Legal Reasoning and Objective Writing: A Comprehensive Approach is a textbook for the objective writing segment of a first-year legal writing class, written by two professors who have collaborated for many years, and who between them have over 50 years of experience teaching legal analysis and writing. The book, which is written in a conversational manner to engage students and put them at ease so that they grasp difficult concepts easily, uses a variety of short examples throughout the chapters as well as sample documents in the appendices with comprehensive annotations keyed to relevant portions of the book. Each chapter and accompanying optional closed-memo problem provide students with a sophisticated yet concrete step-by-step method to learn the analytical, organizational, and presentational skills necessary to convey legal analysis effectively. The accompanying optional introductory problem and related assignment materials use a flipped-class approach to guide students through the memo project independently, allowing teachers to adapt the problem to fit a variety of teaching sequences.

This workbook, designed to accompany any legal writing text, provides a step-by-step approach to objective and persuasive legal writing. It draws upon three case files to instruct students on the essential components of an objective memorandum and a persuasive brief. Each case file begins with a fact pattern and relevant legal authority, followed by a series of worksheets covering the essential components of an objective memorandum and a persuasive brief. Each worksheet includes brainstorming questions and writing formulas to allow students to master an approach to legal writing they can use throughout their careers.

"Like the popular earlier editions, the fourth edition of A Lawyer Writes puts the reader in the place of a first-year attorney faced with real-life assignments. In doing so, it teaches law students not only how to succeed in law school, but also how to succeed in the practice of law. Using graphics and visual samples that demonstrate both effective and ineffective analytical techniques, this updated edition illustrates best practices for objective legal analysis and provides an overview of the transition from objective to persuasive writing. The content and examples in the fourth edition have been supplemented, updated, and reorganized to provide an easy-to-use, step-by-step approach for learning legal analysis and objective writing. A Lawyer Writes aims to provide clear and concrete instruction about each facet of legal analysis, using the same order students will follow when performing the tasks in legal practice. The textbook also provides the relevant theory and background behind the choices attorneys make in their legal writing, enabling students to transfer those techniques to future settings. Speaking to its readers in a straightforward manner, A Lawyer Writes communicates essential skills and theories students can use throughout a lifetime of legal practice"--

Legal Reasoning, Research, and Writing for International Graduate Students, Fifth Edition, helps international students understand and approach legal reasoning and writing the way law students and attorneys do in the United States. With concise and clear text, Professor Nedzel introduces the unique and important features of the American legal system and American law schools. Using clear instruction, examples, visual aids, and practice exercises, she teaches practical lawyering skills with sensitivity to the challenges of ESL students. New to the Fifth Edition: Streamlined presentation makes the material even more accessible. Chapters are short, direct, and to the point. Five chapters on reasoning and writing, including exam skills, office memos, and rewriting. Full chapters on contract drafting and scholarly writing. New flowcharts provide a concise, visual overview for each chapter. Citation coverage updated to new 21st edition of The Bluebook. Simplified examples and exercises. Three thoroughly revised chapters on legal research, including non-fee legal research and technological changes in the practice of U.S. law. Professors and student will benefit from: Comparative perspective informs readers about the unique features of American law as compared to civil law, Islamic law, and Asian traditions. Explanations of practical skills assume no former knowledge of the American legal system. U.S. law school necessary skills explained immediately: case briefing, creating a course outline, time management, reading citations, and writing answers to hypothetical exam questions. Short, lucid chapters that reiterate major points to aid comprehension. Clear introductions to writing hypothetical-based exams, legal memoranda, contract drafting and scholarly writing. An integrated approach to proper citation format, with explanation and instruction provided in context. Discussion of plagiarism and U.S. law school honor codes. Practical skill-building exercises in each chapter. Research exercises are primarily Internet-based Charts and summaries that are useful learning aids and reference tools

Professors Newell and Peterkin deal thoroughly with fundamental grammar skills often overlooked in legal writing textbooks. The chapters in this text cover everything that students should learn in legal writing from spotting issues, to finding and interpreting the law, to writing either an objective or persuasive document for their client or the court. Each chapter provides exhaustive treatment of the topic. The text also provides useful examples and exercises for the reader to test his or her understanding of the topic. The Journey to Excellence in Legal Writing not only contains a thorough explication of legal writing for first-year law students. Upper-level students, practitioners, and judges will also benefit from the instruction contained in these pages. Therefore, this book is the perfect tool for all who wish to learn and improve their legal writing skills.

Just Writing: Grammar, Punctuation, and Style for the Legal Writer, Sixth Edition

Legal Reasoning and Legal Writingteaches students how to organize and incorporate a legal argument into strong and cogent writing for a variety of applications in legal practice. This clear and coherent text has been updated to address the new skills required for modern law practice. While the Ninth Edition still includes the fundamental tools that has made it one of the best-selling legal writing texts, it has been updated to incorporate current and more sophisticated material for students wishing to take their advocacy skills to the next level. Designed for utility in a wide range of legal writing courses, the book covers multiple types of legal writing, including office memos, appellate and motion briefs, client letters, and email correspondence, as well as all aspects of legal reasoning from rule-based analysis to strategies of persuasion. It also covers other key skills such as oral reports to supervisors, appellate and motion argument, tips about the realities of online law practice and modern changes in language and style. The Ninth Edition reflects the collective wisdom of three leaders in the legal writing discipline who together have over 90 years of experience teaching, writing and speaking about legal writing. New to the Ninth Edition: New chapters 23-33 (The Shift to Persuasion). The new chapters are thoroughly modernized and to incorporate the best ideas of the legal scholarship on persuasion in an accessible and clear fashion. The newly organized chapters reflect that legal writing courses might teach appellate briefs or motion briefs, or some combination, and make the assigning of chapters easier for all approaches. New content about theory of the case, motions, procedural posture and the client’s story. Professors and student will benefit from: Clear coverage of the nuts and bolts of writing an office memo, a motion memo, and an appellate brief organized to make assigning chapters easier for all different course approaches. The authors’ paradigm for Organizing a Proof of a Conclusion of Law, which provides the best explanation available of the reasoning underlying the proof of a conclusion of law. Immersive pedagogy where students learn both to think like lawyers and to think like writers. A thoughtful look at all aspects of legal reasoning, from rule-based analysis to the strategy of persuasion An accessible approach that focuses on the process of writing timely examples and exercises from legal practice A full complement of sample documents in the Appendices Teaching materials Include: Teacher’s Manual Additional resources included with Connected Coursebook

Legal theorists consider their discipline as an objective endeavour in line with other fields of science. Objectivity in science is generally regarded as a fundamental condition, informing how science should be practised and how truths may be found. Objective scientists venture to uncover empirical truths about the world and ought to eliminate personal biases, prior commitments and emotional involvement. However, legal theorists are inevitably bound up with a given legal culture. Consequently, their scholarly work derives at least in part from this environment and their subtle interaction with it. This book questions critically, in novel ways and from various perspectives, the possibilities of objectivity of legal theory in the twenty-first century. It transpires that legal theory is unavoidably confronted with varying conceptions of law, underlying ideologies, approaches to legal method, argumentation and discourse etc, which limit the possibilities of 'objectivity' in law and in legal reasoning. The authors of this book reveal some of these underlying notions and discuss their consequences for legal theory.

This book seeks to examine the relations that obtain between law and a theory of law and legal reasoning and a theory of legal reasoning.