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Thursday, August 01, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (19): Avoid dummy subjects and unnecessary preambles

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1. “It” as a Dummy Subject in Grammar The word “it” can be a subject (or dummy subject) in sentences about times, dates, and the weather (...
Thursday, July 25, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (18): Avoid nominalization or hidden verbs

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1. A hidden verb is a verb converted into a noun. It often needs an extra verb to make sense. So we write, “Please make an applicatio...
Thursday, July 18, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (17): Avoid using “and/or”

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(Note: Jump to the Philippine Supreme Court decisions on proper interpretation of “and/or” in Chinabank vs. HDMF, 1999 and Dayao vs. Comele...
Thursday, July 11, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (16): OECD’s Principles of Style

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The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) was officially born on September 30, 1961. It has 34 member-countries tha...
Friday, July 05, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (15): Use gender-free language

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“ The US Supreme Court and Gender-Neutral Language: Splitting La Difference ” by Judith D. Fischer, Universit...
Friday, June 28, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (14): Asian Development Bank’s Clear Writing guidelines

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1. “Clear Writing” from the ADB Handbook of Style and Usage (2017 edition, pages x to xix) 2. In “ Using Plain English ” (Knowledge Sol...
Friday, June 21, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (13): Use simple, clear sentence structures

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1. “ Guidelines for Drafting and Editing Court Rules ” by Bryan A. Garner (used in the Plain Language-restyling of the 1998 US Federal R...
Thursday, June 13, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (12): Use the active voice, minimize the passive

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1. Passive voice is one of the biggest problems with government documents.  (From US National Archives and Records Administration Style Gu...
Tuesday, June 04, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (11): Revising wordy sentences using the Paramedic Method

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1. Prof. Richard Lanham of the UCLA Writing Center developed the Paramedic Method for revising wordy sentences. Here are the steps: Step ...
Friday, May 24, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (10): How to write clear, concise, and direct sentences

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1. “Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason ...
Tuesday, May 14, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (09): Use short sentences

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Recommended average number of words per sentence in legal documents: 15 words (Federal Register Document Drafting Handbook, Octobe...
Thursday, May 02, 2019

Clear, concise, and effective English for law students, bar examinees, and legal writers in organizations, private companies, and government offices (08): Keep your text concise

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1. Thomas Jefferson: “The most valuable of talents is never using two words when one will do.” 2. George Orwell: “Never use a long word ...