Academic Legal Writing - Eugene Volokh [29]
It's also 2005 Arkansas, 2002 Georgia, 2005 Louisiana, 2004 Minnesota, 2005 Mississippi, 2006 New York, 2005 North Carolina, 1996 Pennsylvania, 2004 South Carolina, 1997 Tennessee, and 2000 Texas. In 2000, the Mississippi Supreme Court ordered a mother to take her child to church each week, reasoning that “it is certainly to the best interests of [the child] to receive regular and systematic spiritual training”; in 1996, the Arkansas Supreme Court did the same, partly on the grounds that weekly church attendance, rather than just the once-every-two-weeks attendance that the child would have had if he went only with the other parent, provides superior “moral instruction.”
This is risky: The first three paragraphs are a story from early 1800s England, introducing an article about modern American law. The item that shocks some readers and shows the relevance of the piece—that some American courts even today prefer more religious parents over less religious ones—begins in the fourth paragraph. A safer way of starting an article on this subject might be:
Throughout the country, from Michigan to Mississippi to Pennsylvania, child custody decisions often prefer the more religious parent, or the more churchgoing parent. This, I will argue, generally violates the Establishment Clause and the Free Speech Clause. Courts generally ought not be allowed to consider a parent's religiosity even as part of the best interests analysis....
or maybe
Throughout the country, from Michigan to Mississippi to Pennsylvania, child custody decisions often prefer the more religious parent, or the more churchgoing parent. Some, for instance, count against a parent his “not regularly attend[ing] church and present[ing] no evidence demonstrating any willingness or capacity to attend to religion with [his children].” Some order parents to go to church, for instance by giving a parent custody only on condition that he “will agree to present a plan to the Court of how [he] is going to commence providing some sort of spiritual opportunity for the [children] to learn about God while in [his] custody.”
This, I will argue, generally violates the Establishment Clause and the Free Speech Clause. Courts generally ought not be allowed to consider a parent's religiosity even as part of the best interests analysis....
On the other hand, Shelley is a famous poet, and cases involving famous historical figures tend to be interesting. The story is dramatic—abandonment, suicide, an affair with the author of Frankenstein. And introducing the story helps persuade readers by leading them to think “what an unfortunate, archaic way of thinking” and then springing on them the continuing presence of this thinking. (“Shelley's case may look like something out of another time and place. That time and place, it turns out, is 2005 Michigan ....”).
So the story is vivid enough that it will likely keep the reader's attention for three paragraphs. And it's relevant enough that it will likely help frame the problem and persuade the reader. If you have a story that is vivid, relevant, fairly short, and not yet cliché, it may be a good way to start the article.
4. Start with a concrete but vivid hypothetical that illustrates your point
You can also start with a concrete but vivid hypothetical, or a set of hypotheticals that you want to compare with each other.
Four women are in deadly peril.
Alice is seven months pregnant, and the pregnancy threatens her life; doctors estimate her chance of death at 20%. Her fetus has