Chapter 1 Flashcards
Legal Analysis
The process of applying the law to specific facts. Also know has legal reasoning.
Fact Bound
When even a minor change in the facts can change the outcome.
Cause of Action
A claim that, based on the law and the facts, is sufficient to support a lawsuit.
Enacted Law
Constitutions, statutes, ordinances, and regulations.
Constitutions
Documents ratified by the citizens of a state or nation that establish the organizational structure and the powers granted to different governmental units.
Statutes
Laws that are enacted by a state legislature or by Congress.
Ordinances
Laws similar to statutes but enacted by a local government.
Regulations
Laws promulgated by administrative agencies.
Mandatory Authority
Court decisions from a higher court in the same jurisdiction involving similar facts.
Persuasive Authority
Court decisions from an equal or lower court from the same jurisdiction or from a court in a different jurisdiction.
Percedent
One or more prior court decisions that involve the same legal issue.
Stare Decisis
The doctrine stating that normally once a a court has decided one way on a particular issue, it and other courts in the same jurisdiction, given similar facts, will decide the same way on the issue in the future cases, unless the court can be convinced of the need for change.
Substantive facts
Things that happened to the parties before the litigation began and that are relevant to their claims.
Procedural facts
Facts that relate to what happened procedurally in the lower courts or administrative agencies before the case reached the court issuing issuing the opinion.
Legal issues
Questions about the interpretation and application of the law.
Disposition
The result reached in a particular case.
Affirm
A decision is affirmed when the litigants appeal the trial court decision and the higher court agrees with what the lower court has done.
Reverse
A decision is reversed when the litigants appeal the trial court decision and the higher court disagrees with the decision of the lower court.
Remand
When an appellate court sends a case back to the trial court for a new trial or other action.
Majority Opinion
An opinion in which the majority of the court joins.
Concurring opinion
An opinion that agrees with the majority’s result but disagrees with its reasoning.
Dissenting Opinion
An opinion that disagrees with the majority’s decision and reasoning.
Case Briefing
A method for summarizing court opinions.
Appellate brief
A formal written argument to an appellate court, in which a lawyer argues why that court should affirm or reverse a lower court’s decision.
Rule
In a case brief, general legal principle in existence before the case began.
Issue
In a case brief, the rule of law applied to the case’s specific facts.
Holding
In a case brief, the court’s answer to the issued presented to it; the new legal principle established by a court opinion.
Narrow Holding
A statement of the court’s decision that contains many of the case’s specific facts, thereby limiting its future applicability to a narrow range of cases.
Broad Holding
A statement of the court’s decision in which the facts are either omitted or given in very general terms so that it will apply to a wider range of cases.
Ratio decidendi
The court’s reasoning for its decision
Dictum
A statement in a judicial opinion not necessary for the decision of the case.
Legal Reasoning
The application of legal rules to a specific factual situation; also know as legal analysis
Distinguishable
Different
Analagous
Similar
