Legal Writing Program

Elective Courses

In the 4th through 6th semesters, in addition to a seminar, students often take one or more of the following electives:

Advanced Legal Research

The purpose of the course is to develop research skills in both print and electronic legal research resources. The course covers state and federal judicial, legislative and administrative materials as well as the use of finding tools, legal commentary, forms and trial preparation resources. Effective use of computer-assisted legal research is emphasized.

Advanced Litigation Drafting

This course explores technical and strategic issues in the drafting of litigation documents such as briefs, complaints, answers, written discovery, affidavits, discovery schedules, pretrial orders, jury charges, releases and correspondence. It addresses the use and misuse of form books, the viability of the "plain English" movement, and the view of good legal writing from the perspective of the Bench. During the course, students develop their own form file for their future use.

Advanced Persuasive Writing

This course explores principles of persuasion drawn from cognitive psychology, classical rhetoric, literary technique, modern advertising technique, and ethics. The class examines the relationship between these theories and strategies of persuasion and a lawyer's work as an advocate.

Advanced Transactional Drafting

This course covers issues surrounding the drafting of business-related documents such as wills, contracts, legislation, etc. The course addresses the use and misuse of form books and the viability of the "plain English" movement. The course will offer students practical instruction about various areas of a general business practice. At the end of the semester, students will have sample documents to use as templates in the future, as well as checklists for drafting additional documents.

Appellate Practice & Procedure

This course covers topics of appellate procedure and the documents that correspond with the stages of an appeal. Reading for the course includes law review articles on topics pertaining to appellate legal writing. Time permitting, the course explores several principles of persuasion from the study of rhetoric, cognitive psychology, and jurisprudence. Students make a presentation, do periodic small writing assignments, and take an examination.

Pretrial Practice

Students will examine and use the tools of civil discovery. Working in teams, they plan and implement a discovery program, including interrogatories, document requests, requests for admission, a request for sanctions, objections to discovery requests and the like. They also write a brief and argue one major pretrial motion.

Judicial Field Placement

The student will perform research and writing assignments for his or her judge and is expected to attend hearings, trials, and other proceedings. The student is expected to keep a contemporaneous journal of the court's activities and to turn it in at the end of the internship. The journal's contents should be edited to maintain confidences and otherwise to comply with the ethical and professional obligations of the intern to the court. Each student completes a minimum of 120 hours of service for his or her judge. The course also includes a classroom component. The class meets weekly and covers topics and readings.

Independent Research & Writing

With the approval of a full-time faculty member, an upper-division student may register for independent research and writing. An independent research and writing project is normally undertaken for two hours credit, but in appropriate cases the supervising faculty member may approve registration for one or three hours credit. Credit will be awarded, in the discretion of the supervising faculty member, on either a graded or pass/fail basis, upon the completion of a written product suitable for submission for publication.

Advanced Writing Group

Each section of this course is limited to six students and meets one hour a week. Most weeks the group responds to a piece of writing, sometimes a piece written by a group member and sometimes a piece written by a lawyer or other author. The group reads examples of good writing; reads and edits examples of weak writing; works on selected topics of grammar and style; and studies advanced writing techniques. Enrollment is limited to students in the Legal Writing Certificate Program.

Real Estate Finance

This course surveys the financial issues attendant to the closing of a real estate transaction. The course will cover planning and zoning, a behind-the-scenes look at the bank's perspective on the secondary mortgage market, the mechanics of searching a title for transfer of ownership, closing a real estate transaction, and tax-deferred exchanging. Students search a real estate title and draft intent letters and lien instruments.

Law Review

Members of the Mercer Law Review staff and Editorial Board earn academic credit for each year served on the Review. Upon satisfactory completion of the writing, editing, and other work required for each category of Law Review membership, credit is awarded by the faculty advisor upon the recommendation of the Editor-in-Chief.

Moot Court Board

Upper-level students are eligible for the Moot Court Board. Board members are selected based primarily on their performance in Legal Writing II. They earn academic credit for representing the Law School in various state, regional, and national moot court competitions.