IA Bar cheat sheet

Subject-matter jurisdiction: federal question under 28 U.S.C. § 1331 requires a federal issue on the face of a well-pleaded complaint; diversity under § 1332 requires complete diversity plus an amount in controversy exceeding $75,000, exclusive of interest and costs.

Supplemental jurisdiction (28 U.S.C. § 1367): extends to claims sharing a common nucleus of operative fact with a claim that has original jurisdiction; discretionary dismissal is mandatory in diversity cases when the supplemental claim is against a party joined under Rules 14, 19, 20, or 24 and inconsistent with § 1332.

Personal jurisdiction: general jurisdiction requires an individual's domicile or a corporation's place of incorporation and principal place of business (or an exceptional 'at home' showing); specific jurisdiction requires purposeful availment, relatedness, and reasonableness under the fair-play and substantial-justice standard.

Erie doctrine: in diversity cases, federal courts apply state substantive law (including statutes of limitations and elements of claims) and federal procedural law; if federal law directly conflicts, apply federal law unless it abridges a substantive right or encourages forum shopping.

Pleading standard: a complaint must contain a short and plain statement showing entitlement to relief; plausibility pleading under Twombly and Iqbal requires enough facts to raise a right to relief above the speculative level.

Summary judgment under Rule 56 is granted when there is no genuine dispute of material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law; the nonmovant gets all reasonable inferences, but must identify specific facts showing a genuine issue for trial.

Preclusion: claim preclusion requires a final judgment on the merits, identity of parties or privies, and the same claim; issue preclusion requires actual litigation and determination of the issue, a final judgment, and the same issue against a party who had a full and fair opportunity to litigate.

Removal: a defendant may remove a case from state court within 30 days of service of the initial pleading; a case cannot be removed on diversity grounds more than one year after commencement, and in-state defendants may not remove on diversity.

Class actions under Rule 23 require numerosity, commonality, typicality, and adequacy, plus one of the three predominance or superiority categories; certification is reviewed for abuse of discretion.

Standing requires injury in fact (concrete and particularized, actual or imminent), causation traceable to the defendant, and redressability by a favorable decision; third-party standing requires a close relationship and a hindrance to the third party's ability to sue.

Strict scrutiny applies to suspect classifications (race, national origin, alienage in some contexts) and fundamental rights; the law must be narrowly tailored to a compelling government interest. Intermediate scrutiny applies to sex and illegitimacy; the law must be substantially related to an important interest.

Rational basis review applies to economic and social legislation and to classifications such as age or wealth; the law must be rationally related to a legitimate government interest, and the challenger bears the burden.

Due process: procedural due process weighs the private interest, the risk of erroneous deprivation, and the government's interest (Mathews v. Eldridge); substantive due process protects fundamental rights such as marriage, procreation, and parental care.

First Amendment speech: content-based restrictions get strict scrutiny; content-neutral time, place, and manner rules must serve a significant interest, be narrowly tailored, and leave open ample alternative channels.

Establishment Clause: a law violates the Establishment Clause if it lacks a secular purpose, has the principal effect of advancing or inhibiting religion, or creates excessive entanglement; coercion of religious practice is a core violation.

Commerce power reaches channels of interstate commerce, instrumentalities, and activities substantially affecting interstate commerce; under Lopez, non-economic activity must have a substantial effect, and under Morrison, civil remedies for gender-motivated violence exceeded the power.

Equal protection tiers: racial classifications are subject to strict scrutiny and require a compelling interest plus narrow tailoring; affirmative action programs must have a logical end point and survive strict scrutiny.

State action doctrine: constitutional protections apply to government conduct; private conduct is generally exempt unless there is significant state involvement, a public function, or entwinement.

Common law contract formation requires offer, acceptance, consideration, and mutual assent; the UCC applies to transactions in goods and relaxes the mirror-image rule under UCC § 2-207 so that additional terms become part of the contract between merchants unless they materially alter it or are objected to.

Consideration is a bargained-for exchange of legal detriment; past consideration and moral obligation generally do not suffice, but detrimental reliance may make a promise enforceable through promissory estoppel.

Statute of frauds: writing required for contracts that cannot be performed within one year, land sales, suretyship, marriage consideration, executors' promises, and UCC goods sales of $500 or more; exceptions include part performance, specially manufactured goods, and admission in pleadings.

