Hard line breaks | Typography for Lawyers

hard line breaks

Same paragraph, different line

The hard line break moves the next word to the beginning of a new line without starting a new paragraph.

	Word	Mac OS Word	WordPerfect
hard line break	shift + return	shift + return	control + shift + L

A hard line break can help control text flow when a carriage return won’t work. For instance, this heading breaks awkwardly:

IV. The defendant is entitled to judgment as a matter of
law.

Suppose you want the line to break after judgment. That way, the first line will end in a more logical place and the two lines will be balanced. If you use a carriage return, you’ll get:

IV. The defendant is entitled to judgment
V. as a matter of law.

wrong

Not what you want. Instead, put a hard line break after judgment:

IV. The defendant is entitled to judgment
as a matter of law.

right

Hard line breaks are also useful for separating the lines of an address (for instance, on letterhead or a caption page). See centered text for another example of the hard line break in use.