My LPW instructor last semester said that in legal writing, we should use two spaces after a period. Is this just another arbitrary rule--like countless others in the Bluebook--that we should blindly obey? Ironically, I don't think the "two-space" rule is even a rule in the super comprehensive Bluebook. Isn't one space sufficient and more efficient? What we do we gain by tapping the space bar one more time (obviously, we don't lose much either, but I'd prefer not to)?

Here's an interesting article that argues that we should never use two spaces after a period: http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2011/01/space_invaders.html

Do others have any thoughts on the seemingly arbitrary "two-space" rule?

-- DanielChung - 09 Apr 2012

You're asking a question which implies stupid document-making programs like Microbrain Word.

In English, the typesetter's convention to leave more than a single interword space between sentences is several centuries old. Those of us who read in both English and French, where the typesetter's convention is to leave only an interword space between sentences, may differ in our opinions, but I believe extra spacing is an aid to readability.

But sensible document composition doesn't require the human being to type an extra space when entering text. Sensible document preparation software does typesetting based on easy conventions for the typist, like entering email messages, where only disciplined typists trained in the 20th century will enter two spaces. Text when rendered in print should be respaced by the rendering program. But the spacing used on a printed page should be flexible within and between words, as well as between sentences, lines and paragraphs. All the spacing on a printed page should be balanced harmoniously, which good document production software, like the free software standard TeX, does. TeX, and its fellow markup language LaTeX, have been producing beautiful printed text for decades; Microbrain Word has never created a single properly-composed page.

But TeX input has never required, or even paid any attention to, whether there is a second space after periods in the input; TeX is more than smart enough to deal with that, while it is doing the actual work of laying out the page, work no "word processor" ever does, or will do, but which printers spent hundreds of years learning and perfecting.

You should care about how your documents look, always. Whether on line or on paper, how your text looks affects how people understand it. You should learn about typography and layout, you should understand the literate tradition of which you are a part, you should be capable of appreciating beautiful typography and design. But you shouldn't need to type the second space after your sentences, because you should be using smart software that helps you.

(And of course, this text is rendered without regard for the spacing in the text you type in this wiki. Interword and intersentence spacing is determined by the full cascade of CSS reaching the reader's browser, not by anything you do or don't type into this file.)

I hate Microsoft Word: it can't handle large documents and crashes all the time. I actually downloaded TeX last semester but haven't learned how to use it yet. I really want to learn though--I really like the look of TeX documents. Is there a free and effective way to convert documents between Microsoft Word and TeX? I assume that most lawyers and practices still use Microsoft Office, making collaboration and communication difficult if you prefer TeX or similar software.

TeX and Microsoft Word are two fundamentally different pieces of software. I don't know if you can convert from Word to TeX since that doesn't make conceptual sense. TeX is a layout and typesetting software. You give it the content and specify the logical structure with a markup language called LaTeX. It takes that and figures out that best way for it to look.

Microsoft Word collapses content, layout and typesetting into one poorly designed process. Most of us have only ever used word processors that merge and obscure these elements of document creation, so the idea of separating content from presentation might seem foreign. But once you learn to appreciate the difference, your writing won't be encumbered by layout considerations. You can just write and let the typesetter worry about how it looks.

I learned LaTeX with this tutorial.

Once you get your feet wet, this book is an excellent reference to have.

(Also, TeX is pronounced 'tech' not 'tecks.' The X on the end is the Greek letter chi.)