Set in Style

This post by Jack Balkin refers to this post by Orin Kerr about the rapid increase in law review citations to law-related blogs like the Volokh Conspiracy.

From Balkin’s post:

The legal academy is gradually becoming acclimated to blogs as vehicles of scholarship and scholarly quality. But perhaps even more important: Blogs are not displacing standard form legal scholarship; rather they are being assimilated into the larger universe of legal writing and becoming part of the web of citations and authorities along with cases, treatises, law review articles, and casebooks.

In this article, Duane Morris attorney Eric Sinrod promotes presidential to a proper adjective.

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The Wall Street Journal has this interesting article about Pietro deVolpi, a 3L at American University who’s looking for a job. He’s still in school, but he’s got extensive legal experience (or so he claims).

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Attorney/Author Evan Schaeffer offers some legal writing tips.

I just reviewed this client alert that (not which) was published by Winston & Strawn. It has some good qualities, and some not-so-good qualities.

What struck me first about this alert was the typography. While most firms make the mistake of setting body copy in a sans-serif face, Winston & Strawn’s alerts have a much more professional appearance: heads are set in a sans-serif face, and the body copy is set in a serif face.

The second thing that struck me was the complete lack of hyphenation to justify the copy. (For some reason, law firms just don’t like to justify copy the way the professional publishers do.)

The third thing that struck me was the verbiage at the bottom of the alert. To obtain the alert, I simply clicked a link at the firm’s Web site. So it seemed very odd that the verbiage offered me a way to stop receiving alerts from the firm.

Right above that verbiage was this curious comment:*

If you would like to review your contact information, please click here.

I clicked the link, and the following appeared:

We’re sorry, but something seems to have gone wrong:

The contact and event information could not be decoded.

If you got to this page by clicking on a link in an email, then the link information in the email may have been split across two lines.You may be able to copy the link from the email and paste it into your browser.

OK. The firm thinks it e-mailed the alert to me. So I did this simple test. I clicked the firm’s logotype at the top of the alert, and guess what? Nothing happened! (Had this alert been produced by pros, the logotype would link to the firm’s Web site.)

I went back to the firm’s Publications page and clicked the PDF icon for the alert, and guess what? The PDF version of the alert is an HTML file!

Just for the heck of it, I chose to view the PDF version of another alert**, and guess what? No links at all! Not even to the firm’s Web site.

Winston & Strawn’s a firm with some chutzpah: it claims it’s one of “the most technologically advanced law firms in the world.” It’s alerts say otherwise.
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* After reading this post, the good folks at Winston & Strawn got rid of that curious comment, and all the weird things that followed it. Good for them.

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** In a tribute to the days before the IBM Selectric became so popular, that alert uses underlines, rather than italics,for emphasis.

This white paper discusses a method for “editing a legal document collaboratively.”

Here’s an interesting idea (published by the Los Angeles Times):

Rob Harrison, a lecturer in legal writing at Yale Law School, has been using commitment bonds for the last decade to help students overcome writer’s block. Students have given him checks of up to $10,000 written to charity and authorized Rob to mail the checks if they failed to turn in a paper by a particular time. For the first five years, students made the checks payable to charities that they liked, but about five years ago, a student suggested that making the checks out to charities they didn’t like would be an even more effective incentive. The great news is that Rob has never had to mail one of these commitment checks.

This post (at How the University Works) discusses “racist and sexist trends in corporate and professional fields.”

The post links to a video of Michelle Masse discussing opportunities for professional women, and to this article by Marina Angel about the “devastating effect on women” from the “organizational changes in the legal profession” in the past 30 years.

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The head of any firm that’s really serious about its commitment to women attorneys of color should keep up on such news.

How? One way is to use news alerts. Specify the topics you want to keep up on; you’ll be notified when those topics appear in the news.

All you have to do is master the syntax for specifying topics. Do that, and you’ll stay well informed.

Pullman & Comley claims a long tradition of excellence:

Welcome to Pullman & Comley, LLC. Our firm has played an active and distinguished role in the Connecticut and New England business community since 1919. Nearly a century later, we continue the tradition of excellence instilled by our founders . . . .

