Justice Scalia Bluntly Tells Lawyers How To Argue In Front of the Court

Oh this is too good.



As far as the use of contractions, Scalia and Garner have agreed to disagree, but the justice favors leaving them out of briefs. Scalia dubbed them "Jacobin" and argued they "pull everything down to the street level." He asked rhetorically, "Is any judge going to get mad because you don't use contractions?" In addition, Scalia said that legal writing with lots of italics tends to read "like a high school girl's diary."......

He counseled lawyers to look judges in the eye; when faced with a hypothetical panel of nine justices, advocates should not gaze solely at the ninth justice, who may be the swing vote in a 5-4 decision. "He will be embarrassed, and the other justices will be mad," Scalia explained.....

Scalia's pet peeve: when lawyers respond to a hypothetical example by saying it is "not this case." Going through his mind at that point, Scalia said, is the thought, "I know it's not this case, you idiot." But appellate judges must make decisions that govern many cases, not just the one before them, he explained.

LOL