When ‘Perfect’ Isn’t Possible: The Power of Consistency in Legal Writing
In his bestseller, Atomic Habits, author and motivational speaker James Clear relates the following story about the danger of aiming for perfection.
On the first day of class, Jerry Uelsmann, a professor at the University of Florida, divided his film photography students into two groups.
Everyone on the left side of the classroom, he explained, would be in the “quantity” group. They would be graded solely on the amount of work they produced. On the final day of class, he would tally the number of photos submitted by each student. One hundred photos would rate an A, ninety photos a B, eighty photos a C, and so on.
Meanwhile, everyone on the right side of the room would be in the “quality” group. They would be graded only on the excellence of their work. They would only need to produce one photo during the semester, but to get an A, it had to be a nearly perfect image.
At the end of the term, he was surprised to find that all the best photos were produced by the quantity group. During the semester, these students were busy taking photos, experimenting with composition and lighting, testing out various methods in the darkroom, and learning from their mistakes. In the process of creating hundreds of photos, they honed their skills. Meanwhile, the quality group sat around speculating about perfection. In the end, they had little to show for their efforts other than unverified theories and one mediocre photo.[i]
This story, Clear says, illustrates that success comes when we stop striving for perfection and instead begin to accumulate “small but consistent habits” that lead to positive results.
It’s often noted that lawyers by nature tend to be perfectionists. In fact, that tendency to strive for perfection is widely cited as a chief reason that lawyers experience such high rates of depression and anxiety.[ii] And this tendency manifests early; I find that many of my beginning legal writing students experience disappointment and frustration because they can’t “master” legal writing quickly or easily.
One way I try to manage my students’ disappointment and frustration is to remind them often that while legal readers have many needs and expectations, perfection isn’t one of them. But readability is. So I encourage my students to develop those “small but consistent” writing habits that will add to the document’s readability—and to their own credibility as advocates.
In this vein, I offer here three small habits that you can accumulate to bring greater consistency (and thus greater readability) to your legal writing.
1. Capitalize consistently.
Like many aspects of legal writing, capitalization is governed both by rules and by conventions that supplement the rules. Some of the rules are second-nature (e.g. always capitalize the first word in a sentence, always capitalize names of people). Some of the rules are Bluebook rules (e.g. in legal documents, capitalize “Court” when naming any court in full, when referring to the United States Supreme Court, or when referring to the court in a document submitted to that court).[iii] And the conventions come from many sources—local practice, perhaps, or industry standards.
I think it’s impossible to remember all of the rules and conventions of capitalization. And it would take several columns for me to cover even a fraction of them. It’s worth consulting The Bluebook Rule X and a good legal writing style manual when a specific question about capitalization arises. But I firmly believe this is one area in which consistency is more important than perfection. For example, The Bluebook says to capitalize party designations such as “Plaintiff” and “Defendant” when referring to the parties in the matter that is the subject of the document.[iv] Of course I would love for all of my students to observe this rule perfectly. But what I often see is students observing it sometimes and not observing it other times, within the same document. And that inconsistency detracts from the document’s readability. In fact, I’d rather see the lower case used consistently, even if it’s not technically correct.
2. Use numbers consistently.
There are both rules and conventions for using numbers in legal writing (are you sensing a theme here?), and inconsistency in this regard is noticeable. The Bluebook provides that in text, numbers from zero to ninety-nine must be spelled out.[v] But some style manuals, including the Government Printing Office’s Style Manual,[vi] advise spelling out only the numbers one through nine and using figures for larger numbers.
I’m not sure which practice is “correct,” but again, I believe that consistency is more important than perfection. For example, if your text requires you to refer often to the number twenty, don’t write, “The Answer was filed 20 days late” in one paragraph and then, “This twenty-day delay prejudiced Plaintiff” in the next paragraph. Either use “twenty” both times or use “20” both times. If you need to refer to two or more numbers in the same sentence, do so consistently. For example, don’t write, “Defendant has two children, ages 7 and 4.” Either use figures throughout or spell the numbers out throughout.
3. Format dates and times consistently.
There are (you guessed it) both rules and conventions for formatting dates and times in legal documents. Unfortunately, there is little agreement among sources as to what formats are “correct.” Is it 3 Oct. 2021 or October 3, 2021? Is it 9:15 p.m. or 9:15 PM or 21:15 pm? The Bluebook offers some guidance by way of example;[vii] and the Aspen Handbook for Legal Writers (my favorite style manual, as regular readers know) offers its conventions;[viii] various jurisdictions’ style manuals offer their rules.[ix] And they’re not identical in all respects.
Again, consistency is more important than perfection when stating dates and times. Your legal reader will probably not care which of the many accepted formats you choose for stating dates and times. But he or she will probably notice (and will probably be annoyed) if you switch from format to format to format within the same document—especially if the subject matter of the document is one that necessitates frequent inclusion of dates and times.
These three aspects of legal writing – capitalization, use of numbers, and format of dates and times – may seem trivial compared to “big-ticket items” like well-supported, well-organized analysis, effective use of authority, and adherence to procedural rules. But developing “small but consistent habits” in the little things will enhance our credibility in the eyes of our legal reader, making it easier for the reader to trust the substance of our document. We may never write the “perfect” document, but by practicing consistency, we can keep honing our skills so that each document we write is the “best” it can be.
Laura Graham serves as Professor of Legal Writing and Director of Legal Analysis, Writing, and Research at Wake Forest University School of Law, where she has been teaching since 1999. She was the first recipient of the law school’s Graham Award for Excellence in Teaching Legal Research and Writing, which is named in her honor, and currently serves as president of the Association of Legal Writing Directors. Graham is a graduate of Wake Forest University and Wake Forest University School of Law.
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[i] James Clear, Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones 141-42 (Avery 2018).
[ii] See, e.g., Jerome Doraisamy, Overcoming perfectionism in law, Lawyers Weekly (Sept. 13, 2020), https://www.lawyersweekly.com.au/corporate-counsel/29429-overcoming-perfectionism-in-law.
[iii] The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation (21st ed.), Rule 8.
[iv] Id.
[v] Id. Rule 6.2.
[vi] Government Printing Office, Style Manual (2016), Rule 12, available at https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2016/pdf/GPO-STYLEMANUAL-2016.pdf.
[vii] See The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation (21st ed.), Rule 18 (showing an example with a date formatted as “Mar. 31, 2011” and a time formatted as “11:02 AM”).
[viii] Deborah E. Bouchoux, Aspen Handbook for Legal Writers: A Practical Reference 84 (5th ed. 2021).
[ix] See, e.g., Edward W. Jessen, California Style Manual 142-43 (4th ed. 2000), http://www.sdap.org/downloads/Style-Manual.pdf.