LAI (Read Notes)

Question 1

SYSTEM OF WRITING: Primary Sources of Law

• Enacted law (statues, constitutions, and administrative regulations)
• Case law (judicial decisions) (these cases provide source of enforceable rules called THE COMMON LAW)

Consult these sources first.
Analyze how they are relevant to your problem.

Question 2

COMMON LAW is judge-made law

• Comes from English system of law – SYSTEM OF PRECEDENT
• The decision resole the litigation that is before the court
• Decision is published; is available for useably judges in later litigation

Question 3

TYPES OF COURTS AND JURISDICTION: Courts of Inferior Jurisdiction

• Lowest rung of courts of original jurisdiction
• Limited cases such as misdemeanor cases or cases in which amount of damages the plaintiff demands from the defendant does not exceed a specific sum; small claims
• Maybe specific subject matter such as juvenile or family law
• Decisions are NOT published; and have NO VALUE as precedent to future litigants

Question 4

TYPES OF COURTS AND JURISDICTION: Trial Courts

Litigation often begins

• Civil Litigation
• Criminal Cases
• Presided over by one judge
• Province of the trial court to
  
  • Determine the facts of the case
  • Judge or jury FINDS, determines the facts from
    
    • The evidence
    • The witnesses
    • Admissions of the parties
    • Applicable law
  • Some decisions are by procedures that preclude a trial (motions)

Question 5

TYPES OF COURTS AND JURISDICTION: Appellate Courts

• Step up from the trail courts is the appellate court
• If party that lost at the trial level, may ask for review by a higher court, appellate court
  
  • Known as a appeal
• Most states provide a two levels of applets courts
  
  • Court of Appeals
  • Highest court of appeals and know has Supreme Court (some states have other designations)
  • Intermediate appellate court hears apple’s from trial courts
  • Supreme Court hears appeals from the intermediate courts of appeals
  • Some states Supreme Court must hear appeals for certain types of issues directly from trial courts
  • For states no other court than Supreme Court
  • Some states intermediate appellate level consists of more than one court

Question 6

TYPES OF COURTS AND JURISDICTION: Appellate Courts Decisions

• Appeal is heard by more than one judge; odd numbers; at least 3
• Vote
• Majority writes the decisions
• Minority judge can write a dissenting opinion
• The majority judge that does not write the decision can also write a concurring opinion
• Name on the opinion
  
  • Judge who writes an opinion appears at the beginning
  • No name is designated “per curium” decision; “by the court” and may be used for a shorter opinion on the issue which there is general unanimity

Question 7

TYPES OF COURTS AND JURISDICTION: Federal Courts

• Trial courts in federal system -→ District Courts
  
  • One District Court in every State min.
  • Jurisdiction is limited to the area of its district

Appellate courts

• Intermediate appellate court in federal system called United States Court of Appeals
• US divided into 13 Cricuits
• Eleven are identified by a number

Highest court is the Supreme Court of the United States

Question 8

CIVIL CASES: General

• Attorney-Client - begins when the client comes to the attorney to discuss a problem
• Discuss -→ memorandum -→ research -→ Full memorandum
• Pleadings
• Complaint – file complaint and serve defendant with a summons and copy of the complaint
• Defendant – time limits required in that jurisdiction and responds to the answer tot he complaint or with a motion

Question 9

TYPES OF COURTS AND JURISDICTION: Appellate Courts

• Appellate court has more than one judge
  
  • Odd number of judges, at least 3
  • Procedure differs from trial court
    
    • No evidence; no witnesses; no jury
    • Parties lawyers argue to the appellate judges to persuade them that the court DID or DID NOT commit errors
      
      • This may be oral or written
  • Review and publishes in CASE REPORTERS the decisions

Question 10

CIVIL CASES: Motions to Dismiss

• Defendant may decide to enter a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted
  
  • Often called DEMURRER
• Motion asks the court to dismiss the compliant because even if the plaintiffs alleged facts are true
• Facts do not establish any cause of action and do not provide any relief recognized by the law
• May also provide memorandum of law to the court that explains the reasons for the motion
• Memorandum of this type is an advocacy document written to court to persuade it to grant them otion
• Differs from the office memorandum which is analytical usually kept within a law firm
• If the defendant argues successfully the court may grant the motion
• The plaintiff could stil appeal to the decision of a higher court
• If defendant looses at this stage; the defendant must file an answer to the complaint and litigation continues.

Question 11

CIVIL CASES: Discovery

Next step to gather information for the lawsuit

• Depositions
  
  • Attorney’s oral examination
  • Transcribe by the court reporter
• Interrogatories
  
  • Written questions to the other party
• Affidavits
  
  • From the parters and others and request relevant documents
  • Affidavits are written declarations facts that the person (the affiant) swears to under oath

Question 12

CIVIL CASES: Summary Judgment Motions

• A motion for a summary judgement asks the court to decide the case without a trial
• Applying the controlling law to the facts gathered through discovery
• Parties can submit a memoranda of law in support of or in option tot he summary judgement
• Court CANNON grant this motion if there is any CONFLICT over material facts or disputed facts

Question 13

CIVIL CASES: Trial

• Parties can negotiate or settle the case between themselves
• Losing party may appeal

Question 14

CIVIL CASES: The Appeal

• Attorneys produce formal written documents for the court
• Called Appellate Briefs
  
  • Explain the facts and the law as the party analyzes them
  • Party that appeals the lower court made errors that that require that the appellate court recovers that decision
  • The other party (the appellee) explains that the decision in the lower court was correct and should lie affirmed (upheld)
• Appellate court may make a final decision in the case or send it back (remand) to the lower court for lower court for further proceedings in accord with its legal ruling and the reasons for that ruling.

