NC Bar cheat sheet

Personal jurisdiction: minimum contacts + fair play/substantial justice; general jurisdiction requires 'at home' (incorporation or principal place of business for corporations; domicile for individuals); specific jurisdiction requires purposeful availment, relatedness, and reasonableness (fair play factors).

Subject-matter jurisdiction: federal question under 28 U.S.C. §1331 (well-pleaded complaint rule); diversity under §1332 requires complete diversity and amount in controversy > $75,000 (exclusive of interest and costs).

Erie doctrine: in federal court based on diversity, apply state substantive law (including conflict-of-laws rules) and federal procedural law (FRCP, federal statutes) unless a federal rule is invalid or outcome-determinative under Hanna; state law applies to elements of claims and defenses.

Venue: proper in judicial district where any defendant resides (if all defendants reside in same state), where a substantial part of events or property is located, or if no other district, where any defendant is subject to personal jurisdiction; forum non conveniens and transfer under §1404(a) (convenience) or §1406(a) (improper venue).

Pleadings: complaint must contain short and plain statement of jurisdiction, claim, and demand for relief; defendant must respond within 21 days after service (60 days if waiver of service); Rule 12(b) defenses: lack of SMJ (never waived), lack of PJ, improper venue, insufficient process/service, failure to state a claim, failure to join indispensable party.

Joinder: compulsory counterclaim (same transaction/occurrence) must be asserted or waived; permissive counterclaim requires independent jurisdiction; crossclaims, impleader (third-party defendant), intervention (as of right or permissive), and interpleader (rule 22 or statutory 28 U.S.C. §1335).

Discovery: mandatory initial disclosures under Rule 26(a)(1); scope is any nonprivileged matter relevant to any party's claim or defense and proportional to the needs of the case; work product protection (Rule 26(b)(3)) for documents prepared in anticipation of litigation; expert disclosures and pretrial disclosures.

Summary judgment: granted if no genuine dispute of material fact and moving party entitled to judgment as a matter of law; movant must show absence of evidence for essential element; court views facts in light most favorable to nonmovant; partial summary judgment available.

Preclusion: claim preclusion (res judicata) requires final judgment on merits, same claim (transactional test), same parties or privies; issue preclusion (collateral estoppel) requires actually litigated, determined, and essential issue, with full and fair opportunity to litigate; nonmutual offensive collateral estoppel may be permitted (Parklane Hosiery).

Judicial review: Marbury v. Madison establishes courts may review acts of Congress; political question doctrine bars review of issues textually committed to other branches (e.g., impeachment, foreign affairs recognition); standing requires injury-in-fact, causation, redressability, and no third-party standing unless exception.

State action doctrine: Constitution generally applies only to government conduct; exceptions include public function (e.g., company town) and significant state entanglement (e.g., racial discrimination in private contracts enforced by courts).

Due process: procedural due process requires notice and opportunity to be heard (Mathews v. Eldridge balancing: private interest, risk of erroneous deprivation, government interest); substantive due process protects fundamental rights (strict scrutiny) and economic liberties (rational basis).

Equal protection: strict scrutiny for race, national origin, fundamental rights, and voting; intermediate scrutiny for sex and illegitimacy; rational basis for age, wealth, disability, sexual orientation (currently rational basis in most contexts, but note Obergefell and Romer for animus).

First Amendment speech: content-based restrictions subject to strict scrutiny; content-neutral time/place/manner restrictions subject to intermediate scrutiny (narrow tailoring, significant government interest, leave open alternative channels); prior restraints disfavored; vagueness and overbreadth doctrines.

First Amendment religion: Establishment Clause (Lemon test replaced by historical practices and neutrality in Kennedy v. Bremerton; still consider coercion and neutrality); Free Exercise Clause protects religious beliefs absolutely and conduct partially (strict scrutiny for neutral laws that burden religion after Employment Division v. Smith, but exceptions for individualized exemptions).

Commerce Clause: Congress may regulate channels and instrumentalities of interstate commerce, persons or things in interstate commerce, and activities substantially affecting interstate commerce (Wickard); post-Lopez, noneconomic intrastate activity requires jurisdictional hook; Dormant Commerce Clause restricts state discrimination against interstate commerce (strict scrutiny) and undue burdens (balancing).

Federalism: Tenth Amendment reserves powers to states; anti-commandeering (New York v. United States, Printz); spending power conditions must be for general welfare, unambiguous, related to federal interest, and not coercive (NFIB v. Sebelius); preemption by federal law (express, field, conflict).

Privileges or Immunities (14th Amendment) narrowly interpreted (Slaughter-House); incorporation of Bill of Rights through Due Process (selective incorporation); Second Amendment (Heller, McDonald) individual right to keep and bear arms for self-defense in home.

