I received an e-mail informing me of the death of an alumni of the firm where I articled.

I was saddened by that news – he was a very nice guy – but also (albeit in a less significant way) by the writer’s choice of words.

The Latin singular is alumnus, meaning a foster-son – but also any male child who is a ward, charge or pupil.

By extension, alumnus came to be applied in the USA to former pupils or students. When universities went co-ed, the Latin alumna (foster-daughter, ward etc.) was available.

The plural of alumnus is …

This prefix is overused.

Certainly in co-conspirator, where it is unnecessary, as co- and con- both import the notion of joint action.

That doesn’t stop US legislators from perpetuating the redundancy, however: see, for example, Rule 801 of the Federal Rules of Evidence (where – strike two! – it is spelt without a hyphen).

Co­- also appears a lot in modern job titles: She is co-head of the financial services practice group or The firm appointed two new co-managing partners.

This isn’t wrong, but somehow it’s not pretty – especially where the shared position has two elements like …

We’ve already covered the awful reference when refer to is meant (but I seem to be losing the battle in getting people to use the latter).

Two new horrors crossed the radar recently. One is reference again, but used to mean checking a candidate’s references for employment purposes. Ugh.

The second is cascade.

This is unobjectionable when used to describe what water in the fountains at Versailles does (when the fountains are actually on).

But please don’t repeat this horror in relation to e-mail: Feel free to cascade this within your organization.

One coinage I do like, and …

Library and Archives Canada (LAC) recently updated its historical Canada Gazette database to improve the search experience. This database contains the issues of the Canada Gazette published between 1841 (when it replaced the Upper Canada Gazette and the Lower Canada Gazette) and 1997. For issues of the Canada Gazette from 1998 on, go to the Canada Gazette website.

The improved keyword search means that it is easier to find orders-in-council and SI/SORs by entering their numbers into “All these words” in the Advanced Search. Searches can also be limited by publication (e.g. Canada Gazette, Part I) …

While researching using CanLII, are you looking for documents containing one word or phrase but not another? Or maybe you are looking for documents containing an exact phrase?

Never fear, operators are here to help!

What are operators and how do I use them?

Operators are words or characters you can add to a search box to customize your search results. You may have heard of the basic Boolean operators (AND, NOT, and OR) before, but there are many more that you can use on CanLII.

Consult the table below to see a list of compatible operators, what they do …

I think’s how the kids would express what happened to a California judge.

A better way to describe it might be ‘an embarrassing example of assuming the junior person who’s working for you will have done the proofreading in the first place, and that you don’t need to check things yourself.’

In Golo LLC v Higher Health Networks LLC (SD Calif, case number 3:18-cv-2434-GPC-MSB, 5 February 2019), Curiel USDJ sets out the standard of proof required for the claims being advanced.

At the end of one paragraph, this comment appears in parenthesis: meh I need a better rule statement than …

You will notice that some citations for acts contain the abbreviation “Supp.” (short for “supplement”). An example of this would be “Competition Tribunal Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. 19 (2nd Supp.)”. But what does this mean?

The main volumes of R.S.C. 1985 contain acts that came into being before or on December 31, 1984, but R.S.C. 1985 was not brought into force until December 12, 1988. So what happened to all the legislation made between January 1, 1985 and December 11, 1988? If you guessed that they became the supplements to R.S.C. 1985 you would be correct; for example …

The work of a language nerd is never done.

Possessive problems

In a recent LinkedIn posting, a fundraising person at an educational institution I attended referred to its’ proud history.

At least it wasn’t someone from the academic side.

One see it’s used (incorrectly) as a possessive. Properly, it’s is only ever a contraction for it is, but thinking it’s a singular possessive is an understandable error (if not a forgivable one).

But its’ as an ostensible singular possessive? Mind-boggling.

-S’ is reserved for possessives involving multiple parties (the articling students’ skit at the holiday party…

Lexbox is a supplementary tool on CanLII that can help you keep track of your legal research online by allowing you to view your browsing history, save cases, create and organize folders, and set up alerts. It is free to use the base version and signing up requires only your name, email, and a password. There is also a professional version (Premium) you can choose to subscribe to — you can click here to learn more about what’s in the two plans.

To make sure Lexbox keeps track of your search history, remember to log in to your Lexbox …

The other day I received that now rather unusual thing, a letter.

On the envelope, beneath my business address, was typed Attention: with my name after it.

Why is this – or why was it ever – necessary?

I suppose it helped postal delivery persons and mailroom workers a bit, but surely not that much.

My name at the top with the address after it would reach me with no problem, just like a non-business letter sent to me at my home address.

While we’re on the subject, I like addresses to go from the particular to the general:

Box, …