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With double the length and coverage of the original, this new edition of A Dictionary of Modern Legal Usage (DMLU) thoroughly marshals and analyzes modern legal vocabulary. Since the first edition, Bryan A. Garner has drawn on his unrivaled experience as a legal editor to refine his positions on legal usage and to add a wealth of new material. Here's how Garner's revision makes DMLU, Second Edition indispensable: -- Updates every existing entry, making this a second edition in the fullest sense; -- Adds hundreds of new entries; -- Adds hundreds of new sections within existing entries; -- Adds over 3,000 new illustrative quotations from judicial opinions and leading lawbooks by prominent legal commentators; -- Reconsiders previously held positions, now saying, for example, that contractions are sometimes permissible in legal writing; -- Fully elaborates ideas only mentioned in the first edition; -- Takes into account numerous comments received from first edition users; -- Expands and updates cross-references to guide readers quickly and easily. Influential writers and editors rely on DMLU daily. Charles Alan Wright, for example, says, "I consult Garner regularly. He offers authoritative guidance on many matters of usage that are unique to legal writing....Garner is almost always pithy; he is often witty. Any lawyer, no matter how expert on words and language, is sure to learn from Garner's fine book." And the editors of Harvard Law Review have found it essential: "In a work worthy of comparison to Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage, Mr. Garner...sets forth an authoritative guide to American legal usage and style. All legal writers will find it an invaluable help; many law review editors will find it a source of delight. Don't confront your editor without it." Features: -- Functions both as a style guide and as a law dictionary -- Guides writers to distinguish between true terms of law and mere jargon -- Illustrates recommended forms of expression as well as common blunders with thousands of quotations and citations -- Explains the origins of expressions lawyers regularly use, such as Know all men by these presents, or party of the first part -- Records and evaluates more than 100 twentieth-century neologisms, from conclusory to farminor, from Mirandize to representee -- Distinguishes American from British usage and refers to current practice among Australian, Canadian, and Scottish legal writers -- Solves editorial problems by dealing with practical writing issues -- Offers wit and erudition reminiscent of H.W. Fowler, author of the first so-called usage dictionary. In short, in its Second Edition DMLU remains, as one reviewer hailed it in 1987, "truly unique in the literature of law." It is an essential resource for practicing lawyers, scholars of the law, and libraries of all sizes and types.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 949-951).
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Library Journal Review
Like the superb first edition (LJ 9/15/87), this new version of A Dictionary of Modern Legal Usage is loaded with well-documented (and even witty) definitions and examples of legal usage. With hundreds of new entries the dictionary now lists some 9000 legal words and phrases, including some Latin terms. It has also been widely updated and expanded to include several thousand new illustrative quotations, most of them cited to judicial opinions. A former lawyer and law professor and now a highly respected consultant on legal writing, Garner advises on "the many grammatical and stylistic questions that arise in legal writing." Many of these are problems of usage unique to law. This is primarily a guide to American usage, but American and British differences are carefully distinguished. Legal writers in particular will benefit from the information and advice here, and for readers, too, it makes an excellent supplement to law dictionaries. This dictionary sets the standard for legal usage. It is absolutely indispensable for law libraries, lawyers, and judges, and a wonderful addition to all academic and public library reference collections.Mary Jane Brustman, SUNY at Albany Libs. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
CHOICE Review
The second edition is an impressive enhancement of the original edition (CH, Apr'88), although the book jacket's claim that the work is "more than double the length and coverage of the original" is not quite met. The average length of definitions in the first and second editions is remarkably similar (92 and 94 words respectively). The first edition defines approximately 4,200 terms, the second about 7,230. Nevertheless, the work has clearly been improved. The entry for "habeas corpus" can serve as a fine example; in the first edition the term was dispatched in four lines, whereas the second edition provides 27 lines, including historical background. Many other terms have been similarly enhanced. Puzzling is the omission of "sexual harassment"; the first edition includes an entry under "harass" but omits a separate entry for "harassment," while in the second edition under "sex," readers are referred to "sexual," but again there is no "sexual harassment." The second edition provides an entry under "harassment," referring to the Senate hearings on the appointment of Justice Clarence Thomas. In a new feature, the second edition includes thousands of quotes as examples (all with full citations) selected from cases, books, and "other sources." A substantial number of see references are incorporated. Some terms receive extended coverage. Garner writes in the preface that he has chosen the "conservative side of usage and grammar," which he calls "informed conservatism." Garner's approach to legal language makes this resource essential to law and social science collections and to all levels of readers, including lawyers. G. R. Walden; Ohio State University
Booklist Review
The well-received Dictionary of Modern Legal Usage (1987) has been updated in this superior second edition. This dictionary of law usage and etymology, not just definitions, is written in a clear and concise style. The number of entries has almost doubled from the first edition, and additional illustrative quotations have been added with complete citations. New terms in this edition include remote relatives, reverse discrimination, gray mail, shadow jury, lynch law, and misconduct in the office. The entries are arranged alphabetically, interspersed with brief essays on issues of style, grammar and usage, legal lexicology, word formation, and punctuation. The initial words of these essays are capitalized to set them apart. So, for example, there is both a definition of forbid, forbade, forbidden with four quotations from cases or other law books and a discussion of forbidden words and phrases with a list of useless words--irregardless, wheresoever, etc. It is unfortunate that the introduction from the first edition was not reprinted in the new volume since it describes the purposes of the book--perhaps the most important is "to make legal writers sensitive to the aesthetic possibilities of their prose, to goad them into thinking more acutely about what works in a given context, and what does not." Even libraries that have the first edition should consider this new one, which is highly recommended for any law collection in public or academic libraries. (Reviewed Feb. 15, 1996)
