This is why I use the very bluebook-friendly Lexis. Also, because it really, *REALLY* irks me that Westlaw always logs me out after 15 minutes and that it loves to open new browser windows all the damn time.
When my sister was a paralegal she said to me, somebody should really design a software product which automatically produces correctly formatted legal citations. Was she speaking sense? Has this been done?
It is necessarily Byzantine -- there are in the US approximately a million jurisdictions, each with its own citation form. Most often, I'm citing federal cases, in which case the format is pretty simple, but it annoys me to copy a cite out of Westlaw, edit the two paragraph breaks out of it, change their abbreviation for the name of the court to the correct abbreviation, and put the parens in the right spot. On the other hand, I'm a rotten typist who fears typos in the numerical portion of the cite as something that I could easily miss in proofing, so I'd rather cut and paste than just type it myself.
5: Not sure I'm buying that "necessarily." The cosmic significance of, say, Wash.2d vs. Wn.2d tends to escape me. Also, since it's all coming off of Lexis or Westlaw now anyway, why on Earth spend so much time making sure you've correctly cited a book that no one's ever actually going to look at.
Does EndNote support Blue Book notation? (End Note is a software program that will take your library of citations and automatically format them correctly for whatever notational style you need. I'm not as familiar with the program as some other people here might be, though.)
9: Well, history. Each state's courts have their own names, and their own reporters, and the formats are all slightly different. If everything had been set up rationally in the first place, that'd be fine, but there's federalism for you.
9: And why do all those people everywhere around the world speak all those different languages? And use different currencies? What the hell's wrong with everybody??
And don't even get me started on the different shoe size systems.
I second 2. Why are you using westlaw? Please tell me you didn't get sucked into one of their 'Grand Prize Giveaways' and now you're slavishly accumulating points. At the end of the day, you're only going to end up with a toaster!
Also: just stop. You'll save your clients money! I know some are true assholes, but I really, really think it's a really, really rare judge before whom you who would actually materially prejudice your case by not properly bluebooking. A number of them would say something to you, but I think almost none would actually turn against you (even subtlely) as a result. Some might even appreciate your bold independence! (Of course, in the rare case that a judge really *did* turn sour from your failure to bluebook, that loss might be pretty uncomfortable to explain to the client...)
17: ???? I mean, I am not the most exact of bluebookers, but you do have to get it pretty damn close. Judges care, and more importantly from my immediat perspective, partners sure as hell care.
I find Lexis's interface profoundly counterintuitive.
Lexis on the web has a pretty good interface.
Unfortunately, Westlaw gives us a much better price, so Westlaw it is. (It gets passed on to the client, but keeping client costs down is a good thing for a variety of reasons, both selfish and otherwise).
I have to agree with 19, there are somethings (like citing stuff in accorance with an older version of the Bluebook) that most judges would never notice, but not following the rules for citation is generally viewed somewhat like not following the rules for spelling. You might still communicate what you want to communicate, but you are not making a good impression on the court.
LB, judges I know personally do not care. All the lawyers who appear before them bluebook properly anyway, but they wouldn't read their briefs any differently if the bluebooking was off. I mean, think about it: if you were a judge, would you care about this? They're people too. If the citations are sloppy or inconsistent or confusing -- yes, they certainly care about that. But if they are clear and consistent (which is in some ways more than can be said for the bluebook), they really couldn't give a rat's ass if a citation doesn't match up perfectly with bluebook style. So I recommend just finding a style that's unambiguous and logical and comfortable for you (which may be: cut and paste the citation from Westlaw), and stick with that. Don't get me wrong, there probably are *some* judges who would mind, maybe, but I really do think they're few and far between.
If partners care, well... that's different. I was actually under the impression that you were a partner, and so not burdened by that problem.
It's only read like a misspelling if you have perfect bluebooking and then errors or inconsistencies in some places. Then it's read like a misspelling because it *is* a misspelling -- you were trying to bluebook, and you fucked up.
Don't get me wrong, there probably are *some* judges who would mind, maybe, but I really do think they're few and far between.
Oh, boy do I not think that this is the case. I think you may have heard judges talking about not caring about the fine points, and failing to understand how fine the fine points are. The level at which they would start to care is well on this side of inventing my own system of citation.
I was actually under the impression that you were a partner, and so not burdened by that problem.
It sounds like Ideal is right: the ability to follow formal rules about how to dress your sentences indicates nothing of moment but allows people to pretend it indicates something of moment. It's like not wearing white after Labor Day; there's no real reason for it except to allow people to feel they dress better than others. How are you going to sort your Harvard (or Chicago?) grads from others if not by these sorts of rules.
My question is, "How can it be cost-effective for you to be sorting out these rules for different jurisdictions?"
speaking as a federal law clerk, I personally make a point of not caring whether briefs are properly bluebooked. On the other hand, I live in absolute terror of submitting a memorandum & order with improper citation. I'm new, and so this may be somewhat inaccurate, but I think my judge has similar feelings.
20: I now find Westlaw totally counterintuitive. Probably has to do with the fact that Lexis points were worth more goodies (and lexis has better selection) and so I just got hooked during law school. Thank god my lexis account is currently paid for by the anonymous taxpayer and not a client who will come after me for the bottom line!
