Legal drafting is a specialized practice that necessitates the experience of a seasoned attorney and/or paralegal, one that has exceptional writing abilities. Because legal drafts are such an important part of any case, law companies always use competent writers to create them. In essence, drafting legal documents is concerned with being legally accurate while remaining relevant to the subject matter. Understanding of audience, transparency, sequence, and rationality are the four most essential components of legal writing and drafting. Here, we will take a look at each of these characteristics one by one.
Essential elements of legal drafting?
- Understanding your audience
You won’t be able to communicate with your audience until you know who you’re talking to. The attorneys, the jury, and the parties engaged in the case make up your audience in any legal matter. While your strategy stays the same for attorneys and juries, it alters dramatically in the case of parties. As an agreement drafting expert, your tone and word choice should be understandable to all parties. As a result, you should devote some time to learning about your intended audience.
- Transparency/Clarity
Every word counts in legal documents online; therefore, your choice of words should not only be exact but also express the idea clearly. A factor that contributes to the documents and drafts lack of clarity is the usage of confusing terms and phrases. You can delegate legal drafting preparation services to a professional vendor if you aren’t an expert on clarity or any other component of legal drafts.
- Chronology and sequence
When it comes to writing the specifics of an event, chronology is extremely important. It should be factual and organized logically. For example, if you’re drafting documents about a heist, you should either begin with the events leading up to the crime or begin with the robbery itself and work your way down to the circumstances before it. If the dates and days are important, make sure to write everything down in great detail.
- Logic and rationality
Whatever you write in your legal draft should make sense and be understandable to your intended audience. If the case may finally go to a jury, it is even more critical to present the facts in a logical order. This is because the jury does not have time to go through lengthy paragraphs to comprehend the rationale behind the information. You must make sure that whatever you write in your legal draft should be logical, reasonable, and understandable. There is no room for difficult vocabulary or lengthy writing if this takes away from the ability to easily comprehend the facts of what you are trying to present.
You may become a successful legal drafting expert if you retain these characteristics in your work. The good news is that mastering these components isn’t tough; all you must do is keep them in mind and they’ll become second nature to you in no time.