Clinical Professor of Law Emerita
Professor Stinson taught legal writing and legal method. Her research focuses on the proper role of the courts, arguing that trial courts ought to have greater power in a variety of contexts. She also published the advanced text, The Tao of Legal Writing, and co-authored Examples & Explanations: Legal Writing.
Professor Stinson is the recipient of the 2013 Thomas F. Blackwell Memorial Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Legal Writing, a prestigious honor given annually by the Association of Legal Writing Directors and the Legal Writing Institute. She is a past-president of the Association of Legal Writing Directors.
B.S., University of Arizona
J.D., University of Arizona
My research focuses on the proper role of the courts in resolving disputes. I argue that trial courts ought to have greater power and make this argument in a variety of contexts: by more carefully exploring the holding/dictum distinction; by recognizing tribal courts’ inherent, unlimited criminal jurisdiction over their own members; by allowing courts, pre-Obergefell, to grant same-sex divorces even in jurisdictions that did not permit or recognize same-sex marriage; and by allowing courts to mitigate severe legislatively-imposed criminal penalties for sexual conduct between minors.
Preemptive Dicta: The Problem Created by Judicial Efficiency, 54 Loy. L.A. L. Rev. 587 (2021).
Trusting Tribal Courts: More Lawyers Is Not Always the Solution (with Tara Mospan & Marnie Hodahkwen), 14 L.J. for Soc. Just. at Ariz. St. Univ. 130 (2021).
When Tribal Disenrollment Becomes Cruel and Unusual, 97 Neb. L. Rev. 820 (2019).
Examples & Explanations: Legal Writing (with Terrill Pollman) (Wolters Kluwer Law & Business, 3d ed. 2019).
So You Haven't Taught Legal Writing in a While . . . , 27 Perspectives: Teaching Legal Res. & Writing 38 (Spring 2019).
How LRW Faculty Can Best Position Themselves for Law School Administration, 30 The Second Draft 48 (Spring 2017).
Essay, Out and About: The LGBT Experience in the Profession 5 (ABA & Nat’l LGBT Bar, eds.) (2015).
Team Up for Collaborative Teaching (with Susan M. Chesler), 23 Perspectives: Teaching Legal Res. & Writing 169 (Summer 2015).
Examples & Explanations: Legal Writing (with Terrill Pollman & Elizabeth Pollman) (Wolters Kluwer Law & Business, 2d ed. 2014).
Juveniles, Sex Offenses, and the Scope of Substantive Law (with Carissa Byrne Hessick), 46 Texas Tech. L. Rev. 5 (2013) (symposium issue).
The Teaching, Scholarship, and Service Triathlon, 27 The Second Draft 28 (Summer 2013).
The Right to (Same-Sex) Divorce, 62 Case W. Res. L. Rev. 447 (2012).
Generating Interest, Enthusiasm, and Opportunity for Scholarship, 9 Legal Comm. & Rhetoric: JALWD 315 (2012).
Examples & Explanations: Legal Writing (with Terrill Pollman, Richard Neumann, & Elizabeth Pollman) (Wolters Kluwer Law & Business 2011).
Teaching the Holding/Dictum Distinction, 19 Perspectives: Teaching Legal Res. & Writing 192 (2011).
Why Dicta Becomes Holding and Why it Matters, 76 Brook. L. Rev. 219 (2010).
The Tao of Legal Writing (Carolina Academic Press, 2009).
The Pros of Regional Legal Writing Conferences, AALS Sec. on Legal Writing, Reasoning, and Res. Newsl. 5 (Spring 2004).
IRLAFARC! Surveying the Language of Legal Writing (with Terrill Pollman), 56 Me. L. Rev. 239 (2004).
“Depth” or “Breadth”—or Can You Have Both? 18 The Second Draft 21 (December 2003).
Courses
2024 Spring
Course Number | Course Title |
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LAW 781 | Independent Study |
2023 Spring
Course Number | Course Title |
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LAW 781 | Independent Study |
2022 Spring
Course Number | Course Title |
---|---|
LAW 781 | Independent Study |
2021 Spring
Course Number | Course Title |
---|---|
LAW 781 | Independent Study |
LAW 735 | Teaching Assistant |
2020 Fall
Course Number | Course Title |
---|---|
LAW 735 | Teaching Assistant |
LAW 519 | Legal Method and Writing |
LAW 519 | Legal Method and Writing |
2020 Spring
Course Number | Course Title |
---|---|
LAW 781 | Independent Study |
LAW 524 | Legal Advocacy |
LAW 735 | Teaching Assistant |
LAW 524 | Legal Advocacy |
2019 Fall
Course Number | Course Title |
---|---|
LAW 781 | Independent Study |
LAW 735 | Teaching Assistant |
LAW 519 | Legal Method and Writing |
LAW 519 | Legal Method and Writing |