provision said: “[Nexstar] hereby gives [Time Warner] its consent, pursuant to Section 325(b) of the Act and the FCC Rules, to the nonexclusive retransmission of the entire broadcast signal of each Station (the “Signal”) over each System pursuant to the terms of this Agreement,” with “System” defined to mean all Time Warner Systems, with no geographic limitation.  Citing Bryan Garner’s dictionary of legal usage, the Fifth Circuit held: “The adverb ‘each’ is distributive—that is, [it] refer[s] to every one of the several or many things (or persons) comprised in a group.”  Accordingly, the grant of authority included all Time Warner systems, and no abuse of discretion in denying injunctive relief was found.