Matters that must be avoided in a Statement of Facts.

• Jurisdiction: United States

Section 28. Matters that must be avoided in a Statement of Facts.—Below, in Section 83, under the heading of "Things You Cannot Afford to Do," are collected four outstanding horribles in brief-writing: inexcusable inaccuracy, unsupported hyperbole, unwarranted screaming, and personalities and scandalous matter.

Most of these unpardonables crop up in portions of the brief other than the Statement of Facts; and, at least in my experience, even the most unprofessionally unprofessional inaccuracy is generally met with in the argument portion of the brief (after the writer's ardor has really been inflamed).

Subject to what is said—and collected—in Section 83, a common fault in many Statements of Facts is the tendency to argue and to editorialize. These are faults, because a court reading a statement wants to feel that it is getting the facts, and not the advocate's opinion, comments, or contentions.

Here are some examples of argumentation included in Statements of Facts, taken quite at random, and followed by comments:

(a) It is perfectly apparent from a cursory reading of the decision of the Commission (see particularly pp. 489a-499a) and of the Court (R. 597-601) as against the relevant portions of the testimony (61a-182a) that the decision of both Commission and Court is based upon the social philosophy inherent in the "no profit to affiliates" theory, and not on the record facts which the...