词条 | Legal writing |
释义 |
Distinguishing featuresAuthorityLegal writing places heavy reliance on authority. In most legal writing, the writer must back up assertions and statements with citations of authority. This is accomplished by a unique and complicated citation system, unlike that used in any other genre of writing. The standard methods for American legal citation are defined by two competing rule books: the ALWD Citation Manual: A Professional System of Citation and The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation. Different methods may be used within the United States and in other nations.[3][4] PrecedentLegal writing values precedent, as distinct from authority. Precedent means the way things have been done before. For example, a lawyer who must prepare a contract and who has prepared a similar contract before will often re-use, with limited changes, the old contract for the new occasion. Or a lawyer who has filed a successful motion to dismiss a lawsuit may use the same or a very similar form of motion again in another case, and so on. Many lawyers use and re-use written documents in this way and call these re-usable documents templates or, less commonly, forms. VocabularyLegal writing extensively uses technical terminology that can be categorised in four ways:
FormalityThese features tend to make legal writing formal. This formality can take the form of long sentences, complex constructions, archaic and hyper-formal vocabulary, and a focus on content to the exclusion of reader needs. Some of this formality in legal writing is necessary and desirable, given the importance of some legal documents and the seriousness of the circumstances in which some legal documents are used. Yet not all formality in legal writing is justified. To the extent that formality produces opacity and imprecision, it is undesirable. To the extent that formality hinders reader comprehension, it is less desirable. In particular, when legal content must be conveyed to nonlawyers, formality should give way to clear communication. What is crucial in setting the level of formality in any legal document is assessing the needs and expectations of the audience. For example, an appellate brief to the highest court in a jurisdiction calls for a formal style—this shows proper respect for the court and for the legal matter at issue. An interoffice legal memorandum to a supervisor can probably be less formal—though not colloquial—because it is an in-house decision-making tool, not a court document. And an email message to a friend and client, updating the status of a legal matter, is appropriately informal. Transaction documents—legal drafting—fall on a similar continuum. A 150-page merger agreement between two large corporations, in which both sides are represented by counsel, will be highly formal—and should also be accurate, precise, and airtight (features not always compatible with high formality). A commercial lease for a small company using a small office space will likely be much shorter and will require less complexity, but may still be somewhat formal. But a proxy statement allowing the members of a neighborhood association to designate their voting preferences for the next board meeting ought to be as plain as can be. If informality aids that goal, it is justified. Many U.S. law schools teach legal writing in a way that acknowledges the technical complexity inherent in law and the justified formality that complexity often requires, but with an emphasis on clarity, simplicity, and directness. Yet many practicing lawyers, busy as they are with deadlines and heavy workloads, often resort to a template-based, outdated, hyperformal writing style in both analytical and transactional documents. This is understandable, but it sometimes unfortunately perpetuates an unnecessarily formal legal writing style. Recently a variety of tools have been produced to allow writers to automate core parts of legal writing. For example, automated tools may be used by transactional lawyers to check certain formalities while writing, and tools exist to help litigators verify citations and quotations to legal authority for motions and briefs.