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For most law students, at some point in your law school career you’ll have to write a Note or Comment (possibly for publication). It may seem impossible to pick just one topic to focus your time on (you will work on this paper for a really long time), but Stephanie Martin — a third-year law student who is very familiar with this dilemma — has some excellent advice to share. Take it away Stephanie…
Every year, law students around the country take on another task on top of the “regular” tasks of keeping up with classes and extracurricular activities—participating on a journal. Schools structure their writing and editing processes differently, but the requirement of writing an article for publication is pretty much universal. So every year, law students around the country must dive into the process of Topic Selection.
Choosing a topic on which you will spend a lot of time writing is never an easy task, even in writing for a class. However, classes usually have a limited subject area that narrows down the pool of topics from which students can choose. Writing for a journal often seems more daunting because the potential topics seem virtually limitless. At the same time, a lot of scholarship is written on all topics, which narrows down the scope of potential original topics. These factors coincide to make it both (very!) time consuming and difficult for students effectively to contribute an original thought.
While there are many resources out there, it seems that every new wave of student writers faces the same dilemma.
Aggregating some of these resources into one guide may help alleviate some of that stress.
One resource that is helpful in choosing a topic, and the writing process generally, is Eugene Volokh’s Academic Legal Writing (See excerpt here). A relatively short work, Academic Legal Writing provides a concise body of advice on the writing process. First-time writers will find it especially helpful.
Some other suggestions (some of which are contained in Volokh’s book):
- Check your casebooks. Casebooks, especially in the notes following cases, often identify places where scholarship is lacking.
- Ask professors, especially those who teach in the area on which you want to write. It is a great way to connect with faculty, and they are well versed in both their area of expertise and in the student writing process.
- Ask practitioners, whether they work at your internship, or you meet them elsewhere, or even if you cold-call them (always being respectful of their time). Like professors, they see the issues you are considering come up every day, and know where the scholarship is lacking. And what a great way to start building a network in your field of interest!
- Attend events at your school or elsewhere in your area, such as panel discussions on a topic of interest. They may illuminate some areas for potential research.
I can’t recommend the above suggestions enough.
However, if you’d like to expand your pool of research, here are some online resources:
- The National Law Review.
- ABA or local bar association sites that concentrate on specific practice areas. Check out their areas of scholarship as well as webinars or events they are hosting.
- Many law firms have blogs of their own that concentrate on certain areas. They often highlight new statutes or a recent case and talk about some of its effects. This is great fodder for longer articles. Many also list the practitioners who wrote the piece, who would probably have great ideas for exploring the topic further.
- Don’t underestimate the value of Twitter! Many ideas and legal trends are shared on Twitter. Follow those users that tweet legal news, and you’ll quickly get a feel for emerging trends. Start with institutional users like the ABA and seek out other users in your area of interest.
- LexisNexis and Westlaw also have sections devoted to emerging legal issues.
- Many will also tell you to visit the Circuit Splits blog. While this is an excellent resource, a word of caution is in order. First, this site is widely known, and many other students will also be reading it, looking for inspiration. Second, the fact that these circuit splits exist often means that the Supreme Court will review the issue soon. In either of these cases, an article based on those issues may be preempted by another article or a court decision. It is a great site, but use it with these considerations in mind.
A final word of caution–these are all great resources that can help you find a topic. However, above all, the only way you will find a worthy topic is time. Do not underestimate the time it takes to find topics and make sure someone else hasn’t written about it. Only through thorough research will you be able to find the perfect topic.
Happy writing!
—
Thanks Stephanie!
Stephanie Martin is a third-year law student, a native New Yorker but glad to study law right where it’s made, in Washington DC. She is interested in commercial law and civil litigation. She enjoys cooking and learning to golf. She plans to return to the New York metro area to begin her law career. Stephanie blogs about the law school experience at apparentauthority.wordpress.
Check out these other helpful posts:
- Why is Law School Hard?
- Five Tips for a Great Legal Writing Assignment
- Pay Attention in Class-It Can Save You Time!
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