LawProse Lessons

English orthography, or spelling, is riddled with challenges. Because English speakers have plundered the vocabularies of so many different languages, English words have no common etymology. This diversity of origin has led to words that depart from patterns, or even adopting a source language’s grammatical patterns that are indiscernible to English-language monoglots. Take, for example, …

LawProse Lesson #297: Anomalies of spelling. Read More »

A learned correspondent of ours, Michael Eshleman, is the county attorney for Otero County, New Mexico. A member of both the New Mexico bar and the Ohio bar, he tells us that the New Mexico admission certificate calls him an “attorney and counsellor at law.” But the Ohio admission certificate calls him an “attorney and …

LawProse Lesson #296: Counselor vs. Counsellor Read More »

Unheralded shifts in voice are a common fault in quoting, as when the writer quotes a first-person reference (direct discourse) within a third-person passage (indirect discourse). Here’s a clear example of direct discourse: “The judge declared: ‘I see no genuine issues of material fact.’” And here’s indirect discourse: “The judge declared that she saw no …

LawProse Lesson #295: Shifts in Voice. Read More »

What’s in a Name (or Label or Designation)? In the past few decades, an unfortunate habit has formed within a substantial segment of lawyerdom: giving parties alternative shorthand names. A brief-writer will mention Harold Reynolds and then add, parenthetically, “(Reynolds or Plaintiff)”; a contract-drafter, in a preamble, will write “SFX Corporation” and then add, parenthetically, …

LawProse Lesson #294: Shorthand names Read More »

The English-language has so many homophones (sound-alike words) and near-homophones that it’s hard for people to keep them straight. Let me illustrate with a fictitious paragraph: You know I have a photogenic memory. After Easter observations a couple of years ago, I was at the church bizarre when I overheard someone making laudable remarks about …

LawProse Lesson #293: Word-Swapping Read More »

Write “you”-centered notes, not “I”-centered notes. In any short personal letter, try to ensure that “you” and “your” predominate over “I,” “me,” and “mine.” (Think of the sarcasm of the Beatles’ song “I Me Mine”—about self-centeredness.) Put yourself in the position of the recipient and consider how much better the second of these makes you …

LawProse Lesson #292: A secret for good personal notes. Read More »

Among the most useful devices in document design is the “hanging indent”—the device by which the second and following lines of an indented passage align with the first. The result: the set-off text becomes more prominent on the page. Hanging indents are useful with outlines and numbered, lettered, or bulleted lists. They’re especially useful in …

LawProse Lesson #291: The hanging indent. Read More »

How do you create a clean narrative line? Or a clean analytical line? Or a clean persuasive line? A compelling piece of writing contains no clutter, no distractions—nothing to sidetrack the reader. It marches forward in a clear progression of thought without ever tempting readers to rebel. The key unit of clean writing is the …

LawProse Lesson #290: The clean line in prose. Read More »

Shorter is not always better when it comes to summaries. You don’t want to say more than the occasion demands—but you don’t want to say less, either. Brevity without substance is worthless. So how do you write a concise, useful summary? An effective summary is focused, specific, and placed always at the beginning of your …

LawProse Lesson #289: The true meaning of “executive summary.” Read More »

Know what? You use is, are, was, and were more than any other verbs. You shrink from thinking of stronger verbs. You subconsciously besplatter your pages with inert verbs that squat or prostrate themselves. They do almost nothing. They occasionally flail, they swat at ideas, but mostly they just slumber. So if you want to …

LawProse Lesson #288: To Be or Not to Be. Read More »

Lawyers are so accustomed to their own verbosity that they have come to see the word verbiage as just another term for “wording.” In fact verbiage most commonly (and traditionally) connotes a gross surplus of words. (Note also that verbiage has three syllables, not two.) How bad is verbosity in legal writing? In a typical …

LawProse Lesson #287: The plague of wordiness. Read More »

Most schoolchildren are taught to start an outline with “I, II, III”—a quintessentially linear structure. But for many writers, this rote method leads to “outliner’s block”: the relative inability to produce a traditional outline. Most writers are familiar with the anxiety that facing an empty page can provoke. Not knowing where to begin a project, …

LawProse Lesson #286: Nonlinear outlining. Read More »

What’s the biggest mistake that legal writers make? It’s a simple blunder, really: too many begin writing before truly understanding the message they’re trying to communicate. They compose prematurely, hoping they’ll figure out the message along the way. Even if they do figure it out, their writing will inevitably be longer than necessary—both because it …

LawProse Lesson #285: The Biggest Mistake of Legal Writers. Read More »

Few things are more embarrassing for a professional writer or speaker than to use a wrong word. It’s like a professional musician’s hitting a wrong note. You reach into your mind for a word and end up grabbing the one next to it instead. Because the English language is so full of pairs or even …

LawProse Lesson #284: A short quiz on lexical distinctions. Read More »

It seems that in testing your mastery of capitalization last week, we made an error of our own. The quiz’s final question used the phrase “Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.” A number of you wrote in to say that it should be “Chief Justice of the United States.” And so it should. But that …

LawProse Lesson #283: Chief Justice of What? Read More »

Capitalization rules may seem like the stuff of grade school, but they can be surprisingly tricky. Sure, we all know to capitalize names, months, and days of the week—but what about titles? Or quotations? When is a noun actually a name, and when is it just a common noun? Quite often, it’s a matter of …

LawProse Lesson #282: A short capitalization quiz. Read More »

As a follow-up to our English-usage quiz from last week, here are 10 questions of common punctuation that can trip up even the most careful writers. Try your hand first and then check the answers at the end. Baker alleges that in multiple board meetings, Weirzman referred to her [(a) as, “that useless cow.”; (b) …

LawProse Lesson #281: A short punctuation quiz. Read More »

As a follow-up to our legal-usage quiz from last week, here are 10 questions of common English usage that can trip up even the most careful writers. Try your hand first and then check the answers at the end. Before we meet with the client, can you talk briefly with Margaret and [(a) I, (b) …

LawProse Lesson #280: A short English-usage quiz. Read More »

  Even the most fastidious lawyers can make blunders. Try your hand at these ten common examples of legal usage. Then check your answers at the end and see how well you did.   The court order awarded the plaintiff only 50% of its: [(a) attorneys’ fees, (b) attorneys fees, (c) attorney’s fees, (d) either …

LawProse Lesson #279: A short legal-usage quiz. Read More »

It’s truly astonishing just how often badly drafted provisions become enshrined in contractual forms—even those published as “models.” Just in the past week, my LawProse colleagues and I have come upon formbooks containing the following provisions. Can you spot the substantive problems? (1) “Within seven (7) days after the signing of this Agreement, Buyer agrees …

LawProse Lesson #278: Beware formbooks. Read More »