So, the nerdgasm continues. "The Goldilocks Brief" could be the name for a best-selling thriller that would make me quite wealthy.

But it's not.

It's just the name I have given to one of my brief templates that is not too hot, and not too cold, but (maybe) just right.

In the wake of my Extreme Makeover and Matthew Butterick's Extreme Makeover of the Supreme Court's opinion in Comptroller v. Attorney General (pdf), we received several comments along the lines of:

Wow, that's extreme.

Several even questioned whether there was a happy medium short of going to full on SCOTUS typography with wide margins, 11 point font etc.

There is, and it's the Goldilocks Brief. After the jump, the Goldilocks Brief is explained.

The Goldilocks Brief is not too much like a typewritten term paper. But it is not too much like a SCOTUS brief either. It's just right.

These are the choices that go into a Goldilocks Brief:

  • I use a book font like Century Schoolbook for body text. Footnotes are one or two points smaller.
  • For contrast and readability, I use Helvetica for headings
  • Double spacing is not required in our trial courts, but a judge might object to single spacing, thinking I was trying to put one over on him or her with excessive length. So I use 1.5 line spacing. It still looks fine but more readable.
  • Margins are 1.5 inches on the side to shorten the line length.
  • The wider margins and shorter line length and book font all combine (I hope) to make a very readable product.

And with those choices made, THIS (pdf) is what the cover of the brief looks like and HERE (pdf) is an example of body text and headings.

I have taken to using my Goldilocks template in state trial court proceedings where double spacing is not required by rules leftover from the vestiges of the typewriter era. Not only is it highly readable, it seems shorter too, which is a good thing for your audience.

And I just like the way it looks.

What do you think?

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