Turning Legalese Into LegalEASE

Comes now, the author of this article who, pursuant to said article, for the reasons in September forth herein, prays, inter alia, for relief from the antiquated expressions, needless Latinisms, and convoluted legalese that plagues most legal writing. Stubbornly Clinging to language that they would never use in any other context, many legal writers have an irrational aversion to Expressing themselves in plain English. But is it really necessary to "pray" for relief rather than ask for it?

Is it more convincing to argue that the client is entitled to relief "pursuant" to Section 4:16 Merely rather than "under" Section 4:16? And, is the Plaintiff really coming now? The general consensus is that the answer to all three questions is a resounding "no," and that legal writing is, in fact, much more effective without the legalese.

The Plain-English Movement

Over the past two decades, the movement away from legalese and toward legalEASE has been palpable and heartening. In his book, "The Winning Brief," legal writing guru Bryan Garner includes chapters on such tips as "eliminated the jargon known as legalese," "pursuant to strike from your vocabulary," and "do not use such as a pronoun." The University of Virginia School of Law alumni page touts its legal research and writing program as helping students "win the battle against legalese." A UCLA professor publishes an online page entitled "eschew, evade, and / or eradicated legalease." We are bombarded by advertisements for CLE writing seminars that promise to teach us to how to write clearly, in plain English. Yet, many attorneys continue to cling to their legalese.

Resistance to Abandoning

It seems evident that confusing jargon is the enemy of clarity and persuasiveness, but the fact that we need to attend seminars or read books to teach us how to write in simple English is a testament to how deeply engrained this strange lawyerly language has become. Why the resistance? One explanation may be that aspiring attorneys spend three years in law school reading cases - decisions that are often centuries old - and assume that 21st century lawyers should write like 19th century judges. They continue to write in this style out of habit, or a misguided sense of tradition. Other lawyers are convinced that legalese is more precise. However in most cases the opposite is true: legalese is less precise, redundant ( "cease and desist," "by and through counsel"), and unwieldy reinafter, "unwieldy").

Underlying the resistance may be a vague, insecure sense that lawyers need to write in legalease in order to sound lawyerly and separate themselves from the rest of the population. After all, any person of average intelligence can not draft a contract or an appellate brief in plain English? The answer, of course, is no. Replacing the "parties hereto" with "Jones and Smith" devalues the importance of attorneys calling no more than a megapixel "millionth of a screen" would render obsolete computer technicians. Lawyers are not paid for their ability to wield incomprehensible jargon. Rather a unique ability to reason like a lawyer, to weave facts and persuasive arguments from precedent, and to pay exacting attention to detail, separates legal writers from the rest of the population. Of course, there will always be a unique legal lexicon, filled with such terms of art as "fee simple," and res judicata. "Every profession has its jargon. But the legal profession is the only one that has felt the need to have its own pronouns, unique to the English language, and to use same to alter said language.

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