MBE cheat sheet

Federal question jurisdiction exists under 28 U.S.C. § 1331 when the plaintiff's well-pleaded complaint raises a federal issue; a federal defense generally does not create jurisdiction.

Diversity jurisdiction under § 1332 requires complete diversity of citizenship and an amount in controversy exceeding $75,000, exclusive of interest and costs.

Personal jurisdiction requires purposeful contacts with the forum, relatedness of the claim, and fair play; general jurisdiction exists where a defendant is essentially at home.

Venue under § 1391 is proper where any defendant resides if all reside in the same state, where substantial events occurred, or where any defendant is subject to personal jurisdiction.

Erie requires federal courts in diversity to apply state substantive law and federal procedural law; a valid Federal Rule governs if it is procedural and within the Rules Enabling Act.

A defendant waives personal jurisdiction and venue objections by omitting them from a Rule 12 motion or failing to raise them in the answer.

Summary judgment is granted when no genuine dispute of material fact exists and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law, viewing evidence in the nonmovant's favor.

Claim preclusion requires a final judgment on the merits, same claim, and same parties or privies; issue preclusion requires actual litigation, determination, and essentiality.

Removal generally must be filed within 30 days of service; diversity cases cannot be removed if any properly joined defendant is a citizen of the forum state.

Standing requires an injury in fact that is concrete, particularized, and actual or imminent, fairly traceable to the defendant, and redressable by a favorable decision.

Congress may regulate interstate commerce channels, instrumentalities, and activities substantially affecting interstate commerce, plus regulations necessary and proper to those powers.

Dormant Commerce Clause: discriminatory state laws are presumptively invalid unless they serve an important local purpose and no reasonable nondiscriminatory alternative exists.

Nondiscriminatory state laws burdening interstate commerce are valid unless the burden on commerce clearly exceeds the local benefits.

Content-based speech restrictions receive strict scrutiny; content-neutral time, place, and manner rules receive intermediate scrutiny and must leave ample alternatives.

Equal protection strict scrutiny applies to suspect classifications and fundamental rights; intermediate scrutiny to sex and illegitimacy; rational basis to economic and social legislation.

The state action doctrine limits Fourteenth Amendment claims; private conduct is covered only when state involvement is significant or entangled.

A physical invasion or regulation denying all economically beneficial use is a per se taking; other regulatory takings use Penn Central factors.

Procedural due process under Mathews balances the private interest, risk of erroneous deprivation, and government interest.

UCC Article 2 governs transactions in goods; common law governs services, real estate, and intangible contracts.

An offer must manifest present intent to contract and be sufficiently definite; UCC gap-fillers supply missing price, place, and time terms.

A merchant's signed firm offer is irrevocable without consideration for the stated time or a reasonable time, not exceeding three months.

The Statute of Frauds requires a writing for marriage, one-year, land, executor, surety, and goods of $500 or more.

Under the perfect tender rule, goods and tender must conform exactly; the buyer may reject, but the seller may cure within the contract time.

Expectation damages put the nonbreaching party where performance would have placed them and include foreseeable consequential damages.

Material breach excuses the other party's performance; substantial performance permits recovery minus cost to cure.

Anticipatory repudiation occurs when a party clearly indicates it will not perform, allowing the other to sue immediately or await performance.

Liquidated damages are enforceable if the amount is a reasonable forecast of anticipated harm and not a penalty.

MPC mental states are purposely, knowingly, recklessly, and negligently; common law murder requires malice aforethought.

Felony murder liability attaches to killings during inherently dangerous felonies, limited by proximate cause and agency rules.

Voluntary manslaughter requires adequate provocation, heat of passion, no cooling time, and causation.

Larceny is trespassory taking and carrying away of personal property with intent to permanently deprive.

Embezzlement involves lawful possession followed by fraudulent conversion; false pretenses involves obtaining title by deceit.

Attempt requires intent to commit the crime plus a substantial step beyond mere preparation.

An accomplice must intend to aid or encourage the principal's crime; withdrawal requires neutralizing assistance or timely communication.

Fourth Amendment seizures require probable cause for arrest and reasonable suspicion for a Terry stop; warrants require probable cause.

Miranda warnings apply to custodial interrogation; the Sixth Amendment right to counsel attaches after formal charging.

Relevant evidence tends to make a fact of consequence more or less probable; Rule 403 excludes if probative value is substantially outweighed by unfair prejudice.

Character evidence is generally inadmissible to prove propensity, but the accused may offer pertinent character traits; prosecution may rebut.

MIMIC evidence is admissible for motive, intent, absence of mistake, identity, or common plan, not propensity.

Hearsay is an out-of-court statement offered for truth; statements for effect on listener and verbal acts are nonhearsay.

Present sense impression, excited utterance, and then-existing condition are hearsay exceptions regardless of declarant availability.

Business records are admissible if made in regular course, contemporaneously, by someone with knowledge, unless lack of trustworthiness.

Testimonial hearsay requires unavailability and prior opportunity for cross-examination under the Confrontation Clause, absent forfeiture.

Impeachment by prior inconsistent statement requires oath if substantive; bias and conviction impeachment are also permitted.

Authentication requires sufficient evidence that an item is what the proponent claims; the best evidence rule requires an original to prove contents.

Fee simple absolute is freely alienable and inheritable; defeasible fees terminate or may be divested on stated events.

Joint tenancy requires time, title, interest, and possession unities and includes right of survivorship; severance destroys survivorship.

Tenancy in common has no right of survivorship and allows unequal shares; tenancy by the entirety requires marriage.

A leasehold is personal property; residential leases carry an implied warranty of habitability, and constructive eviction excuses rent.

Easements may be express, implied, by necessity, or prescriptive; appurtenant easements run with the dominant estate.

A real covenant requires writing, intent, touch and concern, privity, and notice; equitable servitudes are enforced by injunction.

Adverse possession requires actual, open and notorious, exclusive, continuous, hostile possession for the statutory period.

Recording statutes: race protects first to record; notice protects BFP without notice; race-notice protects first BFP to record.

A purchase-money mortgage generally has priority over prior liens; foreclosure extinguishes junior liens.

Battery requires intent to cause harmful or offensive contact and actual contact; assault requires apprehension of imminent contact.

Negligence requires duty, breach, actual and proximate causation, and damages; the reasonable person standard governs.

No duty to rescue absent special relationship or creation of peril; landowners owe duties based on entrant status.

Res ipsa loquitur permits inference of negligence when the accident ordinarily does not occur without negligence and the instrumentality is in defendant's control.

Proximate cause limits liability to foreseeable harms; unforeseeable intervening causes supersede.

Comparative negligence reduces recovery; contributory negligence bars under traditional rules; assumption of risk is a complete defense.

Strict products liability covers manufacturing, design, and warning defects that make a product unreasonably dangerous.

Defamation requires defamatory statement, publication, fault, and damages; public figures must prove actual malice.

Private nuisance is substantial unreasonable interference with use and enjoyment; trespass requires physical invasion.