The Poetry of Law

This article examines the literature of statutory drafting. This underappreciated genre is perhaps the last place one would expect to find a sensitive soul struggling to escape the prison house of language. Yet the economic realities facing today\u27s graduate students mean that many former lit majors will find their way onto legislative drafting committees, whence they peek out at us from under the sub-sections of their lives. It is time that this genre was formally recognized. Of course, its artists struggle against the challenge of the form and their achievements must be measured in millimeters rather than miles. This article offers a brief catalogue of the technique and art of statutory poetry, with examples