Anticipatory repudiation gives the non-breaching party an immediate right to sue or to await performance; the repudiating party may retract before the other party materially changes position or indicates it considers the repudiation final.

Expectation damages put the non-breaching party in the position it would have occupied had the contract been performed; reliance damages restore the position before contracting; restitution disgorges benefits conferred.

Consequential damages require foreseeability at the time of contracting (Hadley v. Baxendale); liquidated damages are enforceable if reasonable in light of anticipated or actual harm and difficult to estimate, otherwise they are an unenforceable penalty.

Impracticability discharges a duty when an event makes performance impracticable without fault and the nonoccurrence of the event was a basic assumption; frustration requires the principal purpose of the contract to be substantially frustrated.

UCC perfect tender rule: a buyer may reject goods that fail in any respect to conform, but the seller has a right to cure within the contract time or a reasonable time after rejection if the buyer has not yet revoked acceptance.

Parol evidence rule bars prior or contemporaneous oral statements that contradict a fully integrated writing; consistent additional terms may be admitted if the writing is only partially integrated, and evidence is always admissible to explain ambiguity.

Elements of a crime: actus reus (voluntary act or omission with a legal duty), mens rea (purpose, knowledge, recklessness, or negligence), concurrence, causation, and resulting harm.

Murder is unlawful killing with malice aforethought (intent to kill, intent to inflict serious bodily harm, reckless indifference to an unjustifiably high risk to life, or felony murder); first-degree murder adds premeditation and deliberation.

Felony murder requires an inherently dangerous felony and a killing during its commission; the underlying felony merges with the homicide, and the death must be a foreseeable result of the felony.

Voluntary intoxication may negate specific intent but not malice; involuntary intoxication may be a complete defense; insanity tests include M'Naghten (cognitive), irresistible impulse, and the Model Penal Code substantial-capacity standard.

Self-defense requires reasonable belief in imminent unlawful force and proportionate force; deadly force is permitted only against deadly force or a threat of serious bodily harm, and there is no duty to retreat in one's home under the castle doctrine.

Fourth Amendment: a search requires a warrant supported by probable cause unless an exception applies, including search incident to arrest, automobile, plain view, consent, exigent circumstances, and Terry stop frisk.

Fifth Amendment: Miranda warnings are required before custodial interrogation; the right against self-incrimination is personal and cannot be invoked by a corporation; double jeopardy bars retrial after acquittal or conviction.

Sixth Amendment: the right to counsel attaches at the initiation of adversarial judicial proceedings; ineffective assistance requires deficient performance plus prejudice under Strickland v. Washington.

Exclusionary rule: evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment is generally suppressed, subject to good-faith, inevitable-discovery, and independent-source exceptions; the rule does not apply to grand jury proceedings or civil proceedings.

Relevance requires that evidence have a tendency to make a fact more or less probable and that the fact be of consequence; Rule 403 permits exclusion if probative value is substantially outweighed by unfair prejudice, confusion, or waste of time.

Character evidence is generally inadmissible to prove conduct, but is admissible for other purposes such as motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake, and for character in issue.

Hearsay is an out-of-court statement offered to prove the truth of the matter asserted; it is inadmissible unless an exclusion or exception applies.

Non-hearsay uses include impeachment, effect on the listener, verbal acts with independent legal significance, and statements offered to show the declarant's state of mind rather than the truth of the statement.

Prior consistent statements are admissible to rebut a charge of recent fabrication or improper influence, and prior inconsistent statements under oath at a proceeding are substantive evidence.

Confrontation Clause: testimonial hearsay from an unavailable declarant is inadmissible unless the defendant had a prior opportunity to cross-examine; nontestimonial statements are governed by hearsay rules.

Best evidence rule requires the original document, recording, or photograph to prove its contents; exceptions include duplicates, voluminous records, and the absence of the original.

Privileges: attorney-client protects confidential communications for legal advice; physician-patient and psychotherapist-patient privileges are recognized; spousal privilege includes the confidential marital communications privilege and the testimonial privilege in criminal cases.

Expert testimony is admissible if the witness is qualified, the testimony is based on sufficient facts, the product of reliable principles and methods, and the witness has reliably applied them (Daubert); lay opinion requires firsthand knowledge.

