The practice has been criticised as self-aggrandising and demeaning by some scholars, but judges who use verse in their opinions do so to communicate with particular audiences, signal the importance of a case, or to address the emotional components of a legal dispute.
For example, legal scholars Edward J. Eberle and Bernhard Grossfeld point to Chief Justice William Rehnquist's dissent in Texas v. Johnson (1989) as a powerful example of using poetic modes in judicial writing to demonstrate an argument.
[12] For example, in one case involving a minor sex worker in 1975, a judge described her in verse as a "whore" who "must be adjusted" to "society's rules", and who "while out on parole" would be unlikely to receive support from the "men she used to cajole".
[15] Judge Richard Posner wrote that while poetry may effectively summarise a dispute and the legal rationale for a decision, two different poems—unlike two separate pieces of prose—are imbued with alternate meanings that cannot replace one another.
[17] And in Texas v. Johnson (1989), William Rehnquist's dissent quoted considerably from poetry, hymns, and songs to demonstrate the importance of the American flag.