Legal Writing in Plain English: A Text with Exercises"This easy-to-follow guide is useful both as a general course of instruction and as a targeted aid in solving particular legal writing problems." — Harvard Law Review Clear, concise, down-to-earth, and powerful—all too often, legal writing embodies none of these qualities. Its reputation for obscurity and needless legalese is widespread. For more than twenty years, Bryan A. Garner's Legal Writing in Plain English has helped address this problem by providing lawyers, judges, paralegals, law students, and legal scholars with sound advice and practical tools for improving their written work. The leading guide to clear writing in the field, this indispensable volume encourages legal writers to challenge conventions and offers valuable insights into the writing process that will appeal to other professionals: how to organize ideas, create and refine prose, and improve editing skills. Accessible and witty, Legal Writing in Plain English draws on real-life writing samples that Garner has gathered through decades of teaching. Trenchant advice covers all types of legal materials, from analytical and persuasive writing to legal drafting, and the book's principles are reinforced by sets of basic, intermediate, and advanced exercises in each section. In this new edition, Garner preserves the successful structure of the original while adjusting the content to make it even more classroom-friendly. He includes case examples from the past decade and addresses the widespread use of legal documents in electronic formats. His book remains the standard guide for producing the jargon-free language that clients demand and courts reward. "Those who are willing to approach the book systematically and to complete the exercises will see dramatic improvements in their writing." — Law Library Journal |
Contents
| 1 | |
Principles for All Legal Writing | 5 |
Principles Mainly for Analytical and Persuasive Writing | 67 |
Principles Mainly for Legal Drafting | 107 |
Principles of Document Design | 143 |
Methods for Continued Improvement | 159 |
How to Punctuate | 173 |
Four Model Documents | 191 |
Key to Basic Exercises | 241 |
| 259 | |
| 263 | |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
action additional property Advanced Find AFPC and/or Antonin Scalia appeal applicable argument better brief Bryan Buchanan County Buyer circulate a copy citations claim clause colleague comma contract corporate declaratory judgment defendant document drafters echo link edits Employees Escrow example Exercises Basic fact federal filed following sentences footnotes Garner group or class ideas indemnify Intermediate Find issue Judge judicial opinion language lawyers lease legal drafting legal writing Lender Licensee litigation means Melinda Jackson memo ment motion officer Pantheon paragraph party person personal jurisdiction phrase plain English plaintiff prepared to discuss problem prose published legal writing question quoted readability readers reasonable Rewrite the following Rudolf Flesch rule Seller Silver Sidings statement statute style summary judgment Supreme Court tence termination tion trial usage verb violated whirlybird words writing group you’re