Bluebook citation question(s) Forum

[valen]

Can't find the rule for multiple footnotes at the same spot. For example "This is a sentence.^Footnote 1 Footnote 2 This is the next sentence."

Is there a comma between them? They can't really be merged because they're both really long with commentary.

[A. Nony Mouse]

You don't do two footnotes in a row. Either combine them despite length, or put one earlier in the sentence (you can put more than one footnote in a sentence in legal writing).

[valen]

You don't do two footnotes in a row. Either combine them despite length, or put one earlier in the sentence (you can put more than one footnote in a sentence in legal writing).

thanks - so if I'm checking the citations for a journal note, I should probably just combine them? Also any chance you know the rule for this?

[A. Nony Mouse]

So, I assumed you were writing this, not cite-checking this. I know there are social scientists who will do 1, 2 at the end of a sentence/paragraph and have 2 footnotes in a row, but I've never seen it in law reviews. Unfortunately I don't know what rule that is (and don't have access to a current Bluebook). I think I would probably combine them (that's how I would do them if I were writing the article, and footnotes are allowed to be loooooooong), but you might want to check with someone on your journal in case your journal handles things differently. Sorry that's not helpful!

[Sprout]

You don't do two footnotes in a row. Either combine them despite length, or put one earlier in the sentence (you can put more than one footnote in a sentence in legal writing).

thanks - so if I'm checking the citations for a journal note, I should probably just combine them? Also any chance you know the rule for this?

In the notes that I've edited I always thought the rule was to mark one like FN#a then FN#b, and below just enter them that way. I could be totally wrong on this or missing your question, but smarter people than me have done it that way, if I am understanding what you're asking.

[valen]

thanks Nony and Sprout, I think I'll highlight it for now and check with my journal

[valen]

Another question, can you use the Id in this way?

Author, supra note #, at pg#. Quote from that article is on the same page as just cited. Id.

I know you can't use id to refer to internal cross-references like supra, but what do you do if you use supra to cite a sentence in the journal article, but then you include another sentence or quote from the same page within the footnote - can you use Id after that? Or would it be another supra?

Sorry if this is confusing.

[Jchance]

^yes that's proper.

Id. can be used for the immediately preceding citation, not necessarily in the previous FN. I've seen this done many times.

[valen]

Thanks!