I think you may have heard judges talking about not caring about the fine points, and failing to understand how fine the fine points are.
No, I've had this conversation and gotten back 22 as a response. They want unambiguous, logical, and consistent. As DaveL notes, Wash.2d vs. Wn.2d is not a meaningful difference (except insofar as the latter is a little less clear to the uninitiated).
Again, if you were appointed to the bench, would your rulings be affected by this difference?
Perfect bluebooking is something only law review editors (who are law students) really care about. People in the real world, including judges, have more important things to worry with.
Oh, I doubt many judge's rulings would be explicitly effected by improper bluebooking. But I do think that noticeably outre citation form, particularly from a decent-sized, respectable law firm rather than an overworked sole practitioner, would make you come off like a clown, and you'd lose credibility.
Are we having a contest for boring threads? First highways, now this. You people are failing to entertain me as I sit alone in my empty house with nothing but a wireless router and the mice for company.
You non-lawyers think this is boring, but you just do not know the hours of fun that can be devoted to arguing about the Bluebook. I once got into a vicious screaming match with a more senior associate over the proper way to cite cases from Georgia appellate courts in a brief submitted to a Georgia court. He finally lost his temper and told me that he helped write the darn thing so he knew what it meant. (on reflection, while the question was ambiguous, his interpretation was best).
We lost the case anyway (to the tune of almost half a billion dollars). I do not think better Bluebooking would have helped.
There's always the option of sending a large gang of angry Blue-Book-loving bikers to Westlaw's central headquarters... Failing outright acts of violence, someone's got to be able to come up with a macro that will convert W=>BB format.
I'm on the plaintiffs' side against firms like LB's (securities fraud mainly). In my area, defense lawyers get paid by the hour, and they take the the time to bluebook perfectly. Plaintiffs' lawyers get percentage contingent fees for the results obtained, and don't bother bluebooking. Draw your own conclusions.
I'm not reading this whole thread, so hopefully these points have not yet been made.
1. LB: Westlaw has its own cut and paste function, whereby one can cut and paste an entire selection, and Westlaw will provide the (basically) correct cite. It takes like one second to fix. Highlight the text, and instead of doing a cut & paste via windows, look to the bottom left of your screen, and click on the little "Westlaw Tools" box. there you will find "cut and paste." go from there.
2. Crazy Heads: Westlaw is far superior to Lexis. Lexis is teh suxx. You will learn this with more legal experience.
63: Damn. I did not know that. Remember a couple of months ago when I was complaining that the iPod should really have some way to rate songs so that they'd come up more or less often? This has been another in the same series.
It's still the wrong format though. Would it kill them to abbreviate court names the way the bb does?
I didn't even know they had software as opposed to the web interface. Also, in your defense, the cut & paste function is new. I think I learned about it during an otherwise completely useless training session.
I keep wondering why Google or somebody doesn't come along with the stuff that's on West/Lexis but for free, with ads, or at least cheaper. Most of that stuff is public domain right?
You could call it Loogle.
(I better trademark that then I can sell it to Google).
well, what's helpful about those sites is the variety of ways the cases are organized, so you can find what you aren't looking for. Google would have to put a lot of money into creating a comparable set of interfaces, at which time, they can no longer turn a profit just from ads. My guess.
This, interestingly (for nobody but me) leads us to the reason why Lexis is teh suxx; namely, it doesn't organize all of its cases into a doctrinal framework in the way that Westlaw does; it has no backbone. Westlaw has a backbone: a giant outline stuffed with every case old enough to be dowloaded (2 weeks), and if you know how to use that, you can find what you need very quickly.
Lexis approximates this effect by doing automatic key word searches, but it doesn't work as well.
People, I come to this website to forget that websites like westlaw and lexis exist, and that I am expected to be visiting them daily. You're failing me.
Also, I have only accumulated a total of 1590 Lexis points in the duration of my law school career. That's really, really low. It's because I don't give a shit. Maybe I'll cash in for my Starbucks gift card now.
When you're in law school, both are free. I don't know from the points program, but I'm assuming that the idea is to get you used to using one service while it's free, and then when you're a grownup lawyer, that's the one you'll pay for.
ok, you want boring citation complaints, I've got boring citation complaints. Why does the federal government redesign their websites every two or three months, so that the location of Important Government Documents that My Tax Dollars Paid for and Are Essential for the Transparent Functioning of the Federal System changes, and many of the IGDTMTDPFAAEFTTFOFFS are simply no longer available at all?
I come from the simple world of academic philosophy, where all citations look like this: Quine, W.V.O (1951). Two dogmas of empiricism. Philosophical Review, 60(1), 20--43. Everyone knows where to get Phil Review, and no one tries to hide it from other philosophers.
Sometimes, though, I want my work to be relevant to the real world, so I decide to refer to a government document. Suddenly everything is wrong. Information is in weird forms, in weird places, and hidden by people with weird agendas.
Most big firms have a deal with both. For the ones that don't, I imagine they pick either Lexis or Westlaw based on partner preference. I'm not sure if there's any cost difference.