Contract formation: mutual assent (offer + acceptance) + consideration + no defenses; offer must be definite (parties, subject matter, price, quantity, time); acceptance must be unequivocal and communicated; mailbox rule for acceptance (effective on dispatch) unless option contract.

UCC Article 2: applies to sale of goods; firm offer by merchant (signed writing, assurance, up to 3 months); acceptance with additional terms (2-207) for merchants (becomes part unless material alteration, objection, or different terms); gap fillers (price, place, time, output/requirements).

Consideration: bargained-for exchange; pre-existing duty rule (no consideration for doing what already obligated); exceptions: UCC good faith modification, third-party promise, new consideration; promissory estoppel as substitute for consideration (detrimental reliance, injustice).

Statute of Frauds: writing required for marriage, year (cannot be performed within 1 year), land, executor, surety, sale of goods over $500 (UCC); exceptions: specially manufactured goods, admissions, part payment, merchant confirmation; judicial admission or performance.

Parol evidence rule: bars prior or contemporaneous oral statements to vary integrated written agreement; exceptions: ambiguity, fraud, mistake, condition precedent, course of dealing/performance, usage of trade; UCC allows course of dealing, usage of trade, course of performance to explain or supplement.

Performance and breach: perfect tender (UCC) vs substantial performance (common law); anticipatory repudiation (clear and unequivocal); excuse by impracticability (unforeseen event, nonoccurrence basic assumption), frustration of purpose, impossibility; risk of loss (UCC shipment/ destination contracts).

Remedies: expectation damages (loss of value), reliance, restitution; consequential damages (Hadley v. Baxendale foreseeability); liquidated damages must be reasonable forecast and not penalty; specific performance for land and unique goods; UCC buyer/seller remedies (cover, resale, market price).

Third-party rights: intended beneficiary can enforce (creditor or donee); incidental beneficiary cannot; assignment (rights) and delegation (duties); assignee takes subject to defenses; delegation not allowed if personal services or contract prohibits.

Defenses: incapacity (minor, mental), duress, undue influence, misrepresentation, nondisclosure, mistake (mutual and unilateral), unconscionability (procedural + substantive), illegality; conditions (express, constructive, precedent, subsequent) and excuse (prevention, waiver).

Elements of crime: actus reus (voluntary act or omission where legal duty), mens rea (purpose, knowledge, recklessness, negligence), concurrence, causation, and resulting harm; specific intent vs general intent vs malice vs strict liability.

Homicide: murder (malice aforethought: intent to kill, intent to inflict serious bodily harm, reckless indifference to life, felony murder); manslaughter (voluntary: heat of passion/provocation; involuntary: criminal negligence or misdemeanor manslaughter); felony murder limitations (inherently dangerous felony, res gestae, merger doctrine).

Defenses: justification (self-defense, defense of others, defense of habitation, necessity, duress) and excuse (insanity: M'Naghten, irresistible impulse, ALI; intoxication; infancy; entrapment); deadly force only if imminent death/serious bodily harm; imperfect self-defense mitigates.

Inchoate offenses: attempt (specific intent + substantial step), solicitation (specific intent to have crime committed), conspiracy (agreement + intent + overt act if required); merger: solicitation and attempt merge into completed crime; conspiracy does not merge; Pinkerton liability for co-conspirator crimes.

Fourth Amendment: search/seizure requires warrant (probable cause, particularity, neutral magistrate) or exception (search incident to arrest, automobile, plain view, consent, exigent circumstances, stop and frisk (Terry), inventory, border); exclusionary rule and exceptions (good faith, inevitable discovery, attenuation, independent source).

Fifth Amendment: privilege against self-incrimination (custodial interrogation requires Miranda warnings; waiver must be knowing, voluntary, intelligent; invocation must be unambiguous; Edwards rule); double jeopardy (same offense, same sovereign; no appeal after acquittal); due process voluntariness of confessions.

Sixth Amendment: right to counsel at critical stages (after formal charges, all interrogations, trial, sentencing, appeal); ineffective assistance of counsel (Strickland: deficient performance + prejudice); right to jury trial (serious offenses, unanimous verdict for federal, incorporated to states); confrontation clause (testimonial statements, unavailable declarant, prior opportunity to cross-examine).

Trial and sentencing: burden of proof beyond reasonable doubt; presumption of innocence; jury nullification; sentencing guidelines and Eighth Amendment proportionality (cruel and unusual punishment); death penalty (aggravating factors, individualized sentencing, no mandatory death penalty, no death for non-homicide crimes, no execution of mentally retarded or juveniles).

Criminal procedure: arrest requires probable cause; initial appearance (probable cause determination within 48 hours); grand jury (federal) or preliminary hearing (state); bail; discovery; plea bargaining (voluntary and intelligent, factual basis); speedy trial (Barker v. Wingo factors); double jeopardy and collateral estoppel.

