Legal Writing and Research Commons^™

The Durham Statement On Open Access One Year Later: Preservation And Access To Legal Scholarship, Richard A. Danner

Faculty Scholarship

The Durham Statement on Open Access to Legal Scholarship calls for US law schools to stop publishing their journals in print format and to rely instead on electronic publication with a commitment to keep the electronic versions available in “stable, open, digital formats.” The Statement asks for two things: 1) open access publication of law school-published journals; and 2) an end to print publication of law journals. This paper was written as background for a July 2010 American Association of Law Libraries conference program on the preservation implications of the call to end print publication.

Coke, Selden, Hale And The Oxford English Dictionary, Joel Fishman

Law Faculty Publications

Most readers will of course recognize the names of Edward Coke, John Selden and Matthew Hale as three of the most important judges/lawyers of the seventeenth-century England. Coke is widely known for his role as Chief Justice of King's Bench in the reign of James I and opposition leader in Parliament to Charles I as well as the author of Coke's Reports and the Institutes of the Lawes of England (4 vols. 1628-1644). John Selden was the major legal historian of his age and also a member of the 1628 parliament (and for whom the Selden Society is named after). …

The Power Of Priming In Legal Advocacy: Using The Science Of First Impressions To Persuade The Reader, Kathryn M. Stanchi

Scholarly Works

The contribution of this Article is the synthesis of legal advocacy and the psychological studies of priming. It shows advocates how priming can help them make better strategic decisions in their briefs and gives specific examples of different ways to use priming in persuasive writing. Part I defines the basic concept of priming and gives examples of different ways that priming works. Part II begins the application of the priming studies to law. The focus of Part II is on priming the reader's emotional response through theme and story. It also examines how emotions can impact decision making in unexpected …

The Past, Presence, And Future Of Legal Writing Scholarship: Rhetoric, Voice, And Community, Linda L. Berger, Linda H. Edwards, Terrill Pollman

Scholarly Works

This article welcomes a new generation of legal writing scholars. In the first generation, legal writing professors debated whether they should be engaged in legal scholarship at all. In the second generation, assuming that they should be engaged in scholarship, legal writing professors discerned and defined different genres of and topics for the scholarship in which some or all of us were or should be engaged. In this article, we map the contours of a third generation of legal writing scholarship - one that integrates the elements of our professional lives and allows us to engage more effectively with our …

Symposium, The Legal Writing Institute: Celebrating 25 Years Of Teaching And Scholarship, Linda H. Edwards

Scholarly Works

This is the transcript of Mercer Law Review’s Symposium, The Legal Writing Institute: Celebrating 25 Years of Teaching & Scholarship. In this Symposium Linda Edwards, among other panelists, discussed the work that goes into producing scholarship.

Individuals And Community, Discipline Building And Disciplinary Values: The First Twenty-Five Years Of The Legal Writing Institute, Chris Rideout

Faculty Articles

In this article Professor Rideout is the speaker at the Luncheon Speech during the Symposium “The Legal Writing Institute: Celebrating 25 Years of Teaching & Scholarship”. Professor Rideout examines what the faculty and community in legal writing has been doing in the last twenty-five years that renders legal writing a discipline. Professor Rideout explains that in their work in legal writing, along with creating a community, faculty are also creating a discipline—one that has its own practices and that has its own embedded epistemologies, ideologies, and values. The underlying values constitute the legal writing community as a discipline—of legal writing—one …

An Autobiography Of A Digital Idea: From Waging War Against Laptops To Engaging Students With Laptops, Diana R. Donahoe

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This is an autobiographical account of my attempt to bridge the digital divide to meet students' changing needs. When I first began teaching at Georgetown University Law Center in 1993, I employed many traditional teaching techniques and used printed textbooks. However, laptops soon began peppering my classroom; at first there were only a few, and then suddenly almost every student was hiding behind a laptop. I noticed that my students were looking down at their screens, typing furiously, instead of watching me while I discussed my material written on the blackboard or projected overhead. When I realized that I was …

Narrative, Normativity, And Causation, Lawrence B. Solum

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This essay examines the relationship between constitutional narratives, causation, and normativity in the context of Barry Friedman’s book, The Will of the People: How Public Opinion Has Influenced the Supreme Court and Shaped the Meaning of the Constitution. In his book, Friedman provides a grand narrative of American constitutional history that emphasizes the role of public opinion in the development of American constitutional law. That narrative involves both implicit and explicit claims about the causal forces that shape constitutional doctrine and about normative constitutional theory. The aim of this essay is to identify those claims, excavate their theoretical assumptions, …

Genre Analysis Of Introductions In Tort Textbooks., Tai Chooi Li

Student Works (2010-2019)

