MEE: Multistate Essay Examination
What the MEE tests
The Multistate Essay Examination is six 30-minute essays in three hours. It draws on the seven MBE subjects plus Business Associations, Conflict of Laws, Family Law, Trusts and Estates, and Secured Transactions under UCC Article 9. There are no answer choices: you must spot issues, state rules, apply facts, and reach a conclusion.
Core rules and concepts
- Business Associations: agency authority, partnership duties, LLC formation, corporate veil piercing, fiduciary duties.
- Conflict of Laws: domicile, choice of law, recognition of judgments, full faith and credit.
- Family Law: marriage, divorce, property division, child custody, support.
- Trusts and Estates: intestacy, wills formalities, revocation, trust creation, trustee duties, powers of appointment.
- Secured Transactions: attachment, perfection by filing/possession/control, priority, proceeds, default remedies.
Worked example
A debtor grants a bank a security interest in inventory; the bank files a financing statement naming the debtor's trade name, not legal name. Another creditor later perfects correctly. Under UCC 9-503 and 9-506, a seriously misleading financing statement is ineffective; a filed statement is not seriously misleading if a search of the debtor's correct name would disclose it. Because the trade name is not the legal name and a standard search would not reveal the filing, the bank is unperfected. The later creditor wins if it perfected first in time after the defective filing. The bank may still have an unperfected interest against the debtor, but not priority against the later perfected creditor.
Traps
Answering in outline without rules; missing a second issue, such as both contract and tort; citing a case name instead of stating the rule; ignoring the call of the question; failing to discuss both sides when the facts are ambiguous.