Teo, aren't you a linguist? That's horrible fake latin. Actually I guess the numbers line up (though I think you want "animale" for "animal"), what bugs me is that the original is plural: post coitum omnia animalia tristia sunt. Oh, and you've got no verb.
Also: "missing verb" is a really weird complaint to make about a Latin sentence where the desired "verb" is "esse". I think it's more common than not to omit "esse".
(I, in my Becks-style glory, find that I have hopelessly confused the memory-pictures of Teofilo and of washerdreyer. It's like they're the same person in my head. Also: Check this out! In White Teeth, Zadie Smith informs us that one of the terms for street toughs in late-80's London was Becks! Also she says in the slang of North London, "chief" meant loser, fool, lame-o. Can anyone confirm this?
Also: "missing verb" is a really weird complaint to make about a Latin sentence where the desired "verb" is "esse". I think it's more common than not to omit "esse".
I may be way off base here but I think it's more common to omit "esse", the infinitive, than the conjugated forms.
As long as we're meandering, did anyone just see Norm MacDonald on the Daily Show? I clap-laughed. And I'm alone. And normally don't think he's that funny.
Y'know, i realize we don't want any posts where people might disagree any more due to bad feelings, but there has got to be a happy medium between posting on feminism and posting about citation formats.
103: I think you can drop 'est' relatively easily, or at least it seemed to be missing a lot in introductory Latin translations or on inscriptions
.
But that statment seems to require a 'sunt'. If it's plural.
you can omit sunt if you want. many famous latin maxims, however, which omit apparently needed verbs or are otherwise appartently lacking something are that way because they are just a fragment of a longer, complete sentence.
130 -- If I am parsing your two sentences correctly, you mean: "Omnia animalia post coitum tristia" is a complete sentence but many Latin maxims with verbs missing are not complete sentences. Is that right?
Jeez, I almost missed the Westlaw/Bluebook thread!!!!!!!!!!!
Perfect bluebooking is something only law review editors (who are law students) really care about.
Right, and what do those people do when they leave law school? They clerk for federal judges. Which means that the only person actually reading your brief is the kind of person who will circle every error, and make inferences about your own academic performance in law school (which they're freshly graduated from & thus tend to overrate).
As for why Westlaw doesn't use Bluebook, I had always suspected there was some sort of copyright issue---like the Bluebook people would sue. But I'm just pulling that out of my ass.
Finally, the BLUEBOOK ERROR I INSIST ON MAKING ... I cannot bring myself to write "S.2d" for "So. 2d." Just can't. Anyone else?
"footing the bill" s/b "charging clients by the hour for lexis/westlaw research even though they get a flat monthly rate"
I can't speak for all law firms, obviously, but we certainly do not do this and I suspect most firms don't. If 2 percent of the Westlaw research in a month is for client X, client X pays 2 percent of the flat rate. Since the flat rate is much much cheaper than the hourly rate, even in a slow month, the client does better. Client is taken care of, our disbursement to Westlaw is covered, all is good with the world.
A few notes from a grouchy law clerk, not caring whether anyone will ever read them:
1) I am changing my comment name to hallieflanagan because she is a heroine of mine and because mk is dull.
2) Perhaps the thing I hate most about legal citation is the fact that the "See, e.g." gets italicized, and the case name following that signal gets italicized, but the comma coming between the signal and the case name is NOT italicized. I just had to get that off my chest.
3) Speaking of rivalries between two programs, neither of which is particularly awesome: the worst thing so far about working for the federal courts is their steadfast adherence to Wordperfect. Do law firms use wordperfect? I hate microsoft word as much as the next guy, but as FDR said of Somoza, "it's [MY] son of a bitch" and I just know it's quirks and foibles. Wordperfect seems to have been invented by sadists or demons.
4) I am going to start commenting on Unfogged more because I have slowly discovered that lurking is boring and unrewarding.
5) I wish I were not at work at 10:00 pm on a friday. Anyone else?
You are a law clerk, and it's Friday night. You should not be sitting at your office computer. You should be sitting at home, at that computer, commenting on unfogged, and waiting for your girlfriend to arrive on her delayed flight, pretending to work on a novel you should have finished long ago.
I probably won't ever have to work this late again; this is very abnormal. Mostly, it's because the 6-month list is coming out at the end of the month-- and I'm new, so much slower at the normal daytime routine than I will be 6 months from now-- which slowness has been cutting into my daytime writing time and leaving me to write memoranda after everyone else has left. Also if I go home I'll be too tired for sex with my boyfriend and that is always depressing.
135: I don't doubt you, but why is it fraud? The way I thought it went was that when lawyers do stuff for you that they bill you on their hourly rate for as long as they're doing stuff for you. So if they're spending 2 hours looking up stuff for you on Westlaw, why don't they get to bill you two hours?
As this probably makes clear, I don't know the first thing about how law firm billing works.
I think they still charge you the hourly rate for their time, Matt---it's just the additional fee (expense) for using one of the services gets passed along to the client as well, apparently at cost.
Is the Blue Book format as crazily, arbitrarily Byzantine as I (knowing little thereabout) think it is?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 4:50 PM
This is why I use the very bluebook-friendly Lexis. Also, because it really, *REALLY* irks me that Westlaw always logs me out after 15 minutes and that it loves to open new browser windows all the damn time.
