30 December 2001

Chapter Writing (20%)

Despite getting a terribly late start today for various reasons, I managed to pound out 8 pages of dissertation work tonight, getting through Roscoe Pound's first essay on sociological jurisprudence and up to the first case in this chapter, Bunting v. Oregon. Over the next two days, I just have to cover roughly 30 years of caselaw and commentary, and I will have mapped out the Progressive overturning of a constitutional tradition. Not bad. :)

My prose and reasoning are not as sharp as usual for first drafts that I write (I rarely make changes to papers after writing them) and will need more extensive editing than usual, but I think for this chapter it's most important to get the quotes and cases laid out in the fashion I need them as quickly as possible (with rudimentary commentary), since the conceptual organization and presentation are more important really than my commentary. If I lay out the arguments and cases properly, the transformation of constitutional law is pretty evident even without any commentary additional to previous chapters of the dissertation. I need to keep that in mind to help bang this chapter out more quickly.

I need to get an earlier start tomorrow, and to write much more. Sounds like an exciting New Year's Eve, eh?

[Posted @ 11:51 PM CST]