Brainstorm about the "Erie Doctrine" so that you can spot the Erie question on exams. The Erie question will come up only when parties are in Federal court based on diversity jurisdiction (if you're not sure why, take a minute and think about it). Your fact pattern will need to contain some kind of state statute. Often, there will be a federal statute that potentially conflicts with the given state statute but sneaky law professors don't tell you about the federal statute. Instead, they give you a state statute that is very similar to a FRCP and its up to you to realize that the FRCP is the Federal rule that is used in the Hanna analysis.

Learn the language, "Due Process" is simply a law-school language for "fairness". Try substituting the language every time you hear it, and you may be less confused.

Proximate Cause freaks everyone out. Learn it in a way that actually works. Most people understand proximate cause best when they think about things that fail the proximate cause test because they are not foreseeable. When someone is careless, most of the time, the resulting damage will be considered foreseeable. In order to be considered unforeseeable because it's blamed on a superseding event, you'd need to see an act of God or Nature, A criminal act or intentional tort of a third party, or an act by the victim himself.

Res Ipsa Loquitor is not the name of a tort. Res Ipsa is simply a method of proving duty and breach. Professors will often tell you that Res Ipsa is a "shortcut" and that's true it IS a short cut at TRIAL. Res Ipsa is not a shortcut on an exam. In fact, Res Ipsa requires you to discuss an entire three-part test.

Think about why you learned the Learned Hand Formula. Everyone knows that in a negligence case, we say that defendants have the duty to act "reasonably". The Hand formula is one way to solidify what "reasonable" behavior might mean in a particular situation. This is not the only way to define "reasonable" it's just one way. Other ways include using common sense, looking to industry custom, or consulting a statute.

Try substituting the term "consideration" with the term "motivation for the contract". You may understand things a lot better. And remember, every valid contract has two pieces of consideration. Everyone gets something out of the contract!

Remember to discuss all theories. A huge percentage of your contracts class is devoted to exploring "The Bargain Theory of Contracts" also known as "Contract Proper". This refers to the theory in which you prove the existence of a contract by proving that an offer, an acceptance, and consideration all existed to form a contract. You will also spend some time exploring "promissory estoppel" also known as "Restatement Section 90". This is a different theory of liability that requires a plaintiff to prove offer, reliance, and damages. Sometimes, you can take the same fact pattern and apply both theories. There is also a third way to "win" a contracts lawsuit. A plaintiff could also "win" by proving unjust enrichment. It's not the same thing as proving that a contract exists, but it may still meant hat the Plaintiff walks a way with a check from the Defendant.

Latent Ambiguity. Stop fretting about the Peerless, and think of a more typical 21st century example that doesn't involve boats. Let's say you have two cars. One is a Porsche and one is a jalopy. Your friend says, "Hey, I'll take that car off your hands for $500". You happily agree, thinking he's talking about the jalopy. He gives you the money, and then you realize he's talking about the Porsche. He wants to sue you to force you to turn over your precious Boxter. As long as both of you were innocent in this underlying misunderstanding, everyone goes back to square 1. The contract is nullified. Just think of every episode of Three's Company they are packed with examples of latent misunderstandings.

Liquidated Damages Clauses: The problem with Liquidated Damages clauses is that they are hardly ever enforceable. To work, they'd have to be both necessary and reasonable. In most situations, when there is a contract breach, we can just figure out the actual damages that the innocent party suffered. In those cases, we wouldn't need a liquidated damages clause. If we are in one of those unusual situations where we can't figure out the actual damages, then we can use the liquidated damages clause, but only if it's a reasonable estimate of what the damages would be. So, if you entered into a contract to buy three packs for lo mein-flavored chewing gum for $5 per pack, a liquidated damages clause requiring a breacher to pay $5,000,000 in damages would not be enforceable.

Understand the relationship between mistake of fact and intent. Sometimes, people make mistakes, and sometimes, those mistakes completely negate any inference of intent. For example, if Bob picked up a gun and shot Amy at point-blank range, we'd be able to infer that Bob intended to shoot Amy. However, if Bob were an actor in a play, and he mistakenly thought that the gun he used was a prop, and that it would never hurt Amy, then his mistake of fact would clearly negate any inference of intent.