This study examines the introductions in Tort textbooks to determine the structure and patternings used by writers of this genre. A model for the introduction is then proposed. Five introductions are selected and analysed using Bhatia's(1993) framework to identify the moves in Introductions. Through the stratification process of MOVES and STEPS, findings reveal that similar moves are found across the introductions that were analysed due to the common communicative purposes of the writers. The seven areas of importance in Tort introductions found are the introduction and aim of Tort, distinguishing Tort with other areas of law, the role of policy …

Penderafan Dokumen Wasiat Islam Di Amanah Raya Berhad : Analisis Menurut Perspektif Islam., Al Azifah Mohd Safie

Student Works (2010-2019)

A document is a source of statement which in nature is dominant and authoritative in order to explain certain facts. Hence filing a Wasiyyaħ is more effective as it acts as a record where it can store and keep long term information due to the fact that a death of a person is uncertain. Therefore, this dissertation will be focusing on the prosess of drafting the document of Muslim’s bequests or known as Wasiyyaħ implemented at Amanah Raya Berhad, a Trustee Corporation in Malaysia. The primary objective of this research is to analyse the standard of drafting Muslim’s Wasiyyaħ in …

The Universe Of Thinkable Thoughts Versus The Facts Of Empirical Research, Joseph A. Custer

Faculty Publications

Mr. Custer considers the use of "literary warrant" as it affects the usefulness of the West Digest System, and reports on the results of a survey he conducted with both legal practitioners and law faculty. He concludes that the West Digest System has some viability, but it will need to extend its literary warrant to remain a player in today's legal culture.

Change And Continuity (Rip Van Winkle's Reference Office), Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

How much has law librarianship changed over the past twenty years? Ms. Whisner imagines coming back to her library after being asleep for twenty years, and concludes that while our tools have changed, the basics of our jobs have remained remarkably stable.

Enact Locally, Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

Legal researchers often forget about municipal ordinances when looking for governing authority. Ms. Whisner discusses the wide range of topics that can be covered by local law, and encourages law librarians to think about it both when researching and when teaching the process of legal research

Learning From Reference Experience, Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

While we all learn from experience, law librarians seeking to improve their reference skills can speed up the learning process by using some of the methods Ms. Whisner outlines.

The Rewards Of Tedium, Mary Whisner

Librarians' Articles

While routine projects can be tedious, Ms. Whisner points out factors that make those tedious projects a little easier to bear, as well as some lessons to be learned from a specific project she undertook.

Time To Blossom: An Inquiry Into Bloom’S Taxonomy As A Hierarchy And Means For Teaching Legal Research Skills, Paul D. Callister

Faculty Works

Within law librarianship and legal education, there has been far too little scholarly engagement on the underlying pedagogy at the heart of legal research instruction. To correct this deficiency, law librarianship needs to open a dialogue and should consider adapting Bloom’s Taxonomy as a common schema for a collaborative effort.

This paper was initially presented at the "Conference on Legal Information: Scholarship and Teaching," held at the University of Colorado Law School on June 21-22, 2009, as part of its Boulder Summer Conference Series. It follows the author's own recently published challenge to law librarianship and legal research instructors to …

Leaps And Bounds, Nestor M. Davidson

Michigan Law Review

Imagine how stunted our understanding of the federal government would be without any detailed scholarly examination of the U.S. Constitution itself. As remarkable as that sounds, that is essentially the problem that Gerald Frug and David Barron have set out to remedy for local governments in their superb City Bound. In the book, Frug and Barron take a comprehensive, empirical look at the legal frameworks under which cities and other local governments operate, providing an invaluable roadmap for understanding the hidden architecture of legal constraints that-largely without notice-are shaping America's urban future. Why this kind of analysis has rarely been …

A Review Of Richard A. Posner, How Judges Think (2008), Jeffrey S. Sutton

Michigan Law Review

I was eager to enter the judiciary. I liked the title: federal judge. I liked the job security: life tenure. And I could tolerate the pay: the same as Richard Posner's. That, indeed, may have been the most flattering part of the opportunity-that I could hold the same title and have the same pay grade as one of America's most stunning legal minds. Don't think I didn't mention it when I had the chance. There is so much to admire about Judge Posner-his lively pen, his curiosity, his energy, his apparent understanding of: everything. He has written 53 books, more …

The Legal Writing Institute: Celebrating 25 Years Of Teaching & Scholarship, Robin Boyle

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

BRITTANY FLOWE: Welcome everyone. I am Brittany Flowe, the Lead Articles editor of the Mercer Law Review. On behalf of all the students and faculty, we are truly grateful for your presence here today. We are excited and honored to be celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversa­ry of the Legal Writing Institute. Thank you all for being here; we are looking forward to a wonderful panel. Now, I would like to introduce Dean Daisy Hurst Floyd.