Consider the intro to, and conclusion of, this client alert:

Start:
Effective November 7, 2007, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security changed the rules on how to verify worker eligibility to work in this country.

End:
The Department of Homeland Security plans not to assert violations against employers who use outdated forms during the first 30 days of the new form’s availability, that is, likely though December 6, 2007.

Regarding the intro, we know what the author meant: the changes to the rules took effect on a certain date. But that’s not what the author wrote.

The conclusion contains a misspelling and a typo (though December 6 s/b through December 26).

Before you visit a potential client, you have your clothes cleaned and pressed, your shoes shined, your hair and nails done. If a client’s first impression of you is going to come from something you wrote, then you check spelling and grammar, facts and figures and claims before you publish — because you want to look good. 

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NOTE: on 9 June 2008, Pullman & Comley cut that last sentence in the first paragraph of its About Us page. By 1 September 2008, they had not replaced it.

Here’s a fundamental rule of grammar (the rule of agreement): no part of a sentence should disagree with another part.

There’s quite a lot to it, but one element is this — don’t shift point of view in an independent clause.

And why not? At the least, it burdens readers. And it has the power to leave readers wondering who or what the you mean.

Consider the following sentences, each of which shifts point of view within an independent.

CPDB prides itself on our strong client and community relationships and we are able to offer individuals, families and their businesses a full range of legal services.

For more information about Thelen, the firm’s leadership, or our attorneys, please contact us.

Diversity is an important part of the firm’s culture and essential to our success.

The diversity of the Firm’s client base is matched by the diversity of our attorneys.

What distinguishes Heller Ehrman from competitors is not only the quality and breadth of our practice and client base, but also our commitment to certain core values . . . .

Pillsbury’s continued growth and success reflects a passion for embracing change in order to meet the evolving needs of the market and our clients.

Each Holland & Hart office offers the personal service you expect from a local firm, yet is backed by our nationally recognized lawyers and by today’s most advanced computer technology.

O’Melveny & Myers LLP is proud of its long-standing commitment to diversity and to promoting equal and nondiscriminatory opportunities for all of our lawyers and staff.

Why not simply tell readers that O’Melveny is proud of its workers, or say we are proud of our workers?

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Exercise

Read your firm’s About Us page. How often does it shift point of view in one simple statement? Go to the web site of a Fortune 500 company (one with a really big budget for promoting its own interests) and read the About Us page. Notice any difference?***
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Let’s look at another error that’s fairly common, not just in legal marketing, but in the widest range of discourse.

Now . . . how do you suppose each of the following violates the rule of agreement?

Each of our offices hosts recurring Women’s Forums to address the unique concerns of women attorneys and assist in their career and business development.

Our women partners have been recognized for their outstanding professional achievements.

Four of our offices are led by women managing partners.

As part if its charter, the Women’s Forum holds an annual reception and lunches where the Firm’s women attorneys share experiences with women Summer Associates.

In addition to fewer women making partner, women attorneys continue to make less money than their male counterparts.

ENGAGE was established by our women attorneys as part of our firm’s commitment to endorse and promote diversity.

The Women’s Initiatives Group has evolved with the explosion of women entrepreneurs and women-owned businesses and the increase in women attorneys.

Our goal is one of fostering an environment that is attractive to minority men and women attorneys.

The Women’s Forum provides meaningful opportunities for interaction among women attorneys.

Our Firm encourages and promotes both internal and external leadership positions for women attorneys.

Overall, our women attorneys come from more than 70 colleges, 50 law schools and 15 countries, and speak more than 20 languages.

The Women’s Forum is focused on fostering opportunities for the professional, social and personal growth of our women attorneys.

As part of our Firm’s ongoing commitment to diversity, we will introduce minority and women attorneys to key clients.

The violation? Each sentence uses a noun (women) as an adjective.

And it’s downright sexist. Or have you ever heard a firm refer to its men attorneys?

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Let’s look at another error — one common to law firm marketing materials.

The Firm is committed to advancing the role of women and diverse individuals in the workplace.

