Why do lawyers write so badly? Save and except, without limiting the generality of the foregoing, writers and their heirs, successors, and assigns whose right, title, and interest in and to the aforesaid subject matter is or may be, with the giving of notice or the lapse of time, … Sorry, that sentence got away from me!

The push towards plain language drafting is, of course, nothing new. Joseph Kimble, Emeritus professor at WMU–Cooley Law School, has been writing on the topic for more than 30 years. He has written two books, including Lifting the Fog of Legalese and . . . [more]

A Superior Court Judge has tossed out a Small Claims Court judgment for a long list of reasons which primarily involve the inappropriate manner in which the trial judge dealt with the self-represented defendant throughout the course of the trial.

The reasons for granting the appeal span 92 paragraphs. The conduct of the trial judge becomes increasingly unbelievable as the reasons unfold. The decision is worth a read in its entirety and the findings include the following:

The trial judge had not read any of the material before the trial;

The trial judge gave the defendant “two minutes” to explain . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on technology, research and practice.

Practice

The Long Tail…
David Bilinsky

Lawyers, I surmise, believe with their long history and experience that they are the innovators of any changes in the legal/justice system. However, that theory may need further examination. In fact it may have to be turned onto its head.

Technology

Easy Instant Lines in Microsoft Word*
Dan Pinnington

In Microsoft Word (including Mac versions) you can easily create a variety of horizontal lines . . . [more]

It would be really easy to read last week’s report from the Law Society of Upper Canada’s Working Group on Alternative Business Structures as thoughtful and considered.

Afterall, it has all the hallmarks of a judicial decision – using all the right words and heck, even using numbered paragraphs; no surprise given that Convocation is over-weighted with litigators, many of whom aspire to be judges themselves.

But if you scratch beneath the surface of the report, one quickly finds that all the judicial language in the world cannot hide what really happened in the LSUC Star Chamber amid the fine . . . [more]

Last week there was an interesting post by Xeni Jardin on Boing-Boing concerning the Volkswagen emissions scandal. Jardin cites a New York Times article by Jim Dywer called, “Volkswagen’s Diesel Fraud Makes Critic of Secret Code a Prophet” published earlier in the week.

This is the bit that caught immediately my attention at Boing-Boing:

“Proprietary software is an unsafe building material. You can’t inspect it.”

That quote comes from a talk Columbia Law School professor Eben Moglen gave to the Scottish Society for Computers and Law about 5 years ago, “When Software is in Everything: Future . . . [more]

Each Monday we present brief excerpts of recent posts from five of Canada’s award­-winning legal blogs chosen at random* from sixty recent Clawbie winners. In this way we hope to promote their work, with their permission, to as wide an audience as possible.

This week the randomly selected blogs are 1. Youth and Work  2. Clio Blog 3. DroitDu.net  4. Global Workplace Insider  5. Vincent Gautrais

Youth and Work
Why Are Ryerson University and Bell Media Advertising a Wage Theft Scam?

So it seems that Ryerson University has teamed up with Bell Media to advertise a little back to school . . . [more]

On Friday, the Prime Minister promised if elected he would enact legislation that would create a “tax lock,” preventing future governments from raising taxes,

This new legislation will protect our fragile economy and guarantee reduced taxes and stable incomes for our families.

His party has already promised not to raise taxes, while the other parties have promised they will. This measure goes further, because it would seek to bind the hands of successive governments, without the necessary constitutional amendments.

Former Parliamentary law clerk, Rob Walsh, indicated the proposed legislation would likely be unconstitutional for this reason. The division of powers . . . [more]

One Sunday each month OnPoint Legal Research provides Slaw with an extended summary of, and counsel’s commentary on, an important case from the British Columbia, Alberta, or Ontario court of appeal.

Fredrickson v. Newtech Dental Laboratory Inc., 2015 BCCA 357

AREAS OF LAW: Employment law; Termination; Offer of re-employment; Mitigation of damages

~When considering whether an employee failed to mitigate her damages by refusing an offer of re-employment, the trier of fact must take into account such factors as the completeness of the offer and the erosion of trust between the employer and the employee.~

BACKGROUND: The Appellant, Ms. Fredrickson, . . . [more]

Every week we present the summary of a decision handed down by a Québec court provided to us by SOQUIJ and considered to be of interest to our readers throughout Canada. SOQUIJ is attached to the Québec Department of Justice and collects, analyzes, enriches, and disseminates legal information in Québec.

PÉNAL (DROIT) : La requérante ne peut obtenir la permission d’intejeter appel du jugement de la Cour supérieure ayant confirmé sa culpabilité sous une accusation de conduite avec une alcoolémie supérieure à la limite permise au motif que le ministère public ne pouvait bénéficier de la présomption légale (art. 258 . . . [more]

For the prior thirty weeks the Friday Fillip has been be a chapter in a serialized crime novel, usually followed by a reference you might like to pursue.

Next Friday’s Epilogue will be the last of these instalments of fiction.

Both this chapter of the book and the whole story up to this point can be had as PDF files. You may also subscribe to have chapters delivered to you by email.

MEASURING LIFE
 
Chapter 30
Pluck

1. The Defects of the Management Structure of Law Societies

Law societies in Canada have ignored the unaffordable legal services problem (“the problem”), because of the obsolescence of their management structure. Its major defects are:

(1) management by part-time amateurs (benchers), whose work is mostly charity–“amateurs” because they don’t have the expertise necessary for solving difficult problems such as the unaffordability of legal services (and they don’t try to get it);

(2) an unwillingness to attack the causes of difficult problems such as the unaffordability of legal services because their main duties are to their clients and institutional employers, who . . . [more]

According to a recent article about the favourite literary references used by current US Supreme Court justices in their judgments, Shakespeare and Lewis Carroll top the list.

This was followed by:

• George Orwell
• Charles Dickens
• Aldous Huxley
• Aesop
• Fyodor Dostoyevsky, William Faulkner, Herman Melville and J.D. Salinger (equal number of references)

This reminds me of one of my posts on Slaw.ca (way back in 2006!) on Popular Song Lyrics in Legal Writing. Oklahoma City University School of Law professor Alex B. Long did a study of citations to pop music stars in law journals.

In descending list of “popularity” . . . [more]