Law Commons^™

Inside The Black Box: Comment On Diamond And Vidmar, Valerie P. Hans

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

It is an honor to be invited to comment on the first publication of the Arizona Jury Project, a study of Arizona juries that includes videotaping and analysis of jury room discussions and deliberations. It is a remarkable and unique project, made possible by an unusual confluence of people, places, and events. In an insightful opinion some years ago, United States Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis observed that "[i]t is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments …

Introduction To "Books", Margaret A. Leary

Articles

It's well known that graduate William B. Cook's generosity provided the Law School with its trademark Gothic Law Quadrangle. It is less universally known that Cook endowed the Law School with a trust to support faculty research, and had a strong interest in the nature of that research. He chose to call the library building "Legal Research" and to inscribe above the main entrance "Learned and cultured lawyers are safeguards of the republic." Cook often said that the lack of "intellectual leadership 1s the greatest problem which faces America," and he wanted this Law School to provide that missing leadership. …

Using A Civil Procedure Exam Question To Teach Persuasion, Sophie M. Sparrow

Law Faculty Scholarship

Studies show that learners master new material more effectively when it builds upon what they already know. By revisiting assignments from a previous semester, students can focus their efforts on persuading, rather than learning new doctrine or facts. Turning a predictive discussion into a persuasive argument demonstrates that making an argument requires the same rigorous thinking as predicting a result. One way to do this is to assign students to write an argument based on their fall Civil Procedure exam.

Play It Again, Sam: Repetition-Part Ii, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Repetition plays a key role in legal writing. The September "Scrivener" addressed using repetition to ensure accuracy, to build emphasis, and to connect ideas. This article focuses on using repetition to make readers comfortable with the writer's use of authorities and to alert them to key wording. In addition, the article explores balancing the use of repetition to avoid making readers bored or irritated.

The Quest For Scholarship: The Legal Writing Professor's Paradox, Susan P. Liemer

Publications

This article explores the many institutionalized obstacles placed in the paths of the legal academy's experts on legal writing when they themselves attempt to write.

Business Lawyer, Woman Warrior: An Allegory Of Feminine And Masculine Theories, Barbara Ann White

All Faculty Scholarship

The first part of this essay is a discourse on how two of the last half century’s most influential contributions to legal thinking: Law and Economics Jurisprudence and Feminist Legal Theory, whose adherents are normally adversaries, can function synergistically to create a greater analytic power. Using business law issues as an example - historically law and economics’ terrain but recently explored by feminism - I comment on how each can unravel different knots but each standing alone leave other conundrums unresolved.

Expanding on the feminist concept of “masculine thinking,” I discuss how, just as law and economics’ analytic style (i.e., …

Play It Again, Sam: Repetition-Part I, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Repetition is part of learning. Advertising specialists do not expect their message to stick with consumers until the ad has aired at least three times. Yet, too much repetition can be both distracting and irritating. This column, and Part II, which will appear in the November 2001 issue, will address the role of repetition in legal writing.

Cross-References, As Stated Above, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Often one argument in your brief may share common elements with another. Have you ever attempted to save space and time by simply referring your readers to another argument in a brief with "as stated above" or a similar cross-reference? This article provides tips for helping your readers follow such cross-references with ease.

"Rights Revolutions And Counter-Revolutions" Book Note, Jed Handelsman Shugerman

Faculty Scholarship

The rise of rights talk is a subject that has gripped academia in recent years. Many historians of modem America are now searching for the origins of the rights revolution and the feverish use of rights arguments on the left and on the right. Two recent works of legal history tackle one part of this question with trailblazing interpretations, focusing on left-wing rights discourse and the successes of the civil rights movement. Both books offer compelling and well-written narratives of post-war legal issues, and they present innovative arguments that this revolution began in response to global crises.¹ Richard Primus's …

Footnote Citations?, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Let's face it-legal citations can interrupt the flow of sentences and make them harder to read. In comparison, the widely used Modem Language Association documentation style recommends short parenthetical citations in text that direct readers to a list of authorities at the end: for example, "(Gilli- gan 105)."Another format commonly used in history, art history, and other disciplines is that of the Chicago Manual of Style. The Chicago note style uses raised numerals in the text to refer readers to authorities in endnotes or footnotes. Although such a footnote style is predominant in law reviews, few have advocated it in …

Writing Help At Your Fingertips-Readability Scale, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Writing well takes constant diligence. We all can use some help. But many of us may not be taking advantage of the tools that are available right at our fingertips. Most of us, especially those who are spelling-challenged, run our documents through spell check. Now, many word processing programs list readability statistics in addition to spelling and grammar advice. For example, in Microsoft Word, go to the 'Tools" category and click on "Spelling and Grammar." At the end of the spell check, Microsoft provides a chart labeled "Readability Statistics." Understanding these readability scales can help improve your writing.

Common Disorders Of The Appendix And Their Treatment, Roger J. Miner '56

Federal Courts and Federal Practice

No abstract provided.

Encounters With Sources, Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

A reference encounter with The Congressional Globe leads Ms. Whisner to ruminate on a librarian's relationship with sources.

Parallel Citations-Past And Present, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

By quiet decree, the fifteenth edition of the Bluebook changed all of this. The convention of using parallel citations was dropped in every instance except for "state court cases in documents submitted to courts of the state that originally decided them." Parallel citations were no longer required in legal memoranda or law reviews. Furthermore, the fifteenth edition required writers to use only the West version when a single source was listed. This new rule seemed to undermine the value of official citations that traditionally came before the unofficial West versions and suggested a preference for the official source issued by …

Modeling: Placing Persuasion In Context, Myra G. Orlen

Faculty Scholarship

The Author discusses the use of a contextual model to teach persuasion and its proven success in first year classes at Western New England College School of Law.