DEAN DAISY FLOYD: Thank you everyone. Good morning. It is my great privilege to welcome you to Macon, to Mercer University, and to Mercer University's …

Meeting Students’ Demand For Models Of Good Legal Writing, Patricia Grande Montana

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

First-year legal writing students always plead for model examples of the types of writing we teach. Though most legal writing texts include an appendix of sample legal documents, the students invariably ask for more. They insist that a multitude of samples are needed to fully grasp the structure and organizational approach that is expected of them. Their reasons for wanting models of good legal writing are not without merit. Interoffice memoranda, trial and appellate briefs, as well as the other kinds of legal documents we teach in the first-year writing curriculum are unlike anything our law students have previously …

Leveraging A Library Collection Through Collaborative Digitization Ventures, Femi Cadmus, Fred Shapiro

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Bobbitt, The Rise Of The Market State, And Race, George A. Martinez

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

Further Reflections On Post-Realist Legal Scholarship And Teaching: A Brief Response To Professor Scordato, Gregory S. Crespi

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

In this article, the author scrutinizes Professor Marin Roger Scordato’s recommendations regarding legal scholarship and teaching in the post-realist era. The author takes issue with some of Scordato’s recommendations on how to resolve the tension between instrumentalism and formalist legal discourse. Rather than devoting the bulk of their instruction to conventional doctrines and formalist analysis, the author suggests that instrumentalist law professors give greater relative emphasis to instrumentalist critiques.

Quality Of Academic Law Library Online Catalogs And Its Effect On Information Retrieval, Georgia Briscoe

Publications

Quality in online catalogs is generally presumed to be high. Ms. Briscoe examined a number of online catalog entries and documented the accuracy of selected bibliographic records. After finding a high level of errors, she surveyed reference librarians to determine if they believed that these errors would affect their ability to answer reference questions.

When The Truth And The Story Collide: What Legal Writers Can Learn From The Experience Of Non-Fiction Writers About The Limits Of Legal Storytelling, Jeanne M. Kaiser

Faculty Scholarship

This Article examines what can be gained and what can be lost by using storytelling in legal writing. After reviewing some basic principles of legal storytelling, the Article reviews some lessons that can be learned from the experience of the New Journalists who adopted literary techniques in their non-fiction work. In the end, the Author concludes that while there is much value in using the tools of fiction in legal writing, it is only with a blend of narrative and analysis that we most successfully do our jobs as lawyers.

Finding The Middle Ground In Collection Development: How Academic Law Libraries Can Shape Their Collections In Response To The Call For More Practice-Oriented Legal Education, Leslie A. Street, Amanda M. Runyon

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

To examine how academic law libraries can respond to the call for more practice-oriented legal education, the authors compared trends in collection management decisions regarding secondary sources at academic and law firm libraries along with law firm librarians’ perceptions of law school legal research training of new associates.

Telling Through Type: Typography And Narrative In Legal Briefs, Derek H. Kiernan-Johnson

Publications

Most legal authors today self-publish, using basic word-processing software and letting the software’s default settings determine what their documents will look like when printed. As these settings are not optimized for legal texts, they do so at their peril. The default font Times New Roman, for example, as Chief Judge Frank Easterbrook warns, is "utterly inappropriate for long documents [such as] briefs."

Commentators have started urging a more deliberate approach to legal typography. Their suggestions, however, have been content-neutral, intended for all legal texts and focused on goals such as legibility and readability.

Typography, however, has much greater potential. The …

The Relevance Of Results Generated By Human Indexing And Computer Algorithms: A Study Of West's Headnotes And Key Numbers And Lexisnexis's Headnotes And Topics, Susan Nevelow Mart

Publications

This article begins the investigation into the different ways results are generated in West's "Custom Digest" and in LexisNexis's "Search by Topic or Headnote" and by KeyCite and Shepard's. The author took ten pairs of matching headnotes from important federal and California cases and reviewed the results sets generated by each classification and citator system for relevance. The differences in the results sets for classification systems and for citator systems raise interesting issues about the efficiency and comprehensiveness of any one system, and the need to adjust research strategies accordingly

Colorado Legal Ethics: Guide To Resources, Robert M. Linz

Publications

No abstract provided.

Penumbral Thinking Revisited: Metaphor In Legal Argumentation, Chris Rideout

Faculty Articles

In the modern jurisprudence of the United States Supreme Court, the controversy over the place of metaphor came directly into the spotlight in Griswold v. Connecticut. Justice Douglas, writing for the majority and relying in part on metaphoric reasoning for his argument, located a right to privacy in the penumbral area formed by emanations from specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights. The various opinions in Griswold represent a divide regarding the place of metaphoric reasoning in legal argument. Justice Douglas employs metaphoric reasoning, while several of his fellow justices either avoid it or reject it. Because the case has …