Effective Legal Writing

With examples drawn from legal writing and student papers, this guide walks students through the writing process and helps them refine their skills in exercises throughout the book. The Second Edition features a reorganized Part I, including three new chapters that help students gain proficiency in reading and analyzing legal materials so they can write more effectively. Part II includes a systematic approach to legal writing; understanding your context; getting organized; writing clearly; writing effectively; and reviewing and editing. Part III covers the process of writing a legal memorandum and an appellate court brief. This Second Edition includes two examples of memoranda, An interoffice memo and a memo of points and authority; a streamlined appendix that provides an overview of English sentence structure; and many enhanced writing exercises.

Focusing on improving writing skills in both assignments and exams, this text uses worked examples and exercises to provide students with the skills needed for successful legal writing.

This book is for law students and practitioners who want to learn, or be reminded of, the fundamentals of legal writing and oral advocacy. Effective Lawyering concisely describes useful, yet often neglected, writing techniques. The book has pithy discussions of:(1) ways to avoid recurring, yet frequently overlooked, writing problems;(2) sensible approaches to writing common legal documents; and(3) methods for preparing an oral argument.In addition, it provides the reader with a series of checklists to turn to when undertaking a writing project or preparing for oral argument. The authors have designed the book for practicing attorneys as well as law students. The book is an ideal supplement for first-year and advanced legal writing courses, for upper-division skills courses, and for students participating in law journals or moot court programs. Short and to-the-point, the book's unique check-list approach will help law students and practitioners improve their writing methodically.

In its Fourth Edition, Clear and Effective Legal Writing continues to give students a classic introduction to legal analysis and legal writing. Concise and accessible, the text focuses on memo and brief writing while reinforcing key writing skills. This proven teaching tool provides the student with excellent examples and numerous skill-honing exercises. Offering comprehensive coverage from case synthesis and case briefing to preparing Supreme Court briefs, this text: starts with an overview of legal analysis, and then walks students through the writing process: understanding context, organizing effectively, writing clearly and effectively, and reviewing and editing describes differences between legal language and ordinary discourse, and the linguistic theory underlying the origins of legal language seamlessly combines legal reasoning with legal writing and helps the student understand the relationship between the two provides straightforward rules for writing effective legal documents, with scores of examples of the good, the bad, and the humorous includes numerous exercises throughout the book to help students reinforce their skills dissects and annotates actual trial court memoranda and Supreme Court briefs highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of each example provides an insightful interview with the Clerk of the Supreme Court of the United States on what the Court expects to see in brief and the assistance that his office provides to all litigants appearing before the Court shows how to transform a memorandum into an advocacy document provides guidance for writing well in an appendix with overview of English sentence structure New to the Fourth Edition: updated examples throughout an updated legal process portion taking into account changes in law and updating examples a new set of Supreme Court briefs with annotations additional material addressing how the Internet is affecting court filings and formatting

Understanding Court Opinions and Writing Case Briefs; Grammar and Meaning; Legal Writing Style; Reasoning Legally; Preparing a Inter-office Memo; Writing an Appellate Brief; How to Organize and Develop a Thesis; How to Do Your Best in Final Examinations.

Guiding the reader through the pitfalls of legal writing, Adler explains how to prevent ambiguity and mistakes, therefore saving time and getting the message across effectively.

Effective Legal Writing: A Practical Guide introduces law students to essential writing skills and explains how they are applied in a legal context. It is designed as a course book for first year law students with ongoing relevance as a resource in subsequent years at law school and beyond. Basic literacy, legal literacy and writing skills are explored in a way that is fully integrated into legal content, reflecting current pedagogical best-practice. The text assists students to develop their legal writing skills in their first year of law study and supports their transition to university life. The book also provides a useful reference for ongoing development as students progress through their degree and face a wide variety of legal writing tasks. The skills developed by this text will provide a solid foundation to enhance performance in professional legal writing. The text contains various examples, case-studies, questions and exercises in addition to a range of online ancillary materials designed for both lecturers and students. This review was first published in ETHOS oÂeÂ" ACT Law Society Journal Issue 235 - March 2015 Features oÂeo Basic literacy, legal literacy and writing skills are explored in a way that is fully integrated into legal content oÂeo Contains many examples, case-studies, opportunities for revision, questions and exercises oÂeo Contributes the achievement of the attributes identified by the Australian Teaching and Learning Council (ALTC) threshold learning outcomes (TLO) for law, in particular TLO 5: Communication and collaboration oÂeo Extensive suite of lecturer and student online ancillary resources Related LexisNexis Titles Bott and Talbot-Stokes, Nemes and Coss' Effective Legal Research, 5th ed, 2012 Meehan & Tulloch, LexisNexis Guides: Grammar for Lawyers, 3rd ed, 2013 Stuhmcke, Lexis Nexis Guides: Legal Referencing, 4th ed, 2013