Don't answer a felony murder question until you truly understand the point of the rule. We have the felony murder rule so that when a victim dies accidentally during the commission of a separate felony, the prosecutor can simply blame that death on the criminal. It's a prosecutorial shortcut. Don't be tempted to use the felony murder rule to establish liability for an intentional or reckless killing during the commission of another felony. In that situation, we don't need the felony murder rule we can just use the law of homicide. We only use felony murder when without the rule, there would be no way to blame the death on the defendant.

Accidental homicides fall into a continuum of carelessness. On one end of the continuum is the true accident. Someone was acting reasonably, something terrible happened, and a victim ended up dead. This is something that is not a crime, and is not even a tort. On the far other end of the continuum is highly reckless killing. It's "unintentional" in that a particular intent can't be proven but it's not really an accident. Criminally negligent homicide/involuntary manslaughter/negligence (which is a tort, but not a crime) all fall somewhere on this same spectrum.

Personify "executory interests". Executory interests show up in two distinct situations, but both have something in common. Every time you see an executory interest, it means that someone was hanging out, enjoying their interest when BAM!, someone (the executory interest holder) comes in and disturbs or "cuts short" their interest. We like to personify the Executory Interest as the "bad news earning executive". Pretend you are enjoying your property interest when all of a sudden, a scary looking guy in a suit with a briefcase comes in, shows you some documents, and proceeds to take your land. He's an executive, and he's cutting short your estate.

Learn this concept: Remainders ONLY follow life estates. Life estates can only be followed by either reversions or remainders. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Write it, know it, dream about it.

Learn a few key points to help take the misery out of Future Interests:

1.Do yourself a favor and learn the real origin of the word "remainder". Most people think that a "remainder" refers to an interest in land that is "left over" after a life estate has ended, sort of like the Property equivalent of remainders in fractions. That's wrong! This is how the term actually came about: Life estates are certain to end. At the end of a life estate, the property has to go somewhere. There are two choices: 1) The land can revert back to O (called a "reversion"); or 2) the property can remain away from O (called a "remainder").

Make case charts. Make a two-column chart and across the top, write the issue that is common in each unit of cases. The issue would be something like "Was this protected speech?" or "Does this law violate equal protection?" Then, make one column read "Yes" and the other read "no". When you organize your case-law knowledge in this way, it'll help you organize your essay.

Learn what the "scrutinies" mean, and write them down in a place that you'll see every time you take Constitutional law notes.

1."Strict Scrutiny": If the law in question affects a "suspect class", then the law will not be allowed to stand unless that law is absolutely necessary to achieve a compelling government interest, and that there was NO other possible way to achieve this interest. then you'd better be doing that for a REALLY important government reason, and there has to be no other way the government could achieve that goal.

2.If the law in question affects a "quasi-suspect class", then the law will not be allowed to stand unless that law is substantially related to an important government interest. "Quasi-suspect" classes generally are things like gender and legitimacy. So, if the state is going to make a law that prohibits men from wearing tutus, then that law will only stand as long as it's substantially related to an important government interest . This is different from "strict scrutiny because here, the law doesn't have to be the only way that the government interest could be achieved.

3.If the law in question classifies people in ANY other way (meaning that we are talking about non-suspect classes), then we use the "rational basis" test. This means that the law will be allowed to stand most of the time. As long as the law is rationally related to a legitimate government interest, then it will stand. So, if you're making a law that says that teenagers are allowed to go to the mall in public, but adults are not, or that doctors have to pay higher taxes than lawyers, then the law will stand , as long as there seems to be some good reason for it and the law seems to make some sense.

Proximate Cause freaks everyone out. Learn it in a way that actually works. Most people understand proximate cause best when they think about things that fail the proximate cause test because they are not foreseeable. When someone is careless, most of the time, the resulting damage will be considered foreseeable. In order to be considered unforeseeable because it's blamed on a superseding event, you'd need to see an act of God or Nature, A criminal act or intentional tort of a third party, or an act by the victim himself.

First, learn the difference between "due process" and "equal protection" ...the sooner you learn the difference, the better you'll understand your professor in class! Here's the difference between the two, the Morange way: If someone is complaining that they are being deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, then this is a procedural due process question. This means that the plaintiff is looking for some kind of court adjudication, government action or procedure; you know "process". If a person is complaining that their liberty is being encroached upon because they're not being allowed to do something --like vote, make a contract, use contraceptives, get married, etc., then it is a substantive due process question. If a person is arguing that under the law, they are being treated differently from other people (because they're a woman, or Black or gay or all three), then it's an equal protection question.