Relevance: evidence is relevant if it has any tendency to make a fact more or less probable and the fact is of consequence; relevant evidence may be excluded if probative value substantially outweighed by unfair prejudice, confusion, waste of time (Rule 403).

Character evidence: not admissible to prove conduct in civil cases; in criminal cases, defendant may offer character for pertinent trait, prosecution may rebut; character evidence admissible when character is at issue (defamation, child custody) or for impeachment (truthfulness).

Hearsay: out-of-court statement offered to prove truth of matter asserted; exclusions: prior statements under oath, opposing party statements (admissions), co-conspirator statements; exemptions: excited utterance, present sense impression, then-existing condition, business records, public records, ancient documents, learned treatises, judgment of conviction, family records, market reports.

Confrontation Clause: testimonial hearsay inadmissible unless declarant unavailable and defendant had prior opportunity to cross-examine; nontestimonial hearsay governed by hearsay rules; dying declarations and forfeiture by wrongdoing exceptions.

Privileges: attorney-client (confidential communication for legal advice, crime-fraud exception), physician-patient (varies), psychotherapist-patient (Jaffee), spousal (confidential marital communications and testimonial privilege), clergy, government informer; waiver by disclosure.

Witnesses: competency (personal knowledge, oath, understanding); impeachment by prior inconsistent statement (under oath, opportunity to explain), bias, sensory deficiency, character for truthfulness (conviction of crime involving dishonesty or false statement; felony subject to 403), specific contradictions; rehabilitation.

Opinion and expert testimony: lay opinions (rationally based on perception, helpful, not specialized); expert testimony (qualified, reliable methodology (Daubert/Kumho), helpful, facts/data, reliable principles, applied reliably); court may appoint experts.

Physical evidence: authentication (sufficient evidence to support finding that item is what proponent claims); best evidence rule (original writing required to prove content, exceptions: duplicates, voluminous records, public records, summaries); chain of custody.

Burden of proof: civil preponderance of evidence; criminal beyond reasonable doubt; presumptions (permissive vs mandatory; unconstitutional mandatory presumptions in criminal cases); judicial notice (adjudicative and legislative facts).

Estates in land: fee simple absolute (alienable, devisable, descendible); fee tail (rare); life estate (measured by life, reversion or remainder); fee simple determinable (possibility of reverter); fee simple subject to condition subsequent (right of entry); fee simple subject to executory limitation (executory interest).

Concurrent ownership: tenancy in common (no right of survivorship, unequal shares); joint tenancy (right of survivorship, four unities: time, title, interest, possession; severance by conveyance, mortgage, lease, or agreement); tenancy by the entirety (spouses, survivorship).

Landlord-tenant: leasehold estates (term of years, periodic tenancy, tenancy at will, tenancy at sufferance); duties: quiet enjoyment, warranty of habitability (residential), repair; assignment vs sublease; security deposits; eviction (actual or constructive).

Easements: express (writing), implied (prior use, necessity), prescriptive (adverse use for statutory period), estoppel; appurtenant vs in gross; transferability; termination (merger, release, abandonment, prescription, estoppel).

Covenants and servitudes: real covenants (writing, intent, touch and concern, privity, notice); equitable servitudes (same but no privity, remedy injunction); common scheme; termination by changed conditions; racial covenants unenforceable (Shelley v. Kraemer).

Adverse possession: actual, open and notorious, exclusive, continuous, hostile for statutory period; color of title and payment of taxes may shorten; tacking allowed if privity; government land generally not subject.

Recording acts: race (first to record), notice (first to acquire without notice), race-notice (first to record without notice); notice types: actual, inquiry, record; shelter rule; wild deed; estoppel by deed; marketable title (free from encumbrances, liens, defects).

Mortgages: lien theory vs title theory; foreclosure (judicial or power of sale); priority (first recorded); purchase money mortgage priority; deficiency judgment; redemption (equitable and statutory); deed in lieu of foreclosure; anti-deficiency statutes.

Zoning and land use: zoning ordinances (use, height, density); nonconforming uses; variances (use and area); special exceptions; spot zoning; taking (regulatory taking, Lucas, Penn Central); exactions (Nollan/Dolan).

Intentional torts: battery (harmful/offensive contact), assault (apprehension of imminent battery), false imprisonment (confinement), trespass to land (physical invasion), trespass to chattels (interference), conversion (substantial interference); defenses: consent, self-defense, defense of others, necessity, arrest.

Negligence: duty (reasonable person standard, special relationships, foreseeable plaintiffs), breach (custom, Hand formula), causation (actual cause 'but for' and proximate cause/foreseeability), damages (actual harm); res ipsa loquitur (exclusive control, unlikely without negligence, no plaintiff contribution).

