Sarcasm and bitterness.

• Jurisdiction: United States

Section 131. Sarcasm and bitterness.—Anything in the nature of sarcasm or bitterness is in the nature of a personality, because it injects an emotional element into what should be essentially an intellectual difference of opinion. Hence these also are improper and should be avoided.

On occasion the temptation to indulge in either or both is a strong one. In my own experience, I probably yielded to both emotions in the original argument of the first court-martial cases; ⁴⁸ some examples—fairly horrible examples, too—are noted in the margin.⁴⁹ I will not say that these cases could or would have been won on the first hearing had a more objective and dispassionate argument then been made, but the items referred to—and there were others of the same nature—did not help my cause, and in the cold, clear, and infinitely painful light of the morning after the original decisions, I became more and more aware of the probable harm that these expressions of personal resentment had done.

Once more to stress the obvious, in an appellate court emotion must have an intellectual foundation on which to rest, and it is far better for the tribunal to be moved to a sense of outrage on its own...