Re: "Each and Every" and "Whether or Not"

[Roy Jacobsen <royj -at- writingclearandsimple -dot- com>]

The thing about those "legal" doublets and triplets--and most 
"legalese," in fact--is that, legally speaking, they're not necessary. A 
document written in plain English can be just as legally binding as one 
clogged up with lawyerly gobbledygook.

No, IANAL (I Am Not A Lawyer), but I was told this by Joseph Kimble, 
Thomas Cooley Law School professor and editor-in-chief of The Scribes 
Journal of Legal Writing. (I interviewed Kimble for The Editorial Eye. 
For what it's worth, you can read the interview here: 
*http://tinyurl.com/2h8lzx)
*
Back to the subject of technical documentation, I tend to delete such 
doublets whenever I find them.

Roy Jacobsen
Writing, Clear and Simple
http://rmjacobsen.squarespace.com

Stuart Burnfield wrote:
> David Crystal has this to say in his excellent book, 'The Stories of 
> English' (pub. Allen Lane, 2004):
>
> "As the profession of the law became regularized during the thirteenth 
> century, French replaced Latin as the primary language of legal 
> expression... Then , during the fifteenth century, law French was 
> gradually replaced by law English.
> ...
> The problem was: how can tradition be respected yet precision maintained 
> when there are three languages competing for attention?
> ...
> The solution, in many cases, was: don't choose; use both. In Middle 
> English we see the rise of the legal lexical doublets which would become 
> one of the stylistic hallmarks of that profession. Old English _goods_ 
> and Old English _chattels_ resulted in Middle English legalese _goods 
> and chattels_."
>
> Crystal gives examples of such doublets (fit and proper; acknowledge and 
> confess) and triplets (give, devise, and bequeath; right, title, and 
> interest) and goes on to say:
>
> "And it was not long before the habit of doubling became extended to 
> pairs of words regardless of their language of origin... In _have and 
> hold_, _let or hindrance_, and _each and every_, English words are 
> together."
>
> Stuart
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>   
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