Posted by mk | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 4:52 PM
Because West Publishing Company is evil. Mostly the hide the evil in their billing department, but every now and then it gets loose.
Posted by DaveL | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 4:52 PM
When my sister was a paralegal she said to me, somebody should really design a software product which automatically produces correctly formatted legal citations. Was she speaking sense? Has this been done?
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 4:54 PM
It is necessarily Byzantine -- there are in the US approximately a million jurisdictions, each with its own citation form. Most often, I'm citing federal cases, in which case the format is pretty simple, but it annoys me to copy a cite out of Westlaw, edit the two paragraph breaks out of it, change their abbreviation for the name of the court to the correct abbreviation, and put the parens in the right spot. On the other hand, I'm a rotten typist who fears typos in the numerical portion of the cite as something that I could easily miss in proofing, so I'd rather cut and paste than just type it myself.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 4:54 PM
4: It would be a wonderful product, and I am not aware that it exists, if it does.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 4:55 PM
5: Not sure I'm buying that "necessarily." The cosmic significance of, say, Wash.2d vs. Wn.2d tends to escape me. Also, since it's all coming off of Lexis or Westlaw now anyway, why on Earth spend so much time making sure you've correctly cited a book that no one's ever actually going to look at.
Fucking litigators.
Posted by DaveL | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 4:58 PM
Hey! Some of us are winsome and friendly. And also despise Blue Booking.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:01 PM
It is necessarily Byzantine -- there are in the US approximately a million jurisdictions, each with its own citation form.
But is it necessary that there be so many different citation forms? Why can't they all just be the same?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:02 PM
Does EndNote support Blue Book notation? (End Note is a software program that will take your library of citations and automatically format them correctly for whatever notational style you need. I'm not as familiar with the program as some other people here might be, though.)
Posted by Jackmormon | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:02 PM
Real lawyers use the Maroon Book.
Posted by unf | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:05 PM
9: Well, history. Each state's courts have their own names, and their own reporters, and the formats are all slightly different. If everything had been set up rationally in the first place, that'd be fine, but there's federalism for you.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:05 PM
Unf!
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:09 PM
9: And why do all those people everywhere around the world speak all those different languages? And use different currencies? What the hell's wrong with everybody??
And don't even get me started on the different shoe size systems.
Posted by M/tch M/lls | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:13 PM
And use different currencies?
I believe they're working on this one.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:15 PM
Aren't you supposed to hate on Michael, M/tch?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:15 PM
I second 2. Why are you using westlaw? Please tell me you didn't get sucked into one of their 'Grand Prize Giveaways' and now you're slavishly accumulating points. At the end of the day, you're only going to end up with a toaster!
Also: just stop. You'll save your clients money! I know some are true assholes, but I really, really think it's a really, really rare judge before whom you who would actually materially prejudice your case by not properly bluebooking. A number of them would say something to you, but I think almost none would actually turn against you (even subtlely) as a result. Some might even appreciate your bold independence! (Of course, in the rare case that a judge really *did* turn sour from your failure to bluebook, that loss might be pretty uncomfortable to explain to the client...)
Of course, IANAL, so keep that in mind.
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:16 PM
Please tell me you didn't get sucked into one of their 'Grand Prize Giveaways' and now you're slavishly accumulating points.
Please tell me this is a joke.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:20 PM
17: ???? I mean, I am not the most exact of bluebookers, but you do have to get it pretty damn close. Judges care, and more importantly from my immediat perspective, partners sure as hell care.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:24 PM
And I like Westlaw much better than Lexis -- I find Lexis's interface profoundly counterintuitive.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:25 PM
I find Lexis's interface profoundly counterintuitive.
Lexis on the web has a pretty good interface.
Unfortunately, Westlaw gives us a much better price, so Westlaw it is. (It gets passed on to the client, but keeping client costs down is a good thing for a variety of reasons, both selfish and otherwise).
I have to agree with 19, there are somethings (like citing stuff in accorance with an older version of the Bluebook) that most judges would never notice, but not following the rules for citation is generally viewed somewhat like not following the rules for spelling. You might still communicate what you want to communicate, but you are not making a good impression on the court.
Posted by Idealist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:31 PM
LB, judges I know personally do not care. All the lawyers who appear before them bluebook properly anyway, but they wouldn't read their briefs any differently if the bluebooking was off. I mean, think about it: if you were a judge, would you care about this? They're people too. If the citations are sloppy or inconsistent or confusing -- yes, they certainly care about that. But if they are clear and consistent (which is in some ways more than can be said for the bluebook), they really couldn't give a rat's ass if a citation doesn't match up perfectly with bluebook style. So I recommend just finding a style that's unambiguous and logical and comfortable for you (which may be: cut and paste the citation from Westlaw), and stick with that. Don't get me wrong, there probably are *some* judges who would mind, maybe, but I really do think they're few and far between.
If partners care, well... that's different. I was actually under the impression that you were a partner, and so not burdened by that problem.
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:35 PM
It's only read like a misspelling if you have perfect bluebooking and then errors or inconsistencies in some places. Then it's read like a misspelling because it *is* a misspelling -- you were trying to bluebook, and you fucked up.
