This lesson is designed for students taking an introductory legal research course who are already somewhat familiar with online research on Westlaw and Lexis. This lesson should be useful for students with basic or intermediate searching knowledge and experience.
This lesson will provide an overview of secondary resources used in legal research. Secondary resources are books and other material ABOUT legal subjects and issues: they discuss and explain primary resources such as cases and statutes and can be useful in assisting our understanding about specific areas of law. The student will learn about the different types of secondary resources and what secondary resources are most useful for specific types of legal research tasks.
This lesson is designed as an overview of specific jurisdiction. While we will review some of the most important precedents and their implications, our primary focus will be to put the doctrine in context and identify some of its major constitutional dimensions. Other lessons will explore more detailed aspects of the doctrine.
This is an introductory lesson on federal and state statutes to acquaint first-year law students with this important form of law. The lesson focuses on the basic structure of statutes and the sources in which they appear. It doesn't describe how to research statutes, but you'll learn statutory research much more easily if you understand this material first.
This lesson explores invitations to negotiate/preliminary negotiations and other statements and expressions that are not offers, including advertisements, invitations to bid, price quotations and statements of intention. Determining whether a particular communication is an offer or preliminary negotiation (a matter determined according to the surrounding circumstances) prior to the formation of contract is essential to the determination of whether a contract exists.
This lesson is intended to familiarize the user with the types of primary legal research materials you will encounter when researching Iowa law. The lesson focuses on primary source material including: the Iowa Constitution, Iowa statutes, codes, and administrative law, the Iowa court system, and Iowa cases. The lesson is aimed primarily at students and professionals who will be learning about these materials for the first time. Thus, no prior knowledge of Iowa legal research is necessary to follow this lesson.
This lesson will introduce the reader to secondary research sources for Iowa legal research. The lesson will begin with a discussion of finding aids, and will then transition to a discussion of the following secondary resources: Treatises & Practice Materials, Legal Periodicals & Restatements, and sources for Iowa Legal Forms. The lesson is primarily intended as an introduction to these sources but can also be used as a refresher for the seasoned Iowa attorney.
This lesson will cover the basic structure of written legal analysis: IRAC. IRAC stands for Issue, Rule, Application/Analysis, Conclusion. There are slightly different versions of IRAC which may be used for different legal documents. This lesson will focus on IRAC for essay exam writing. Some faculty may prefer CRAC, or CIRAC, where the conclusion is placed first. You may also learn CRREAC for writing legal memos and briefs, which stands for Conclusion, Rule, Rule Explanation, Application, Conclusion.
This lesson presents the elements of issue preclusion, sometimes referred to as "collateral estoppel", and exceptions to the doctrine. This lesson will explore the elements of collateral estoppel and the questions of who may be bound by, or take advantage of, the prior adjudication. Another lesson will address the question of whether an adjudication in one jurisdiction can preclude relitigation in a second jurisdiction.
This lesson explores one of the fundamental lawyering skills, which is to be able to spot issues. This lesson looks at what an issue is, and best practices in spotting them in cases, with clients, and on exams. Students will go through basic issue spotting exercises to better prepare for exams.
This lesson introduces a modern approach to writing issue statements for traditional memos and briefs. The lesson steers users away from single-sentence issue statements. It bases much of its approach on the syllogism.
The goal of this program is to teach a substantial amount of Article 2 through the study of a single case. This exercise begins with a warranty case, ITT v. LTX.