Government Mandates
All branches of the federal government recognize the need for clear communications with the public. Here are some links to government documents and organizations that mandate the use of plain language.
President Clinton's 1998 memorandum on Plain Language in Government Writing and the guidelines issued to help agencies implement them.
The National Institutes of Health's Plain Language Initiative requiring the use of plain language in all new documents.The Office of Management and Budget's government-wide
guidance establishing a standard
format for grant announcements 
.
Here's an excellent handbook
from the SEC on how to create clear
financial-disclosure documents. It will be useful for
writers of other plain language documents as well.
In Walters v. Reno, 145 F.3d 1032 (9th Cir. 1998), the court found that the forms issued by the Immigration and Naturalization Service were so confusing and affirmatively misleading that they violated a person's due-process rights.
Here's a guide to writing HIPPA Privacy Notices in plain language.
The Federal Aviation Administration issued an internal directive requiring staff to write in plain language.
