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Do you know your reader?

Article Excerpt
When you write a brief, for whom are you writing it? What reader do you have in mind while you slave away, piecing together legal arguments and explaining how sophisticated principles of law, applied to the facts of your case, dictate a favorable result for your client?

If you don't have anyone particular in mind, you should put more thought into who your audience is. Perhaps now more than ever, your clients' fates rest largely on the quality of your briefs and how effectively they persuade your readers.

Who are your readers? This is an easy one. If you're a litigator, then judges are your readers, right? Well, sort of. You're probably aware that in most courts, your initial reader is a judicial clerk or a court research attorney. But knowing this in a general sense is vastly different from keeping it in the front of your mind when you write.

Judicial clerks and court research attorneys are usually among the brightest graduates in their law school classes. They're intelligent and diligent. But they're often inexperienced--typically having less than two years of legal work experience. Most haven't practiced law at all. In fact, some judicial clerks are still law students.

These clerks and research attorneys may have a variety of work duties, but their primary...

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