Estates: fee simple absolute is the largest estate; fee tail is limited to lineal heirs; life estate ends at death and may be measured by the life of another (pur autre vie); future interests include reversion, remainder, executory interest, and possibility of reverter.

Rule against perpetuities: no interest is good unless it must vest, if at all, not later than 21 years after the death of a life in being at creation; the common-law rule applies to contingent remainders and executory interests.

Concurrent estates: tenancy in common has no right of survivorship; joint tenancy requires the four unities (time, title, interest, possession) and includes survivorship; tenancy by the entirety is available to married couples.

Landlord-tenant: covenant of quiet enjoyment is breached by actual or constructive eviction; the implied warranty of habitability requires the landlord to maintain the premises in a habitable condition; retaliatory eviction is prohibited.

Recording acts: race, notice, and race-notice statutes determine priority among competing interests; a bona fide purchaser for value without notice prevails under notice and race-notice statutes.

Easements: express easements require a writing; easements by implication arise from prior use; prescriptive easements require open, notorious, adverse, and continuous use for the statutory period; easements may be terminated by abandonment, merger, or prescription.

Adverse possession requires actual, exclusive, continuous, open and notorious, and hostile possession for the statutory period; some jurisdictions require color of title or payment of taxes.

Zoning: nonconforming uses may continue but cannot be expanded; variances require undue hardship; spot zoning is invalid if it is inconsistent with the comprehensive plan.

Mortgages: a deed of trust transfers title to a trustee; foreclosure is judicial or by power of sale; lien priority generally follows recording order, and purchase-money mortgages may have priority over prior liens.

Negligence requires duty, breach, causation (actual and proximate), and damages; the standard of care is that of a reasonable person, with special standards for professionals, children, and common carriers.

Duty: a landowner owes a duty to invitees to inspect and warn of known and unknown dangerous conditions, to licensees to warn of known dangers, and to trespassers only to refrain from willful and wanton misconduct, subject to the attractive nuisance doctrine.

Proximate cause requires foreseeability; intervening causes supersede only if unforeseeable; the rescue doctrine and the eggshell plaintiff rule expand liability.

Strict liability applies to abnormally dangerous activities and to defective products; product liability theories include manufacturing defect, design defect, and failure to warn, with defenses of misuse and assumption of risk.

Intentional torts: battery requires harmful or offensive contact with intent; assault requires apprehension of imminent harmful or offensive contact; false imprisonment requires confinement within boundaries with intent.

Defamation: a defamatory statement of fact about the plaintiff, published to a third party, causing damage; public figures must prove actual malice (knowledge of falsity or reckless disregard) under New York Times v. Sullivan.

Privacy torts: intrusion upon seclusion, public disclosure of private facts, false light, and appropriation of name or likeness.

Damages: compensatory damages include economic and non-economic losses; punitive damages require willful, wanton, or malicious conduct and are subject to due process limits.

Comparative and contributory negligence: pure comparative negligence reduces recovery by the plaintiff's fault; modified comparative bars recovery if the plaintiff's fault exceeds or equals the defendant's; contributory negligence is a complete bar in a few jurisdictions.

IRAC structure: Issue (frame the legal question), Rule (state the governing law), Application (apply facts to the rule), Conclusion (answer the question); CREAC adds a conclusion first and an explanation of the rule.

Case brief components: facts, procedural history, issue, holding, reasoning, and disposition; the holding is the court's answer to the issue, while dicta is non-binding commentary.

Legal citation: Bluebook format for cases is Party v. Party, Volume Reporter Page (Court Year); statutes are cited by title, section, and year; signals such as see, cf., and but see indicate the strength of support.

Objective legal writing predicts how a court would rule; persuasive writing advocates for a position; both require accurate authority and transparent reasoning.

Rule synthesis: combine holdings from multiple cases into a single rule statement, noting majority and minority rules and any jurisdictional variations.

Analogical reasoning: compare the facts of the precedent to the client's facts; distinguish cases on material facts and explain why the difference matters to the outcome.

Counterargument: identify the strongest opposing argument, address it directly, and explain why the client's position should prevail under the governing rule.

Plain language: use short sentences, active voice, and defined terms; avoid legalese and unnecessary Latin; keep paragraphs focused on one idea.

Editing checklist: verify citation accuracy, check quotation marks and pin cites, confirm that every rule statement is supported by authority, and ensure the conclusion answers the question asked.