Bench & Bar January/February 2026

EFFECTIVE LEGAL WRITING

THE BEAUTY IS IN THE NUANCE EFFECTIVE LEGAL WRITING STRATEGIES: BY CASSIE CHAMBERS ARMSTRONG

J ust a few days ago, I finished grading dozens of first year law school exams. I am incredibly proud of my students’ growth from the beginning of the semester. It is magical to watch them learn how to spot issues, research rules, and cite cases. But I noticed, in their writing, a tendency to shy away from nuance: to more confidently state the status of the law than is warranted, to gloss over adverse authority, to strongly state conclusions when a bit of uncertainty would be best. This is, of course, to be expected from first year legal writing. But reading my students’ work made me think about the way that we as lawyers are trained—and sometimes never untrained—to skip the nuance. We are told that we must vigorously advo cate for our clients—which of course we must. But somewhere along the way, zeal ous advocacy gets equated with absolute certainty. The problem with skipping the nuance is that you forfeit your credibility with informed readers. A judge knows when you do not fully engage with

So here are a few tips that I give my law stu dents that will perhaps serve as reminders to practitioners. 1) Avoid absolute words. Only say that something is “always” or “never” true if you are absolutely sure that is the case. Absolutes invite those with legal train ing to invent counterfactuals—beware! 2) Acknowledge the complexity. It is rare to find an area of law that isn’t riddled with exceptions and uncertainty. It is okay to tell the court that there is disagreement in the precedent about how an issue is to be treated. You gain more credibility by identifying the ambiguity and explain ing why it should be resolved in favor of your client than you do by pretending the ambiguity doesn’t exist. 3) Admit when the other side sounds persuasive. You’ll go up against a lot of smart lawyers in practice. You get further by acknowledg ing the strength of their argument,

then explaining why your explanation is nevertheless superior, than you do by discounting the other side all together. 4) Fully explain your “problem” precedents. Almost every time you write a brief, you will find a case that is a problem for your argument. Often, our instinct is to write very little about this case. Instead, do the opposite. Fully explain its facts and why it doesn’t apply. Just like you did in high school math, “show your work” to the court and explain in detail why it is distinguishable. The fact that nuance exists is one of the most beautiful things about our common law system. It has evolved by applying the same law to thousands—sometimes hundreds of thousands—of scenarios. Of course the result is murky and hard to wade through. But that messiness is also a reminder about the enduring strength of our legal system—the way it has the poten tial to render justice to numerous people in numerous circumstances. And that is a beautiful thing.

a case that undercuts your argu ment. Similarly, your opposing counsel picks up when you side step the murkiness of evolving legal precedent. The law is complicated, and informed readers expect to see that complexity.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR CASSIE CHAMBERS ARM STRONG is an assistant professor at the University of Louisville Brandeis School of Law, where she teaches torts, lawyering skills, and family law.

24 january/february 2026