The Best Legal Writers Use a 3-Pillar Approach

Dear Legal Writer, The best legal writers use a 3-pillar approach. Try it in your next brief or business letter:

🔹 1: The first pillar is clarity. That’s the holy grail.

If your writing isn’t clear, it will not persuade.

No judge will take time to decipher what you mean to say.

A client may throw up their hands in dismay.

Worse, they may assume it is YOU who is confused.

And then your words have literally no sway.

So aim to write clearly.

Clarity is the holy grail.

🔹 2: The second pillar is simplicity.

Simple writing begets clear writing.

But if you have long sentences with dependent clauses and gerunds and subjunctives and passive constructions, those all get in the reader’s way.

The law is complex enough.
Don’t make it any more so with your writing style.

Write simply.

Simplicity begets clarity.

Clarity is the holy grail.

🔹 3: And last, we have Brevity.

In other words, write succinctly.

Every word must work.

Otherwise, it should go.

You want your reader focused on the important things you say.

Filler words and extra baggage?

For those, you’ll have to pay.

 “When you use fewer words to express an idea, you enhance your writing’s speed, clarity, and impact.”

– Bryan Garner, The Winning Brief (3d edition 2014).

⬇️

So aim for CSB—clarity, simplicity, brevity.

That’s how to get your reader seeing your way.

Clarity is the holy grail.

💌 Amanda

#DearLegalWriter

P.S. Please think of me and add some CLARITY in your writing today!