Chapter 10Free sample

Law Review & Academic Writing

Footnotes, journal rules, short forms and cite-checking for law reviews.

An article argues above the line and proves its case below it. Readers mine the notes for research, editors test every one, and a judge who cites the article may follow a note back to its source. So each footnote has two jobs: lead a stranger to the exact page, and show which of your words that page supports. Both diagrams come from one 2026 article, which cites Brent Ferguson’s Predictive Facts in full in note 153 and comes back to it by a short form in note 355.

Tomer Kenneth, In Defense of Factual Precedents, 93 U. Chi. L. Rev. 1367, 1389 n.153, 1429 n.355 (2026).

An article cited in full in a footnote (note 153)

Brent Ferguson, Predictive Facts, 95 Wash. L. Rev. 1621, 1624 (2020).

1 author, as the byline prints the name
2 title in italics, from the first page
3 volume
4 journal, abbreviated, in large and small capitals
5 first page
6 pinpoint: the page that holds the words
7 year of the volume

The same article by a short form, 202 notes later (note 355)

Ferguson, supra note 153, at 1659.

8 the author’s surname alone
9 supra, in italics: cited above
10 the note that holds the full citation
11 “at” and the new page