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:38 PM
Comment 22 was written with a judge sample size of 2.
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:40 PM
Don't get me wrong, there probably are *some* judges who would mind, maybe, but I really do think they're few and far between.
Oh, boy do I not think that this is the case. I think you may have heard judges talking about not caring about the fine points, and failing to understand how fine the fine points are. The level at which they would start to care is well on this side of inventing my own system of citation.
I was actually under the impression that you were a partner, and so not burdened by that problem.
Heh. No.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:40 PM
Is this thread really more interesting than the freeways thread?
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:40 PM
It sounds like Ideal is right: the ability to follow formal rules about how to dress your sentences indicates nothing of moment but allows people to pretend it indicates something of moment. It's like not wearing white after Labor Day; there's no real reason for it except to allow people to feel they dress better than others. How are you going to sort your Harvard (or Chicago?) grads from others if not by these sorts of rules.
My question is, "How can it be cost-effective for you to be sorting out these rules for different jurisdictions?"
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:42 PM
speaking as a federal law clerk, I personally make a point of not caring whether briefs are properly bluebooked. On the other hand, I live in absolute terror of submitting a memorandum & order with improper citation. I'm new, and so this may be somewhat inaccurate, but I think my judge has similar feelings.
20: I now find Westlaw totally counterintuitive. Probably has to do with the fact that Lexis points were worth more goodies (and lexis has better selection) and so I just got hooked during law school. Thank god my lexis account is currently paid for by the anonymous taxpayer and not a client who will come after me for the bottom line!
Posted by mk | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:45 PM
26 - No. Infrastructure is more interesting than citation.
Posted by Megan | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:45 PM
Preach it, Megan.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:47 PM
I think you may have heard judges talking about not caring about the fine points, and failing to understand how fine the fine points are.
No, I've had this conversation and gotten back 22 as a response. They want unambiguous, logical, and consistent. As DaveL notes, Wash.2d vs. Wn.2d is not a meaningful difference (except insofar as the latter is a little less clear to the uninitiated).
Again, if you were appointed to the bench, would your rulings be affected by this difference?
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:47 PM
And, IIRC, Washington courts tend to use one form (Wn.2d, I think) while the Blue Book requires the other.
Posted by DaveL | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:49 PM
The sample increases to 3!
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:49 PM
33 to 28.
Perfect bluebooking is something only law review editors (who are law students) really care about. People in the real world, including judges, have more important things to worry with.
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:52 PM
26 - No. Infrastructure is more interesting than citation.
But isn't citation, like, the infrastructure of reference?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:52 PM
Oh, I doubt many judge's rulings would be explicitly effected by improper bluebooking. But I do think that noticeably outre citation form, particularly from a decent-sized, respectable law firm rather than an overworked sole practitioner, would make you come off like a clown, and you'd lose credibility.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:54 PM
I fear my rapid-fire enthusiastic posts on this, the dullest of all threads, is once and for all exposing me as teh lame.
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:54 PM
Sure, but citation doesn't involve heavy machinery. Heavy machinery wins everything.
Posted by Megan | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:55 PM
Aaack! Affected, not effected.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:55 PM
Sure, but citation doesn't involve heavy machinery. Heavy machinery wins everything.
But aren't Westlaw and Lexis, like, the heavy machinery of legal research?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:55 PM
Don't mock me, ben.
Posted by Heavy Machinery | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:56 PM
36: don't you have a flock of overpaid minions to cite-check for you? I thought that is what first year associates are for.
Posted by mk | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:56 PM
Sure, but you can't imagine stealing an unlocked Westlaw and taking it for a joyride and wrecking abandoned warehouses. So, not fun.
Posted by Megan | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:59 PM
My law firm is rather oddly structured. Most associates come in as laterals, leading to a sad dearth of first-year cannon-fodder.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:59 PM
Are we having a contest for boring threads? First highways, now this. You people are failing to entertain me as I sit alone in my empty house with nothing but a wireless router and the mice for company.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 5:59 PM
Southern California lawyers say "the westlaw" and "the lexis."
Posted by eb | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:04 PM
People in the real world, including judges, have more important things to worry with.
This is one of those facially plausible claims that's wrong about 90% of the time it's made, whatever the topic.
/existential despair
Posted by DaveL | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:04 PM
45: There's this...
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:06 PM
You non-lawyers think this is boring, but you just do not know the hours of fun that can be devoted to arguing about the Bluebook. I once got into a vicious screaming match with a more senior associate over the proper way to cite cases from Georgia appellate courts in a brief submitted to a Georgia court. He finally lost his temper and told me that he helped write the darn thing so he knew what it meant. (on reflection, while the question was ambiguous, his interpretation was best).
We lost the case anyway (to the tune of almost half a billion dollars). I do not think better Bluebooking would have helped.
Posted by Idealist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:06 PM
Are we having a contest for boring threads?
Peyton Manning has an amazing ass!
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:06 PM
Mouse poop also has an amazing ass.
Posted by standpipe b | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:07 PM
Everybody mail Wolfson pictures of your finger.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:10 PM
There's always the option of sending a large gang of angry Blue-Book-loving bikers to Westlaw's central headquarters... Failing outright acts of violence, someone's got to be able to come up with a macro that will convert W=>BB format.