We are committed to creating an inclusive, open, and respectful culture comprised of diverse individuals from diverse backgrounds.

In addition to expanding our pool of highly qualified minority applicants, the Firm has implemented training for our attorneys who interview on campus to ensure that we successfully communicate to minority candidates that our Firm is an excellent place for diverse attorneys to grow and succeed in the legal profession.

Our dedication is prominently reflected in the firm’s values statement, in which we pledge to achieve “uncompromising excellence,” by, among other things, “identifying superior and diverse lawyers.”

The Firm is committed to optimizing this opportunity to hire outstanding individuals of diverse backgrounds.

We encourage diverse students to pursue a career in law.

Diversity at our firm does not mean that we have a certain number of diverse attorneys; true diversity means that it is no longer noteworthy to see diverse lawyers leading our practice groups or managing client relationships.

We are dedicated to improving retention by building upon our monitoring and mentoring program for all diverse associates.

We have focused our diversity initiatives on both increasing the number of diverse associates and addressing the challenges diverse attorneys face in building lasting careers and rising to senior and leadership positions.

While several of our key practice groups are led by diverse partners and female partners, the Firm endeavors to create a culture which will foster a deep pool of such attorneys who can then develop into the firm’s future leaders.

We understand that simply hiring diverse associates will not change the diversity of the firm.

The Firm is working to mentor and retain diverse associates so that our progress in racial, gender and cultural diversity is also reflected at the highest levels of leadership within the firm.

As part of our Firm’s ongoing commitment to diversity, we will enhance our recruiting efforts to promote the hiring of individuals from diverse backgrounds.

The violation? Each sentence uses ‘diverse’ to describe an individual, or an individual’s background. Yet, it’s a property that describes groups, not individuals.

A law firm might consist of a diverse group of attorneys, but it’s hard to imagine a firm that consists of a group of diverse attorneys (unless they’re schizophrenics).

One More Example

Consider this popular phrase: Prior results to not guarantee a similar outcome.

Does that phrase follow the rule of agreement?

No, it doesn’t.

The disagreement is between results (plural) and outcome (singular).

That’s right. Strange as it may seem, attorneys in New York are required to add this grammatically incorrect statement to all of their promotional materials.

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Aside from middle schoolers getting ready for statewide assessments in English, does any of this matter to anyone?

I believe it does. And I believe some among your base of potential clients do agree.

*** Yes, you’ll find shifts in point of view (like “At Adobe, we value our long-standing relationship with Thorne”), but not in a simple statement.

Here’s an interesting story from Inside Higher Ed. It’s about this new program at Hamline University meant “to produce lawyers capable of exploring social and political issues through fiction and creative nonfiction writing.”

Here’s a notable quote from the article:

“At the end of the day, lawyers are story-tellers. We make compelling stories for juries, we make compelling stories for courts, for legislators,” said Jon Garon, dean of Hamline’s School of Law. He added that forums for public discourse are shifting and lawyers are increasingly interested in impacting public policy by writing for lay audiences.

Here’s the last paragraph of a decision issued yesterday by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeal. It was written by Judge Richard Posner, who is so well known for his way with words:

A note, finally, on advocacy in this court. The lawyers’ oral arguments were excellent. But their briefs, although well written and professionally competent, were difficult for us judges to understand because of the density of the reinsurance jargon in them. There is nothing wrong with a specialized vocabulary — for use by specialists. Federal district and circuit judges, however, with the partial exception of the judges of the court of appeals for the Federal Circuit (which is semi-specialized), are generalists. We hear very few cases involving reinsurance, and cannot possibly achieve expertise in reinsurance practices except by the happenstance of having practiced in that area before becoming a judge, as none of us has. Lawyers should understand the judges’ limited knowledge of specialized fields and choose their vocabulary accordingly. Every esoteric term used by the reinsurance industry has a counterpart in ordinary English, as we hope this opinion has demonstrated. The able lawyers who briefed and argued this case could have saved us some work and presented their positions more effectively had they done the translations from reinsurancese into everyday English themselves.

Look closely, and you’ll see that the first paragraph of the decision contains a grammatical error as well as an error in punctuation.