Storytelling, The Sound of Music, and Special Teams: Revisiting Some Basic Legal Writing Techniques with Fresh Eyes

After working as an attorney for a while, I went back to teaching legal writing to first-year law students. I realized how important it is to revisit the basics of writing, even for experienced practitioners like myself. I found a lot of helpful articles and books on legal writing, and I want to share some tips with you on writing a trial memorandum or appellate brief. This includes focusing on important facts, using case examples, and creating effective headings to make your writing more persuasive. Legally relevant facts are the ones that can change the outcome if they were different. Explanatory facts provide context, while emotionally significant facts help the reader understand why someone did something. It’s important for facts to be accurate and in the right order, but they should also make the reader have a reaction. Good legal writing also uses techniques like emphasizing certain points and using the right voice and word choice. A well-written statement of facts should also tell a story. Lawyers should use storytelling techniques to make their legal arguments more convincing. They can do this by creating a likeable character (their client), defining the conflict, and coming up with a satisfying resolution. They should also think about how they want to tell the story and what details to include to make their argument stronger. This doesn’t mean making up facts, but using storytelling tools to make their case more persuasive. To make legal writing more interesting, writers should use different storytelling techniques to create a compelling statement of the facts. This will help the reader become invested in the story and how it should end. It’s important to choose the right perspective and avoid sudden changes in point of view. When you know how to organize your thoughts, you can argue about anything. Your conclusion comes first, then the rules you’ll use, then examples of how those rules have been used before, and then your analysis of how the rules apply to the specific situation. Finally, you repeat your conclusion based on the rules and analysis. Case illustrations are important in legal writing because they help to show how a rule was applied in real cases. A good case illustration should have four parts: a “hook” to grab the reader’s attention and explain the legal principle, “trigger” facts that were important to the court’s decision, the court’s holding, and the court’s reasoning. When writing a case illustration, it’s important to focus on the specific legal question and the part of the court’s decision that relates to that question. This helps to clarify and prove a legal principle. The court’s reasoning is the explanation of how existing law applied to the facts of a case led to its decision. Sometimes the court doesn’t explain this, so you have to guess based on the facts and their decision. Using a hook to introduce a case helps to organize it around legal principles. Other important parts of a legal document include the questions presented, statement of the case, point headings, and summary of the argument. Of these, the most important is the point heading. Point headings are important in legal writing because they help the court understand the main arguments in a case. They are like the special teams in football, making a big impact on the outcome of the game. Point headings should clearly state the action or conclusion you want the court to take, and give the main reason for that. It’s important to write them in full sentences, keep them short, and make sure they are easy to read. Good point headings should engage the reader and lead them to the outcome you want. It’s important to make sure that the headings in your writing make sense and flow well together. This is especially true in legal writing, where the headings are the first thing people see in the table of contents. Take the time to review and rework your headings to make sure they tell the whole story and transition smoothly from one point to the next. This will make your writing more engaging and effective. Whether you’re a new or experienced writer, taking the time to improve your writing skills will pay off in the long run.

Source: https://www.floridabar.org/the-florida-bar-journal/storytelling-the-sound-of-music-and-special-teams-revisiting-some-basic-legal-writing-techniques-with-fresh-eyes/