Posted by DominEditrix | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:10 PM
A=A.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:11 PM
"facially plausible"?
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:11 PM
I'm on the plaintiffs' side against firms like LB's (securities fraud mainly). In my area, defense lawyers get paid by the hour, and they take the the time to bluebook perfectly. Plaintiffs' lawyers get percentage contingent fees for the results obtained, and don't bother bluebooking. Draw your own conclusions.
Posted by an irregular | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:14 PM
55: Practice law for a few years and it starts to look like English.
Posted by DaveL | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:15 PM
56 gets it exactly right.
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:15 PM
What do you want to talk about, B?
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:19 PM
60!
Posted by Brock Landers | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:20 PM
Shit, I dunno. I'm bored. I haven't a thing on my mind except boredom, and the smell of swiffer cleaner.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:22 PM
Everyone's just sad, B. Why can't you just commiserate?
Posted by Stanley | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:27 PM
I'm not reading this whole thread, so hopefully these points have not yet been made.
1. LB: Westlaw has its own cut and paste function, whereby one can cut and paste an entire selection, and Westlaw will provide the (basically) correct cite. It takes like one second to fix. Highlight the text, and instead of doing a cut & paste via windows, look to the bottom left of your screen, and click on the little "Westlaw Tools" box. there you will find "cut and paste." go from there.
2. Crazy Heads: Westlaw is far superior to Lexis. Lexis is teh suxx. You will learn this with more legal experience.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:29 PM
Because I'm bitchy.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:30 PM
That's bottom right of your screen, LB, sorry. Otherwise my advice is sound.
Bluebooking rules are byzantine and dumb, but eventually they become like second nature. But at that point, you have lost your soul.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:31 PM
Hasn't text only been a lawyer for like a year?
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:34 PM
63: Damn. I did not know that. Remember a couple of months ago when I was complaining that the iPod should really have some way to rate songs so that they'd come up more or less often? This has been another in the same series.
It's still the wrong format though. Would it kill them to abbreviate court names the way the bb does?
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:35 PM
yeah, I don't know what's up with that. But at least they fix the font and get rid of the hyperlinks and crap.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:36 PM
In my defense, I just gave up and switched to the web interface, rather than the software, this year. I don't think this feature was in the software.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:39 PM
I am a lawyer and I haven't touched a Blue Book in over ten years.
Posted by joeo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:44 PM
I didn't even know they had software as opposed to the web interface. Also, in your defense, the cut & paste function is new. I think I learned about it during an otherwise completely useless training session.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 6:44 PM
I keep wondering why Google or somebody doesn't come along with the stuff that's on West/Lexis but for free, with ads, or at least cheaper. Most of that stuff is public domain right?
You could call it Loogle.
(I better trademark that then I can sell it to Google).
Posted by Anonymous | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:02 PM
well, what's helpful about those sites is the variety of ways the cases are organized, so you can find what you aren't looking for. Google would have to put a lot of money into creating a comparable set of interfaces, at which time, they can no longer turn a profit just from ads. My guess.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:04 PM
This, interestingly (for nobody but me) leads us to the reason why Lexis is teh suxx; namely, it doesn't organize all of its cases into a doctrinal framework in the way that Westlaw does; it has no backbone. Westlaw has a backbone: a giant outline stuffed with every case old enough to be dowloaded (2 weeks), and if you know how to use that, you can find what you need very quickly.
Lexis approximates this effect by doing automatic key word searches, but it doesn't work as well.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:10 PM
People, I come to this website to forget that websites like westlaw and lexis exist, and that I am expected to be visiting them daily. You're failing me.
Also, I have only accumulated a total of 1590 Lexis points in the duration of my law school career. That's really, really low. It's because I don't give a shit. Maybe I'll cash in for my Starbucks gift card now.
Seriously, no one ever go to law school.
Posted by m. leblanc | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:14 PM
So these companies seriously give out points? WTF?
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:18 PM
When you're in law school, both are free. I don't know from the points program, but I'm assuming that the idea is to get you used to using one service while it's free, and then when you're a grownup lawyer, that's the one you'll pay for.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:21 PM
Yes. I know someone who redeemed their points for an iPod nano.
Posted by m. leblanc | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:22 PM
So grownup lawyers get to choose the programs they use? Doesn't the firm have a say in it? I'm assuming they're footing the bill.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:30 PM
ok, you want boring citation complaints, I've got boring citation complaints. Why does the federal government redesign their websites every two or three months, so that the location of Important Government Documents that My Tax Dollars Paid for and Are Essential for the Transparent Functioning of the Federal System changes, and many of the IGDTMTDPFAAEFTTFOFFS are simply no longer available at all?
I come from the simple world of academic philosophy, where all citations look like this: Quine, W.V.O (1951). Two dogmas of empiricism. Philosophical Review, 60(1), 20--43. Everyone knows where to get Phil Review, and no one tries to hide it from other philosophers.
Sometimes, though, I want my work to be relevant to the real world, so I decide to refer to a government document. Suddenly everything is wrong. Information is in weird forms, in weird places, and hidden by people with weird agendas.
I don’t like it.
