Looking at the Most Influential Writers Before the U.S. Supreme Court

What’s the most effective writing style for lawyers filing briefs before the U.S. Supreme Court?

“I’d say relatively short sentences, with a non-confrontational tone,” said Adam Feldman, a Ph.D. candidate in political science and international relations at the University of Southern California, who has become an expert on the matter.

This year, Feldman studied 9,400 merits briefs and their respective Supreme Court opinions from 1946 to 2013, and found a number of trends. In an academic paper titled, “Who Wins in the Supreme Court? An Examination of Attorney and Law Firm Influence,” Feldman lays out his findings, including which lawyers and ...