[5] Categories of legal writingLegal writing is of two, broad categories: (i) legal analysis and (ii) legal drafting. Legal analysis is two-fold: (1) predictive analysis, and (2) persuasive analysis. In the United States, in most law schools students must learn legal writing; the courses focus on: (1) predictive analysis, i.e., an outcome-predicting memorandum (positive or negative) of a given action for the attorney's client; and (2) persuasive analysis, e.g., motions and briefs. Although not as widely taught in law schools, legal drafting courses exist; other types of legal writing concentrate upon writing appeals or on interdisciplinary aspects of persuasion. Predictive legal analysisThe legal memorandum is the most common type of predictive legal analysis; it may include the client letter or legal opinion. The legal memorandum predicts the outcome of a legal question by analyzing the authorities governing the question and the relevant facts that gave rise to the legal question. It explains and applies the authorities in predicting an outcome, and ends with advice and recommendations. The legal memorandum also serves as record of the research done for a given legal question. Traditionally, and to meet the legal reader's expectations, it is formally organized and written. Persuasive legal analysisThe persuasive document, a motion or a brief, attempts to persuade a deciding authority to favorably decide the dispute for the author's client. Motions and briefs are usually submitted to judges, but also to mediators, arbitrators, and others. In addition a persuasive letter may attempt to persuade the dispute's opposing party. Persuasive writing is the most rhetorically stylized. So although a brief states the legal issues, describes authorities, and applies authorities to the question—as does a memorandum—the brief's application portion is framed as an argument. The author argues for one approach to resolving the legal matter and does not present a neutral analysis. Legal draftingLegal drafting creates binding legal text. It includes enacted law like statutes, rule and regulations; contracts (private and public); personal legal documents like wills and trusts; and public legal documents like notices and instructions. Legal drafting requires no legal authority citation and generally is written without a stylised voice. PlagiarismIn writing an objective analysis or a persuasive document, including a memorandum or brief, lawyers write under the same plagiarism rules applicable to most other writers,[6] with additional ethical implications for presenting copied materials as original.[7] Legal memoranda and briefs must properly attribute quotations and source authorities; yet, within a law office, a lawyer might borrow from other lawyers' texts without attribution, in using a well-phrased, successful argument made in a previous brief. Plagiarism is strictly prohibited in academic work, especially in law review articles, seminar papers, and similar writings intended to reflect the author's original thoughts.[8] The drafting of legal documents such as contracts is different as, unlike in most other legal writing categories, it is common to use language and clauses that are derived from form books, legal opinions and other documents without attribution. Lawyers use forms documents when drafting documents such as contracts, wills, and judgments. The key difference between using phrases or paragraphs from other legal documents, and copying in other contexts or copying the entire document, arises from the fact that lawyers are effectively drawing upon a common pool of clauses that they adjust and modify for their own purposes.[9] Plain language movementThe Plain Language Movement in legal writing involves an effort to avoid complex language and terminology in legal documents, to make legal writing more understandable and accessible.[10] One of the goals of the movement is to reduce reliance on terms of art, words that have a specific meaning within the context of the law, but that may carry a different meaning in other contexts.[11] Legalese{{Original research section|date=August 2013}}Legalese is an English term first used in 1914[12] for legal writing that is very difficult for laymen to read and understand, the implication being that this abstruseness is deliberate for excluding the legally untrained and to justify high fees. Legalese, as a term, has been adopted in other languages.[13][14] Legalese is characterized by long sentences, many modifying clauses, complex vocabulary, high abstraction, and insensitivity to the layman's need to understand the document's gist. Legalese arises most commonly in legal drafting, yet appears in both types of legal analysis. Some important points in the debate of "legalese" v. "plain language" as the continued standard for legal writing include:
Joseph Kimble, a modern plain-English expert and advocate, rejects the claim that legalese is less ambiguous in The Great Myth that Plain Language is not Precise.[16] Kimble says legalese often contains so many convoluted constructions and circumlocutions that it is more ambiguous than plain English.
