GUIDELINES

The following guidelines may be helpful to you in beginning to draft

a contract:

1. Reconcile yourself to writing many drafts of the contract to get it right.

If you try to get all the details right in the first draft, you are likely to
miss some important larger points.
2. Use clear, simple, businesslike language. Much progress has been
made in this area, particularly in the areas of insurance and finance.
Be careful not to slip back into overuse of “legalese”. Use only the
technical terms you need and define them if necessary.
3. Make each clause do one thing, not more. Outlines can help you here
by breaking down the whole contract into a series of small points.
4. When revising, check for ambiguities:

a. Check to make sure that you have used only one term for one item
or person. Referring to the same person, item or concept by two
different terms creates an ambiguity that invites misunderstandings
later. If needed, include a definition section to define all your key
terms, so that the reader understands any unusual terms.
b. Check also to be sure that you have not used one term for several
different items or persons. This can create unwanted ambiguities.

5. After polishing each clause in the contract, reread the document as a

whole, looking for larger contradictions between parts of the contract,
rather than wording problems within one clause. In your concern for
the details, you may have overlooked some larger ambiguities.

6. Somewhere along the way, consult others. No one person can imagine
all the pitfalls that the parties to any contract are hoping to avoid. No
one person can imagine all the ways some reader can misconstrue a
point.

IMPORTANCE OF MULTIPLE DRAFTS

Always try to write more than one draft of any given legal piece. Let the first
draft be creative, thorough and imperfect.
Include everything you think necessary to the piece and all things that you
think might be useful. Then use second, third, fourth and other drafts for
rewriting, revising, and polishing.

GUIDELINES FOR REVISING DRAFTS OF CONTRACTS

Revising occurs after rewriting in the writing process. Revising concentrates
on small-scale organization, sentence structure, transitions, paragraphing,
grammar, and punctuation.
There are two things to remember about revising. First, do not revise while
you write; this slows down both the writing and the revising processes.
When you are writing, concentrate solely on your ideas, no matter how
unpolished your writing may seem. Revise later. Second, when you revise,
do it in stages. It is exhausting and inefficient to try to revise on every level
at once. Use your time for revising to move from general writing problems to
more specific ones.

1. ACCURACY: No amount of readability will replace accuracy, so make

sure you check first for the content of each legal point.

Ask yourself the following questions:

a. Is the content accurately stated?
b. Could any points be misunderstood because of ambiguity?
c. Are irrelevant facts or other irrelevant information excluded?
d. Are terms of art used correctly?
e. Are key terms used correctly?
f. Are paraphrases accurate?
g. Are names of parties and their status correct?
h. Are the citations accurate?

2. ORGANIZATION:
a. Are paragraphs internally logical?
b. Are there clear and precise transitions between paragraphs and
sentences?

3. READABILITY:
a. Are subjects and verbs close together?
b. Are unnecessary modifiers eliminated?
c. Are sentences not overly long?
d. Are lists clearly structured?
e. Are unnecessary prepositional phrases eliminated?
f. Is the text generally concise?

4. STYLE:
a. Is style consistent?
b. Is the tone and level of formality appropriate and consistent?