By John T. Harding
The point of a comma is to indicate a pause. It's used in music notation to tell instrumentalists and singers when to take a breath. In text, the comma serves a similar purpose, separating clauses by a very short pause.
Hint: Commas often come in pairs, so if you have a phrase that can be lifted out and moved elsewhere in text, you need both commas. If, however, the phrase limits the description of something, do not use commas.
Example: The man who was struck told police ... This indicates that there was at least one other man, who was not struck.
Example B: The President, who was born in Hawaii, appeared yesterday ... Without commas, the sentence would suggest that there was another president who was not born in Hawaii.
There is also a difference between titles and job descriptions. Titles in front of a name do not earn a comma. Examples: President John Smith. Sergeant Joe Friday. General Herman Munster.
Where a pause is useful to encourage overall flow, commas help to do that. Too many commas, however, can slow the flow and put the reader to sleep.
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