Question 15

COMMON LAW: Binding and Persuasive Authority

• What courts have jurisdiction and binding authority
• State course must follow from higher courts in the state
• Intermedia Appellate court also must follow the decisions of the state highest court
• But not of intermediate courts because these courts are not superior to it; instead they are persuasive
• A state court is bound by the statutes of that state as interpreted by its court
• Other state are persuasive only

Question 16

COMMON LAW: Federal Courts

• The decisions of the Supreme Court of the US are binding on all courts in all jurisdictions for matters of constitutional and other federal law
• Court of appeals is bound only by the its own decisions and those of the Supreme Court
• Federal district court (trial court) is bound by its own decisions and decisions of the court of appeals of the circuit in which the district court is located
• Federal courts in lawsuits between parties from different states known as DIVERSITY SUITS
• DIVERSITY SUITS federal court must apply state law and thus follow the state courts decisions on state substantive law questions

Question 17

COMMON LAW: Binding Nature of Statute

The statute and the case law interpreting its language are binding

Statutory requirements must be satisfied

Case law may exist interpreting the statute that tells you how to interpret the statutory langauge

Question 18

COMMON LAW: Holding and Dictaes

• Judge may decide to be bound by a precedent and to reach the same outcome in a case before the court when the causes of action are the same; issues presented to the court for decision are the same
• Issues presented to the court of decision are the same
• Material facts are similar enough so the reasoning of the early case applies
• Similar case from a court that is binding on the judges decision – just is bound only by the holding of the previous decision
• Binding force of precedents in add to the limitation that arises from the judges ability to overrule an earlier decision

Question 19

COMMON LAW: Holding of a Case Generally

• The holding of a case is the court’s decision on the issue or issues litigated
• Deciding a case, a court identifies the particular rule that controls the issue being litigated
• Then it analyzes whether the facts the case satisfy the requirements of the rule
• Statute -→ Admin Agency law -→ Common Law -→ Private Docs

Question 20

COMMON LAW: Facts

Facts -→ Essential to decisions

• There is no one correct way to formulate a holding
• Difficulty is to determine which facts are essential to the decision
• Other difficulty is how to describe the facts
  
  • Too broad – facts that raise consideration that are diff from those that the court took into account when it made its decision
  • Common sense will take you a long way in deciding how to determine a holding

Question 21

COMMON LAW: Formulating a Holding

• Use more specific facts rather than broad categories
• Persuade a court that is bound in participate way by a precedent’s holding, you may need to describe the facts more generally in order for them to encompass your clients’ situation
• The court itself will announce its holding
• You don’t always have to accept the court’s formulation
• Make sure the judge has not state the holding too broadly or to narrowly
• Principle the judge has articulated was actually required for the resolution of that case
• The statement must be read in conjunction with the facts of the case

Question 22

COMMON LAW: Dicta

May statement in a judicial decision that are not part of the holding and are not binding on later courts.

These statements are called dicta

• Statements that are dicta are not always unimportant
• Sometimes dicta in a case become more important in later years
• Dicta is analogous to persuasive authority in the statements may be persuasive to a later judge
• When you write about judicial decisions,
  
  • you will have to describe the action that the court took by saying the court said something, or held something or found something
  • Use the correct verb
    
    • Trial court held….
    • Instead found that …
    • The court HELD that the defendant was GUILTY ….
  • Dicta – said, stated, or explained NOT held

Question 23

WRITING: Weight of Authority

Statute -→ Case law -→ Highest Court first to the lowest court – within Jurisdiction

Always in this order… set out the law and the jurisdiction of the problem

Question 24

WRITING: Evaluating Case Law

Weight of Authority:

• If there is no binding authority – the decision of ht courts within the jurisdiction even if not binding are important
• The level of the court that decided the previous case is important – a case decided by the states Supreme Court is more auth than one by lower court
• An opinion written by a particular judge may be important because of the excellent reputation of the judge – decisions from a particular court in era may carry extra weight because of the membership of the court those years
• A case decided by a unanimous court or nearly, may be more persuasive as a precedent than one in which the court was closely divided
• The year of the decision is important – case is old reflects policies and social conditions that no longer are import
• Decisions from states that are geo come and that have similar social and econ conditions that related to the litigation may be favored by some courts
• A case in which the issue received the full attn of the previous court and was fully and articulately discussed will be more imps than in which ? received cursory att.

Question 25

WRITING: Stare Decisis and Overruling Decisions

Stare Decisis implies that following precedent within a particular jurisdiction is mandatory

• But the doctrine as applied in the US does not produce riding adherence to prior decisions
  
  • Decide a case by a rule different from the one it had previously adopted
• One reason that the court may overrule
  
  • Decision has become outdated because of changed conditions
  • Existing rule has produced undesirable results which has now been recognized as poor reasoning
• When overrules a case the change in the law has no effect on the parties to the litigation that produced the prior decision or on other parties whose rights have determined under that precedent
• Applies to future cases only
• The other means is legislation amendment….

Question 26

FIRAC

• Facts List — Stated in your own words only relevant or background facts
• Issue Primary — Must be stated in own words as a LEGAL QUESTION (court is confronted with)
• Rules - General principle of law that court applied to resolve the legal question (Battery is an intentional harmful or offensive contact with the person of another).
• Analysis - Apply the rule to the facts of the case — court’s reasoning and rationale
• Conclusion — Holding or substantive conclusion (not procedural — a procedural is a disposition of the case)
  
  • What happens procedurally — what happens after the court issues its ruling
  • What did the court do with the case (affirmed, reverse, remanded)
• Directed Verdict —