Abstract

Technological advances that impact lawyers day-to-day work are nothing new. From typewriters, dictaphones, and computers to electronic legal research, email, and e-discovery, new technologies have changed the nuts and bolts of how lawyers practice for decades. Previous technologies may have replaced the pen with the typewriter and supplanted the letter for the email, but the lawyer remained the one doing the work. For more junior lawyers, this meant assigned tasks – reading cases, drafting motions, dictating client updates, summarizing discovery, and creating deposition outlines – could not be outsourced to technology.

The emergence of generative artificial intelligence (“Gen AI”) presents the potential for more significant change. This technology may replace some human lawyers to a meaningful degree. Such a disruption could significantly impact both the economics of the private practice of law and the overall functioning of the legal system. As law professors, particularly those who teach legal writing, we need to prepare our students for this evolving workplace.

This article considers what skills students need before they can effectively use Gen AI. It evaluates the skills students must learn in legal writing to become competent lawyers in a Gen AI world by considering the work they do during the first few years after graduation. This includes considering the tasks newer lawyers face in a civil litigation practice and analyzing the benefits and harms of widespread Gen AI adoption, as it relates to junior lawyers.

Utilizing the four stages of the writing process described in the “Flowers Paradigm,” this article considers the question of when to employ, and when to avoid, Gen AI use when teaching legal writing. The Flowers’ Paradigm breaks down the writing process into four roles – Madman, Architect, Carpenter, and Judge. Rather than treating “legal writing” as one task when assessing whether to use or not use Gen AI, the Flowers Paradigm provides a helpful framework for considering the use of this new technology at different stages of the writing process.

After considering the work new lawyers traditionally face in their first few years of practice and Gen AI use through the Flower’s Paradigm, this article advances the argument that Gen AI should play a very limited role in 1L legal writing courses. By maintaining the law student’s role as the actual author of the work product, students retain the opportunity to develop the essential judgment, analytical abilities, and writing skills that help form the foundation of the legal profession. As students cultivate these skills, legal writing professors can introduce students to Gen AI as a tool to potentially enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of their writing in certain circumstances, albeit with thoughtful guardrails in place. Only after learning how to do the work themselves can these future practitioners properly and effectively utilize this new and potentially transformative technology.

This article proceeds in three parts. Part I first provides some foundational background on Gen AI and the ways junior lawyers have traditionally been utilized in a civil litigation practice. Then, it considers how Gen AI may impact junior associates in their first few years after law school. Part II turns to the importance of maintaining human centrality in the writing process, particularly in the 1L legal writing classroom. It then uses the Flowers Paradigm to consider the different stages in the writing process and assess Gen AI use during each of the four roles. Having considered this new technology, the employment landscape, and the different stages of the writing process, Part III offers suggestions for legal writing faculty who are wrestling with how to rethink their classes in this new reality.

ISSN

0739-9731

Additional Information

Published in Unending Conversation: Fall 2025 Stetson Law Review Online Forum

Keywords

Legal Writing, Generative A.I., Legal Education

Disciplines

Intellectual Property Law | Law | Legal Education | Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility | Legal Profession | Legal Writing and Research

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