Irish Legal History: An Overview And Guide To The Sources, Janet Sinder

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Teaching Social Justice Through Legal Writing, Pamela Edwards, Sheilah Vance

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Finding Out What They Want To Know, Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

A skilled reference librarian knows more than simply where and how to look up information. Recognizing the importance of knowing what to look for as well, Ms. Whisner discusses the venerable reference interview and its role in this key aspect of patron services.

Escape To Alcatraz: What Self-Guided Museum Tours Can Show Us About Teaching Legal Research, James B. Levy

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Selected Conceptions Of Federalism: The Selective Use Of History In The Supreme Court's States' Rights Opinions, Lucian E. Dervan

Law Faculty Scholarship

In the period leading to the Civil War, debate over federalism and states’ rights developed into the seeds of a war that would forever change America. Over one hundred years later, the debate over federalism continues, unanswered by the blood of more than half a million soldiers. Over the last decade, the United States Supreme Court has increased state sovereignty and state immunity to levels unseen since the pre-Civil War period. The Court’s opinions are structured in a manner that relies significantly on historical methodologies. The multiple rationales used to structure the Justices’ arguments clash, and the Justices spar with …

Joseph Mccarthy, The Law Student, Jeffrey S. Kinsler

Law Faculty Scholarship

Much is known about Joseph McCarthy, the United States Senator. A fair amount is also known about Joseph McCarthy, the lawyer and Circuit Court Judge; particularly in his home state of Wisconsin. Not much is known, however, about Joe McCarthy, the law student. This is unfortunate because, arguably, many of the traits that catapulted McCarthy to the top and bottom of American politics were first exhibited in law school. It is a safe bet that very few of the current students at Marquette University Law School (MULS) are even aware that Joe McCarthy is an alumnus (LL.B., 1935) of the …

The Lsat Myth, Jeffrey S. Kinsler

Law Faculty Scholarship

Predicting which students will perform well in law school may seem like an impossible task, but law schools endeavor to do so everyday, and the primary tool they use to make such predictions is the Law School Admission Test (LSAT), a standardized, 101-question multiple-choice examination. This article explores whether the LSAT warrants such prominence. Using statistical and anecdotal evidence, this article analyzes recent graduates of Marquette University Law School (MULS) to ascertain whether: (1) the LSAT is a valid predictor of three-year performance in law school; (2) the LSAT is a better predictor of law school performance than the UGPA …

The New Face Of Creationism: The Establishment Clause And The Latest Efforts To Suppress Evolution In Public Schools, Deborah R. Farringer

Law Faculty Scholarship

If America wants to stay at the forefront of scientific study and remain competitive with other nations, its students must be taught scientific principles that are generally applied in the global scientific community. Thus, the implications involved in the latest battles over God and science extend beyond whether to teach controversial subjects, and could have a significant effect on the future of American schools. These problems warrant the development of a new test, or new legal analysis, that will enable the Court to deal with this latest chapter in the heated evolution and creationism debate. This Note examines the evidentiary …

Secondary Legal Sources: A Selected Subject Bibliography Of Treatises, Looseleaf Services And Form Books Seventh Edition, Thomas G. Oatmen

Law Library Publications

This bibliography, now in its seventh edition, is a subject arrangement of selected English language treatises, looseleaf services and form books in the University of Michigan Law Library, current through 2001.

The goal of the bibliography is to list books that provide a starting point for legal research in major areas of American law. It includes only works published since 1990 or those kept current via looseleaf or other supplementation. Books that are kept up-to-date by some sort of supplementation are indicated by a hyphen following the publication date, e.g., "1949-". The bibliography excludes casebooks, journals, popular works and encyclopedias. …

The 50th Anniversary Of The Catholic University Law Review, Ralph J. Rohner

Scholarly Articles

This is an essay, not a history, on the first fifty years of the Catholic University Law Review. When an enterprise survives that long, it is cause for acknowledgment and celebration. This seems especially appropriate for the Law Review when we consider that it is managed by amateurs, relies on volunteer labor, and changes leadership every year; yet, it has grown and matured into a respectable scholarly journal. There is reason to wonder from where the Law Review has come, what it has accomplished, and how and where it is going. There is reason, too, to reminisce over half a …

I Know That I Taught Them How To Do That, Laurel Oates

Faculty Articles

Teachers have complained for years that students could not transfer their skills from one class to another, and employers have complained that the students could not apply the skills they learned in class to real world tasks. This article delves into the issues involved in students acquiring skills and the ability to transfer those to skills to similar tasks. The article describes the four steps involved in transfer identified by researchers: problem representation, search and retrieval, mapping, and application.

A Novelist's Perspective, Marianne Wesson

Publications

No abstract provided.

Undoing Indian Law One Case At A Time: Judicial Minimalism And Tribal Sovereignty, Sarah Krakoff

Publications

No abstract provided.

Mary S. Lawrence: Director Of Legal Research And Writing University Of Oregon 1978 - 2000, Linda H. Edwards

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

Gender And Legal Writing: Law Schools’ Dirty Little Secrets, Kathryn M. Stanchi, Jan M. Levine

Scholarly Works

While great strides have been made by legal writing professors in the past two decades, many law schools-perhaps most accurately, many law school deans-try to avoid the investments needed to provide their students with professional, high-quality instruction in legal research and legal writing. Law professors, including women law professors, have reacted to their deans' decisions to maintain the status quo largely by quiet acquiescence- although in some cases they openly support that stance. Legal writing seems to be just too hard, and too demanding in time and energy, to be taught by doctrinal law professors, most of whom are men …