Duty: general duty to foreseeable plaintiffs (Palsgraf); no duty to rescue unless special relationship or creation of peril; landowners: trespasser (no duty except intentional/willful), licensee (warn of known dangers), invitee (reasonable care to inspect and warn); attractive nuisance for children.

Defenses to negligence: contributory negligence (complete bar, minority), comparative negligence (pure, modified, slight/gross), assumption of risk (express or implied); sudden emergency; statute of limitations; immunity (governmental, charitable).

Strict liability: abnormally dangerous activities (high risk, cannot eliminate with reasonable care, uncommon, inappropriate location); animals (wild animals, known dangerous domestic); products liability (manufacturing defect, design defect, warning defect; commercial seller; foreseeable use).

Products liability: strict liability in tort (Restatement 402A) vs negligence vs warranty; defenses: misuse, assumption of risk, sophisticated user, statute of repose; preemption; learned intermediary doctrine for prescription drugs.

Defamation: defamatory statement, publication, identification, harm; constitutional limits: public officials/figures must prove actual malice (New York Times v. Sullivan); private plaintiffs need negligence for actual damages, actual malice for presumed/punitive; defenses: truth, privilege, retraction.

Privacy torts: appropriation of name/likeness, intrusion upon seclusion, public disclosure of private facts, false light; defenses: consent, newsworthiness, privilege; First Amendment limitations.

Nuisance: private nuisance (substantial, unreasonable interference with use/enjoyment); public nuisance (unreasonable interference with right common to public); remedies: injunction, damages; coming to nuisance defense; zoning as defense; trespass vs nuisance distinction.

MPT format: two 90-minute tasks (usually one objective memo and one persuasive brief or letter); closed universe of materials (library and file); no outside law; tests practical lawyering skills, not substantive knowledge.

Objective memo structure: heading (TO/FROM/DATE/RE), question presented, brief answer, statement of facts, discussion (issues, rules, analysis, counterarguments), conclusion; use IRAC or CREAC; cite only provided authorities.

Persuasive brief structure: caption, statement of facts (favorable), argument (point headings, rule, application, counterargument rebuttal), conclusion, prayer for relief; tone persuasive but professional; cite provided authorities.

Client letter: clear, plain language, explain legal issues and options, avoid jargon, maintain confidentiality, include next steps; format: date, address, salutation, body, closing.

IRAC: Issue (legal question), Rule (applicable law from library), Application (facts from file to rule), Conclusion (answer); CREAC: Conclusion, Rule, Explanation, Application, Conclusion; use for each issue.

Time management: 90 minutes per task; allocate 20-30 minutes reading and outlining, 50-60 minutes writing, 10 minutes reviewing; prioritize high-value issues; do not over-research; use provided authorities efficiently.

Fact application: use specific facts from file; analogize and distinguish provided cases; address counterarguments; avoid conclusory statements; explain reasoning; cite record and library.

Ethical considerations: candor to tribunal, confidentiality, conflicts of interest, competence, diligence; MPT may test professional responsibility; follow ABA Model Rules if referenced.

Scoring: graded on organization, analysis, use of authorities, factual application, clarity, grammar, and adherence to format; follow instructions precisely (e.g., memo to partner, brief to court); no outside law.

MBE format: 200 multiple-choice questions, 6 hours (two 3-hour sessions), 175 scored; subjects: Civil Procedure, Constitutional Law, Contracts, Criminal Law and Procedure, Evidence, Real Property, Torts; no Legal Writing.

Scoring: scaled score 0-200; passing score varies by jurisdiction (e.g., 133-145); MBE is 50% of total score in most UBE jurisdictions; national average ~135-140; need approximately 60-65% correct to pass.

Civil Procedure: 25 questions (approx.); focus on jurisdiction, venue, pleadings, joinder, discovery, summary judgment, preclusion, Erie.

Constitutional Law: 25 questions; focus on judicial review, federalism, due process, equal protection, First Amendment, commerce clause.

Contracts: 25 questions; focus on formation, consideration, Statute of Frauds, parol evidence, performance, remedies, UCC Article 2.

Criminal Law and Procedure: 25 questions; focus on elements, homicide, defenses, Fourth/Fifth/Sixth Amendment, trial rights.

Evidence: 25 questions; focus on relevance, hearsay, character evidence, impeachment, privileges, expert testimony.

Real Property: 25 questions; focus on estates, concurrent ownership, landlord-tenant, easements, covenants, adverse possession, recording acts, mortgages.

Torts: 25 questions; focus on negligence, intentional torts, strict liability, products liability, defamation, privacy, nuisance; plus test-taking strategies: read call carefully, eliminate, avoid overthinking, manage time (1.8 min/question).