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Apply elite legal writing techniques drawn from Justice Kagan, Boies & Olson, and other top advocates to any legal document — briefs, submissions, letters, opinions, memos, or persuasive correspondence. This skill covers both prose craft (clarity, examples, parallel construction, voice, quoting) and architectural strategy (argument sequencing, framing, openings, endings).
Passed 20 of 22 test cases with the skill, and 13 of 22 without it.
and 4 more in the full report
7 fixed13 passed either way2 still failing0 broke
Tokens, turns and time describe resource use, not a dollar price.
One of 7 test cases the skill fixed. Same model, same prompt, with and without the skill.
Draft a paragraph illustrating why government installation of automated license plate readers on quiet residential streets violates reasonable expectations of privacy.
| Checked | Without skill | With skill |
|---|---|---|
| The passage presents a concrete narrative hypothetical before stating the legal privacy rule. | Missed | Passed |
The instructions your model reads when the skill loads.
This skill distills the techniques that separate serviceable legal writing from writing that actually moves people — judges, tribunals, opposing counsel, clients. The principles come from close study of Justice Kagan's opinions and dissents, the advocacy of David Boies and Ted Olson, and the analytical framework of Ross Guberman. They apply to any legal document that needs to persuade.
The skill is organised into two parts: Architecture (how to structure and sequence your arguments) and Craft (how to write the sentences and paragraphs themselves). Use both. Architecture without craft produces outlines; craft without architecture produces beautiful paragraphs that don't land.
The opening paragraph is the most important paragraph in any legal document. Its job is not to summarise — it is to frame. The reader should finish your opening having already absorbed your conclusion, even before you argue for it.
There are two proven approaches, and which one you choose depends on your role:
The Syllogistic Opening (for opinions, submissions, and analytical documents)
State the issue, state the opposing position, and then state the principle that defeats it — all in two or three sentences. The reader experiences the conclusion as inevitable. Kagan does this in Florida v. Harris: issue, lower court holding, governing standard — done. The holding sounds unreasonable before she has argued a word against it.
When drafting: write your opening last, after you know your strongest argument. Then compress that argument into a frame that makes the other side's position sound untenable on its face.
The Binary Opening (for advocacy and persuasive correspondence)
Force the reader to choose between two starkly different characterisations of the dispute. Boies and Olson do this by juxtaposing "hypothesized uncertainty" against deprivation of a constitutional right "for years." The imbalance is baked into the framing before any argument
test cases passed, vs 13 / 22 without
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