Vol. 76, No. 2, February
2003
Judge Eich's 10 Commandments of
Brief-writing
(A Personal List)
1) Know your audience. Court of appeals judges are
very busy people, with only limited time to devote to reading your
brief; they need information; they need direction; they appreciate
conciseness, courtesy, and honesty. And they are attracted to
thoughtful, graceful writing.
2) Don't neglect the basics. Even the required,
seemingly mundane, portions of the brief - the Statement of Issues and
the Table of Contents - can serve a persuasive purpose because they
provide the judges with a roadmap through the reading, deliberative, and
opinion-writing phases of the appeal.
3) Curb that narrative. Don't recite facts for
recitation's sake. I know it feels good, but it is distracting to the
judges and often sends them down blind alleys, testing their patience
with you and your arguments. Keep it relevant.
4) Organize! Argue your strengths first; and put
away the shotgun. Don't give the judges an array of arguments to pick
from; show them the one they should take.
5) Avoid legalese. Hereinafter eschew said jargon.
Try to forget you went to law school. Write like a nonlawyer.
6) Be wary of parentheses. Stifle that urge ("the
urge") to double-identify. It'll help.
7) Write with style. Think of E.B. White ("A
sentence should contain no unnecessary words, and a paragraph no
unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no
unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts") - or even Vin
Scully ("He hit the ball as wide and deep as the August sky ....").
(They're worth repeating.)
8) Be courteous. Trashing anyone - an opponent, the
trial court, the prosecutor - may relieve the writer's tensions, but it
is very counterproductive.
9) Rewrite.
10) Rewrite again.
Wisconsin
Lawyer
