Update Exhibit Numbering in MS Word Automatically

Getting the numbering (or lettering) of exhibits in a brief can be maddening. Whether you have a brief referencing numerous exhibits, or are working with an attorney that decides to add and/or remove exhibits shortly before the filing deadline, putting the numbering or lettering in order and avoiding gaps can be a time consuming and frustrating experience. MS Word can automate the process by entering codes to keep track of the sequence of exhibits and account for insertions or deletions.

In MS Word 2016, follow these steps:

1. On the Reference tab, click on 'Insert Caption'.

2. In the dialog box which appears click on 'New Label' and add 'Exhibit', 'Ex.', 'Exh.' as necessary.

3. Click on 'Numbering' where you can choose either standard numbering; Roman numerals, or Latin letters.

4. If you have trouble getting the exhibit references to use the same font as the rest of the document, open up Styles (press CTRL + ALT + SHIFT + S) and right click on 'Caption' to modify the font.

5. Word will enter SEQ codes in the document.

6. If you press ALT + F9, the code references will be swapped with the actual exhibit references.

7. After removing an exhibit reference, update the SEQ codes by selecting all of the text in the document, right clicking, and hitting 'Update Field'

8. The exhibit references update automatically.

Listing a Demand for Jury Trial in Pleading Titles

The rules for many federal and state courts require that a party demanding a jury trial indicate this demand in the title of their pleading.

See for example the Local Rules of Practice in Civil Proceedings before the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, which state that:

"When a demand for jury trial is included in a pleading, the demand must be set forth at the end of the pleading. When the demand is made by a party who is represented by counsel, the pleading must be signed by the attorney for the party making the demand. In the caption of such pleading, immediately following the title of the pleading, the following must appear: 'DEMAND FOR JURY TRIAL.'" N.D. Cal. Civil L.R. 3-6(a).

The Local Rules of United States Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Florida state that:

"(c) Demand for Jury Trial. If demand for jury trial is contained within a pleading, the title of the pleading shall include the words 'Demand for Jury Trial' or the equivalent." Bankr. M.D. Fla. Local Rule 9004-1.

The Local Rules of Civil Practice and Procedure of the United States District Court for the District of Delaware state that:

"If a party demands a jury trial by endorsing it on a pleading, as permitted by Fed. R. Civ. P. 38(b) , a notation shall be placed in the caption of the pleading stating 'Demand For Jury Trial' or the equivalent. This notation will serve as a sufficient demand under Fed. R. Civ. P. 38(b)." D. Del. LR 38.1

Note that the courts' local rules specify how they should be cited to, and the form of citation varies.

Fed. R. Civ. P. 38(b) requires that a jury demand be made in writing no later than 14 days after the last pleading directed to the issue is served, and states that this demand may be included in the pleading itself.

The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York has posted Instructions for Filing a Complaint which reference a form complaint and state that:

"You should indicate on the first page of the complaint whether you want a jury trial by checking either 'yes' or 'no' in the top right corner of the first page of the complaint."

The Michigan Court Rules of 1985 state that:

"A party may include the demand in a pleading if notice of the demand is included in the caption of the pleading." MCR Rule 2.508.

Online Database of SCOTUS Decisions

The Washington University School of Law has posted an online database of decisions by the Supreme Court of the United States. An updated version of the database was released in August 2018. There is a case centered and a justice centered version of the database. The database contains 200 hundred data points for each decision issued since 1791. It's split into two parts: The modern database has decisions issued since 1946; the legacy version covers 1791 to 1945. The data can be downloaded as an Excel spreadsheet. It was formerly known as the Spaeth database.

Alternate forms of the database are posted with a row for each legal citation, each case docket, or each issue. The spreadsheet makes use of numeric codes, which are listed in the Codebook posted here.

In this example, I've filtered the spreadsheet by the code for Miranda warnings, 10100

There are other numeric codes for individual justices; the particular Article, Section, Paragraphs, and Amendments of the Constitution at issue; the court which is the source of the case; and several other fields.

You can search an online version of the database here. It presents the collected data for each case.