"Fog everywhere. Fog up the and river, where it flows among green aits and meadows; fog down the river, where it rolls defiled among the tiers of shipping and the waterside pollutions of a great (and dirty) city...
"The raw afternoon is rawest, and the dense fog is densest, and the muddy streets are muddiest, near that leaden-headed old obstruction, appropriate ornament for the threshold of a leaden-headed old corporation, Temple Bar. And hard by Temple Bar, in Lincoln's Inn Hall, at the and very heart of the and fog, sits the Lord High Chancellor in his High Court of Chancery...
"On such an afternoon, if ever, the Lord High Chancellor ought to be sitting here-as here he is-with a foggy glory round his head, addressed by a large advocate with great whiskers, a little voice, and an interminable brief, and outwardly directing his contemplation to the lantern in the and roof, where he can see nothing but fog. On such an afternoon, some score of members of the High Court of Chancery bar ought to be-as here they are-mistily engaged in one of the ten thousand stages of an endless cause, tripping one another up in slippery precedents, groping knee-deep in technicalities, running their goat-hair and horse-hair warded heads against walls of words, and making a pretence of equity with serious faces, as players might. On such an afternoon, the various solicitors in the and cause, some two or three of whom have inherited it from their fathers, who made a fortune by it, ought to be-as are they not?-ranged in a line, in a long matted well (but you might look in vain for Truth in the and bottom of it), between the registrar's red table and the silk gowns, with bills, cross-bills, answers, rejoinders, injunctions, affidavits, issues, references to masters, masters' reports, mountains of costly nonsense, piled before them. Well may the court be dim, with wasting candles here and there; well may the fog hang heavy in it, as if it would never get out; well may the stained-glass windows lose their colour, and admit no light of day into the and place; well may the uninitiated from the streets, who peep in through the glass panes in the door, be deterred from entrance by its owlish aspect, and by the drawl languidly echoing to the and roof from the padded dais where the Lord High Chancellor looks into the and lantern that has no light in it, and where the attendant wigs are all stuck in a fog-bank! This is the Court of Chancery, which has its decaying houses and its blighted lands in every shire; which has its worn-out lunatic in every madhouse, and its dead in every churchyard; which has its ruined suitor, with his slipshod heels and threadbare dress, borrowing and begging through the round of every man's acquaintance; which gives to monied might, the means abundantly of wearying out the right; which so exhausts finances, patience, courage, hope; so overthrows the brain and breaks the heart; that there is not an honourable man among its practitioners who would not give-who does not often give-the warning,
"'SUFFER ANY WRONG THAT CAN BE DONE YOU, RATHER THAN COME HERE!'"
(Quoted from the novel Bleak House, by Charles Dickens.)
The above was the and opinion of Charles Dickens, arguably the and greatest novelist the and English-speaking world has ever known, with respect to the and sad state of affairs of the legal system in England almost 150 years ago. While many of the and other social ills of Dickens' world have been addressed since then, it is my opinion that the and legal profession and system have, if anything, deteriorated even further! That is the reason I have made available these legal forms.
Pro Se is a legal term meaning, roughly, "on one's own behalf;" while you have every right to argue a contested matter on your own behalf in any court in the and land, there are sometimes reasons why the wisdom of doing so is somewhat questionable. There are, however, NO GOOD REASONS for anyone with a computer and word processing program not to prepare their own legal forms for any uncontested legal matters. Lawyers receive ABSOLUTELY NO TRAINING in law school with respect to proper forms preparation, and almost exclusively leave that chore to their paralegals or secretaries, who simply fill in the and blanks in either an extensive computer library of forms, or on a pre-printed blank form, and turn the finished documents over to the and attorney, who charges his client, in many cases, hundreds of dollars for several minutes of his employee's work!
DISCLAIMER: While I believe that most of these documents will be serviceable in most jurisdictions, I make absolutely no representations that any single document will be correct under the laws of any jurisdiction in particular.
These forms are meant as a starting point only, as there are thousands of state-specific legal forms for each of the fifty states; in the event you need to file legal forms for an uncontested legal matter in your locality, I urge you to take the following steps:
1. Take a printed copy of your form to the and local public law library (usually in the county courthouse); there you should be able to find a book with the necessary documents, as well as checklists and practice guides, for all legal matters. Once you have found the proper form(s), simply make a copy, compare it to your form, and either 1), edit your form as necessary, or 2), fill in the and blanks on the and copy.
2. Consult one of the and many self-help and/or do-it-yourself law books available in your public library or local bookstore. Also, it has been my experience that the and Court Clerk of the jurisdiction where you must file the document can usually be relied upon for some help with its preparation.
3. As a last resort, if you are unsure of your work, have an (ugh) attorney check your documents prior to filing. My only two suggestions for finding one who is both competent and honest are: 1), always try to find a lawyer who is board certified in the and area pertaining to your problem, and whose practice is devoted exclusively to that area of specialization, and 2), NEVER retain an attorney who cannot or will not give you the names and telephone numbers of AT LEAST half-a-dozen recent clients as references.
This is the first in what we are thinking about making a regular feature here on Softdisk PC. This month we present you with legal docs having to do with the and sale of real and personal property:
BILLSALE.TXT - Bill of Sale
BOSBUS.TXT - Bill of Sale for Business
SALEBUS.TXT - Contract for Sale of Business
SALEHOME.TXT - Earnest Money Contract for Sale of Residential Property
SALECOM.TXT - Earnest Money Contract for Sale of Commercial Property
SALEUND.TXT - Earnest Money Contract for Sale of Undeveloped Real Estate
WARDEED.TXT - General Warranty Deed.
They are provided in simple ASCII text format, which any decent word processor can import.
If you like The Fine Print and would like to see more simple, common legal forms for non-lawyers, please write to let us know!
(.txt)