Posted by rob helpy-chalk | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:34 PM
"footing the bill" s/b "charging clients by the hour for lexis/westlaw research even though they get a flat monthly rate"
Posted by m. leblanc | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:35 PM
Most big firms have a deal with both. For the ones that don't, I imagine they pick either Lexis or Westlaw based on partner preference. I'm not sure if there's any cost difference.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:37 PM
Everyone's just sad
It's the well known post-cock-picture malaise, isn't it?
Posted by ac | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:39 PM
81: Oh.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:44 PM
83: Omne animal post cockpicturum triste.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:48 PM
Teo, aren't you a linguist? That's horrible fake latin. Actually I guess the numbers line up (though I think you want "animale" for "animal"), what bugs me is that the original is plural: post coitum omnia animalia tristia sunt. Oh, and you've got no verb.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:52 PM
For a Mexican, your Spanish is pretty much unintelligible, Teofilo.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:52 PM
86: Fuck, I knew I was misremembering it. It's been years since I took Latin.
87: Hardly surprising.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:54 PM
I'll cop to the missing verb, but the singular seems pretty widespread out there. Which is not to say it's necessarily correct.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:57 PM
86: Fuck off, Wolfson. Why do you have to be so hurtful? No one ever picks on you.
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 7:57 PM
Some more googling reveals that the singular is vastly more common out there than the plural.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:02 PM
Wait now, Teo's a Mexican? Thot he was a white man.
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:02 PM
I am very much a white man. Some people seem confused, though.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:03 PM
Also: "missing verb" is a really weird complaint to make about a Latin sentence where the desired "verb" is "esse". I think it's more common than not to omit "esse".
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:05 PM
94: That's what I thought. I'm sure I first heard the phrase in the form I used in 85, although the form with verb seems to be more common.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:06 PM
Wait now, Teo's a Mexican?
There's a New Mexico, you know.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:09 PM
(I, in my Becks-style glory, find that I have hopelessly confused the memory-pictures of Teofilo and of washerdreyer. It's like they're the same person in my head. Also: Check this out! In White Teeth, Zadie Smith informs us that one of the terms for street toughs in late-80's London was Becks! Also she says in the slang of North London, "chief" meant loser, fool, lame-o. Can anyone confirm this?
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:10 PM
Teo, is the verb in a sentence like "After coitus, all animals are sad" called "copulative"?
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:11 PM
)
Posted by ac | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:12 PM
Thanks ac!
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:13 PM
Looking at the threads today, you'd have to say DeLong's commenter got it about right. There's something peculiarly surreal about today, perhaps.
Posted by SomeCallMeTim | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:14 PM
98: Wikipædia says yes.
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:18 PM
Also: "missing verb" is a really weird complaint to make about a Latin sentence where the desired "verb" is "esse". I think it's more common than not to omit "esse".
I may be way off base here but I think it's more common to omit "esse", the infinitive, than the conjugated forms.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:19 PM
98: It's called a copula. The usual adjective is "copular," applied to a sentence.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:19 PM
96: Ahem.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:23 PM
103 -- Ok, well you know far more about Latin than I. 104 -- Thanks Teo!
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:24 PM
(First sentence of 106 should include a parenthetical "despite your youth")
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 8:25 PM
California has its own special citation rules, if you're practicing before State Courts. Say goodbye to the BlueBook people.
Posted by Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 9:13 PM
Things to do when Lexis/Nexis/Sexis becomes boring:
The Bar & Grill Menu
Soup de Jure
Soup Poena
Shepardized Pie
Amicus Curry
Haggis Corpus
Rice Adjudicata
Pro Tempura with Nolo Condiments
Persona Non Gratinée
Appellate Brown Betty
Chocolate Torte
Posted by DominEditrix | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 9:26 PM
As long as we're meandering, did anyone just see Norm MacDonald on the Daily Show? I clap-laughed. And I'm alone. And normally don't think he's that funny.
Posted by Stanley | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 9:28 PM
108 - We always listed both of them. MAde it easier all around.
Posted by DominEditrix | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 9:30 PM
110: guess not.
Posted by Stanley | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 9:52 PM
Dude, I don't even, like, own a TV. That's how I fight the Man.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 9:57 PM
teo's the Man.
Posted by Stanley | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:06 PM
Aren't you supposed to hate on Michael, M/tch?
It's not hate, ben, it's tough love.
That's also why I haven't yet sent you a picture of my cock.
Posted by M/tch M/lls | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:21 PM
114: You bet I am.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:26 PM
(I was hoping someone would make that connection.)
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:27 PM
Y'know, i realize we don't want any posts where people might disagree any more due to bad feelings, but there has got to be a happy medium between posting on feminism and posting about citation formats.
103: I think you can drop 'est' relatively easily, or at least it seemed to be missing a lot in introductory Latin translations or on inscriptions
.
But that statment seems to require a 'sunt'. If it's plural.
109: Squid pro quo?
Posted by Cala | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:29 PM
Surely if you can drop "est" you can drop "sunt." And my version, which seems to be much more common than Ben's, is singular anyway.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:30 PM
I believe posting about grammar is the happy medium you seek.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:31 PM
And bacon. On cats. Apparently.
Posted by Stanley | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:34 PM
An eclectic web magazine about bacon and cats.
