Honghu Wang (1L), with translations by the UV Editorial Board
Whereas the writers for Ultra Vires desire to help students complete their examinations with a style and verve which might showcase their most fulsome potential; and
Whereas the writers draw inspiration from cases past;
Therefore we present a brief guide containing phrases that you can drop on your way to an HHH, with translations provided for those who have not attended a British boarding school.
- Now the boot is on the other foot.
- (Your foot is going to hurt because boots are cut for specific feet.)
- That is a distinction without a difference.
- (The heaviest academic shade you can throw against a nitpicking argument.)
- Carry the day.
- (Sweeeeeeeeeet, sweet victoryyyy, ya.)
- Intimated
- (Getting your point across without really “going there,” not to be mistaken for intimidated.)
- It doesn’t lie in your mouth to say…
- (Shut up and let me talk…)
- My learned brother.
- (This asshole over here.)
- With respect.
- (Fuck you.)
- …, without more, …
- (This argument should not have been advanced.)
- Shocks the conscience of the court.
- (Wash your hands—they’re dirty.)
- Inter alia
-
- (A subgenre of Tropicália, the 1960s Brazilian art movement.)
- Ex ante
-
- (She was your aunt until she and your uncle split up.)
- Ex post facto
-
- (She was your post facto until she and your ipso split up.)
- &c
- (I’m so busy and important that I can’t even be bothered to write out “etc.”)
- Viz
- (Lookit that.)
- A priori knowledge.
- (You knew what you were getting into.)
- This party is now trying to have his cake and eat it too.
- (Nobody came to my birthday.)
- Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.
- (Throw them out separately.)
- While the ship of state now sails on larger ventures and into foreign waters she still retains the watertight compartments which are an essential part of her original structure.
- (Antonin Scalia was right.)
- Our Constitution is a living tree which, by way of progressive interpretation, accommodates and addresses the realities of modern life.
- (We’re really just making this up as we go along.)
- The length of the Chancellor’s foot.
- (As opposed to the length of his [redacted].)
- Enter contracts with eyes wide open.
- (Always drop acid before any big negotiation.)
- Liability in an indeterminate amount for an indeterminate time to an indeterminate class.
- (You’re going to lose your shirt.)
- Straws in the wind.
- (I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.)
- Donning the cloak of a soothsayer to plumb the intent of the legislature.
- (Who the hell knows what those commoners are really thinking.)
- Sounding like Molly Bloom’s eulogy in the final chapter of Ulysses.
- (I am very smart and I have definitely read all of Ulysses.)
- Do indirectly what you can’t do directly.
- (How I got my Panamanian pass-through corporation set up.)
- What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
- (Translation lost to the ages. What kind of weirdo feeds sauce to geese?)
- In summertime village cricket is the delight of everyone.
- (It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of good fortune, must be in want of a cricket game.)