Banish Citations From Main Text, Pleads Lawyer/Author

Legal writing should put case citations in footnotes, and keep those footnotes free of any discussion, argues Bryan Garner, president of LawProse Inc. and editor-in-chief of all current editions of Black’s Law Dictionary. Doing so would result in a tighter narrative and make documents easier to understand for lay audiences. The only reason citations are not relegated to footnotes,  Garner says, is that the format of legal writing was developed when lawyers were using typewriters.