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:35 PM
I seem to have learned the quotation wrong.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:36 PM
Bacon on cats is a great happy medium.
I am not pulling out my Cicero at this hour. (Or ever.)
Posted by Cala | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:37 PM
The Mineshaft purrs tonight.
Posted by Stanley | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:37 PM
123: Vindication!
Posted by teofilo | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:38 PM
I am not pulling out my Cicero at this hour. (Or ever.)
It's Ovid.
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:43 PM
I wasn't talking about finding your quote, but examples of dropped 'est's.
Posted by Cala | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:45 PM
IHNTSH, IJWTS 'was killed and eaten by lawyers.'
max
['O, the savagery of the naked breast...um, beast...']
Posted by max | Link to this comment | 09-14-06 10:51 PM
you can omit sunt if you want. many famous latin maxims, however, which omit apparently needed verbs or are otherwise appartently lacking something are that way because they are just a fragment of a longer, complete sentence.
Posted by alameida | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 2:03 AM
118: Go, cephalopods!
Posted by DominEditrix | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 4:14 AM
130 -- If I am parsing your two sentences correctly, you mean: "Omnia animalia post coitum tristia" is a complete sentence but many Latin maxims with verbs missing are not complete sentences. Is that right?
Posted by Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 5:51 AM
Jeez, I almost missed the Westlaw/Bluebook thread!!!!!!!!!!!
Perfect bluebooking is something only law review editors (who are law students) really care about.
Right, and what do those people do when they leave law school? They clerk for federal judges. Which means that the only person actually reading your brief is the kind of person who will circle every error, and make inferences about your own academic performance in law school (which they're freshly graduated from & thus tend to overrate).
As for why Westlaw doesn't use Bluebook, I had always suspected there was some sort of copyright issue---like the Bluebook people would sue. But I'm just pulling that out of my ass.
Finally, the BLUEBOOK ERROR I INSIST ON MAKING ... I cannot bring myself to write "S.2d" for "So. 2d." Just can't. Anyone else?
Posted by Anderson | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 7:30 AM
"footing the bill" s/b "charging clients by the hour for lexis/westlaw research even though they get a flat monthly rate"
I can't speak for all law firms, obviously, but we certainly do not do this and I suspect most firms don't. If 2 percent of the Westlaw research in a month is for client X, client X pays 2 percent of the flat rate. Since the flat rate is much much cheaper than the hourly rate, even in a slow month, the client does better. Client is taken care of, our disbursement to Westlaw is covered, all is good with the world.
Posted by Idealist | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 7:44 AM
If 2 percent of the Westlaw research in a month is for client X, client X pays 2 percent of the flat rate.
Well, yeah. The word for doing it any other way is "fraud."
Posted by Anderson | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 8:54 AM
A few notes from a grouchy law clerk, not caring whether anyone will ever read them:
1) I am changing my comment name to hallieflanagan because she is a heroine of mine and because mk is dull.
2) Perhaps the thing I hate most about legal citation is the fact that the "See, e.g." gets italicized, and the case name following that signal gets italicized, but the comma coming between the signal and the case name is NOT italicized. I just had to get that off my chest.
3) Speaking of rivalries between two programs, neither of which is particularly awesome: the worst thing so far about working for the federal courts is their steadfast adherence to Wordperfect. Do law firms use wordperfect? I hate microsoft word as much as the next guy, but as FDR said of Somoza, "it's [MY] son of a bitch" and I just know it's quirks and foibles. Wordperfect seems to have been invented by sadists or demons.
4) I am going to start commenting on Unfogged more because I have slowly discovered that lurking is boring and unrewarding.
5) I wish I were not at work at 10:00 pm on a friday. Anyone else?
Posted by hallieflanagan | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 8:03 PM
You are a law clerk, and it's Friday night. You should not be sitting at your office computer. You should be sitting at home, at that computer, commenting on unfogged, and waiting for your girlfriend to arrive on her delayed flight, pretending to work on a novel you should have finished long ago.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 8:37 PM
I probably won't ever have to work this late again; this is very abnormal. Mostly, it's because the 6-month list is coming out at the end of the month-- and I'm new, so much slower at the normal daytime routine than I will be 6 months from now-- which slowness has been cutting into my daytime writing time and leaving me to write memoranda after everyone else has left. Also if I go home I'll be too tired for sex with my boyfriend and that is always depressing.
Posted by hallieflanagan | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 8:46 PM
that's a rather self-defeating attitude.
Posted by text | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 8:53 PM
135: I don't doubt you, but why is it fraud? The way I thought it went was that when lawyers do stuff for you that they bill you on their hourly rate for as long as they're doing stuff for you. So if they're spending 2 hours looking up stuff for you on Westlaw, why don't they get to bill you two hours?
As this probably makes clear, I don't know the first thing about how law firm billing works.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 9:17 PM
I think they still charge you the hourly rate for their time, Matt---it's just the additional fee (expense) for using one of the services gets passed along to the client as well, apparently at cost.
Posted by Chopper | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 9:22 PM
Oh, so the contrast is with adding on what Lexis/Westlaw would charge for per-hour use. Got it. (If I've got it.)
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 09-15-06 10:22 PM