Plain-English advocates suggest that no document can possibly cover every contingency, and that lawyers should not attempt to encompass every contingency they can foresee. Rather, lawyers should only draft for the known, possible, reasonably expected contingencies.[17] See also
References1. ^{{Cite news|url=https://hls.harvard.edu/dept/opia/what-is-public-interest-law/public-interest-work-types/legal-writing/|title=Legal Research and Writing {{!}} Harvard Law School|last=School|first=Harvard Law|work=Harvard Law School|access-date=2018-10-31|language=en}} 2. ^{{Cite web|url=https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/legal_writing|title=Legal writing|last=Staff|first=LII|date=2007-08-06|website=LII / Legal Information Institute|language=en|access-date=2018-10-31}} 3. ^{{cite web|title=Legal Citation Guides/Authorities (U.S. Based)|url=https://guides.library.harvard.edu/c.php?g=309930&p=2070190|website=Harvard Law School Library|accessdate=25 February 2018|date=24 August 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180226152027/https://guides.library.harvard.edu/c.php?g=309930&p=2070190|archive-date=2018-02-26|dead-url=yes|df=}} 4. ^{{cite web|title=Citation Guides from Foreign Jurisdictions|url=https://guides.library.harvard.edu/c.php?g=309930&p=2070191|website=Harvard Law School Library|accessdate=25 February 2018|date=24 August 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180226151940/https://guides.library.harvard.edu/c.php?g=309930&p=2070191|archive-date=2018-02-26|dead-url=yes|df=}} 5. ^{{cite web|title=Citations and References: Let the computer do it|url=https://libguides.southernct.edu/c.php?g=179069&p=1176746|website=Hilton C. Buley Library|publisher=Southern Connecticut State University|accessdate=25 February 2018}} 6. ^{{cite web|last1=Larson|first1=Aaron|title=Lawyers: Don't Plagiarize Content For Your Websites|url=https://www.expertlaw.com/library/law-practice-management/lawyers-dont-plagiarize-content-your-websites|website=ExpertLaw.com|accessdate=9 April 2018|date=21 August 2016}} 7. ^{{cite journal|last1=Strickland|first1=Cooper J.|title=The Dark Side of Unattributed Copying and the Ethical Implications of Plagiarism in the Legal Profession|journal=North Carolina Law Review|date=1 March 2012|volume=90|issue=3|page=920|url=https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?httpsredir=1&article=1464&context=facpubs|accessdate=9 April 2018}} 8. ^{{cite web|last1=Dunnewold|first1=Mary|title=Plagiarism: Proceed with Caution|url=https://abaforlawstudents.com/2011/09/01/plagiarism-proceed-caution/|website=ABA For Law Students|publisher=American Bar Association|accessdate=9 April 2018|date=1 September 2011}} 9. ^{{cite journal|last1=Adams|first1=Kenneth A.|title=Copyright and the Contract Drafter|journal=New York Law Journal|date=23 August 2006|url=http://www.adamsdrafting.com/downloads/Copyright-NYLJ-8.23.06.pdf|accessdate=9 April 2018}} 10. ^{{cite web|title=Bryan Garner on Plain English|url=https://www.plainlanguage.gov/about/definitions/bryan-garner-on-plain-english/|website=plainlanguage.gov|publisher=Plain Language Action and Information Network|accessdate=25 February 2018}} 11. ^{{cite web|last1=Butt|first1=Peter|title=What is plain language law and why use it?|url=http://www.lawfoundation.net.au/ljf/app/&id=/2FD34F71BE2A0155CA25714C001739DA|website=Law and Justice Foundation|accessdate=25 February 2018|date=12 September 2002}} 12. ^{{cite web|title=legalese|url=https://www.etymonline.com/word/legalese|website=Online Etymological Dictionary|publisher=Douglas Harper|accessdate=25 February 2018}} 13. ^{{cite web|title=Legalese|url=http://www.babylon-software.com/definition/legalese/French|website=Babylon (French)|publisher=Babylon Software Ltd.|accessdate=25 February 2018}} 14. ^See, e.g., {{cite web|title=estimación para el posterior deslinde en trámite de ejecución de sentencia|url=https://www.proz.com/kudoz/spanish_to_english/law_contracts/1551838-estimaci%C3%B3n_para_el_posterior_deslinde_en_tr%C3%A1mite_de_ejecuci%C3%B3n_de_sentencia.html|website=ProZ.com|accessdate=25 February 2018}} 15. ^{{cite web | last=Lundin | first=Leigh | url=http://www.criminalbrief.com/?p=10866 | title=Buzzwords—Bang * Splat! | work=Criminal Brief | date=2009-12-31 | accessdate=2010-02-19}} 16. ^7 Scribes J. Leg. Writing 109 (1998–2000) 17. ^{{cite book|last=Darmstadter |first=Howard |title=Hereof, Thereof, and Everywhereof: A Contrarian Guide to Legal Drafting |edition=2 |year=2008 |publisher=American Bar Association |location=Chicago, Illinois 60610 |isbn=978-1-59031-9772}} External links
6 : English language|Jargon|Language varieties and styles|Legal communication|Legal literature|Legal writing |
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