Essays on Legal Research Text

Jonathan Friesen - Writing Coach

example of a 2,500 word legal research piece which is typical of the task required as part of the bar vocational course. This particular piece is on clinical negligence and focuses on the law of causation therein

1. I am asked to advise on the following issues: causation in relation to the negligent treatment errol winston received at st. Dealt with errol winston's case differences in the law's approach to causation in clinical negligence as opposed to cases of solicitor's negligence and personal injuries cases generally further questions to be put to mr khan, the expert in the case, to clarify or amplify his statement an overall estimation on the likely prospect of success/percentage discount likely in this case against craft co. The facts of the case are that mr winston was referred to mr reginald howard, an orthopaedic surgeon at st john's hospital, tooting because of pain to his shoulder. Mr howard recommended a rotator cuff operation, which was carried out in the hospital. In breach of hospital procedure, mr winston was not provided with ted stockings before or during his operation.

Mr winston subsequently developed dvt shortly after the operation, and the suffered a pulmonary embolism. hellip in this essay we will discuss the process of legal research, writing, and analysis. The textbook that we will be referencing is gilbert law summaries: legal research, writing, and analysis 10th ed, barbri group, 2006. The us court system consists of a trial court, an appellate court, and a supreme or high court. The trial court is the first to hear the facts of a case and has original jurisdiction.

300 Words Essay

The appellate court hears cases whose resolution is disputed by the losing party in the trial court. The supreme or high court hears cases whose outcome is disputed by the losing party in the appellate court. The federal court of appeals has thirteen 13 circuits which cover most states except the district of columbia. The federal system also has specialty courts such as the court of federal claims and the united states tax court. An important point to keep in mind is that all binding decisions are initiated at the highest court at either the federal or state level.

Stare decisis refers to the practice of the courts adhering to previously rendered decisions. This is especially true involving united states supreme court decisions that have binding authority on both the federal and the state courts. Remember that court decisions in the same jurisdiction only have persuasive authority which is not binding. When a federal or a state appellate or supreme court issues an opinion that opinion is recorded in writing. Official reporters are those that are authorized to be published by the government.

Unofficially, federal cases are reported in the supreme court reporter, united states supreme court reports, lawyer's edition, and the united states law week. Federal appellate decisions can be found in the federal reporter and prior to 1880 in federal cases. Courts that deal with bankruptcy, federal rules or military law among others have unofficial reporters. In the thompson west system similar points of law are indicated by a key number that will match another key number to cases with similar points of law. Make sure you read each case if you have any uncertainty while reading the headnotes.

Looseleaf materials are published for specialized areas of case law such as tax law. The association of legal writing director's alwd citation manual, and the bluebook: a uniform system of citation are the two main manuals for citing legal sources. Lexisnexis utilizes shepard's citations for the purpose of reporting the most current judicial decisions.

Shepard's citations are most valuable once you have established precedent and are researching the. Legal researchers have always struggled to explain the nature of their activities to colleagues in other disciplines. 1 work continues to represent an accurate account of how academic lawyers are viewed by their peers they have much work still to do in this respect. He found that they were regarded as ‘not really academic … arcane, distant and alien: an appendage to the academic world … vociferous, untrustworthy, immoral, narrow and arrogant’.

Their research fared no better, being dismissed as ‘… unexciting, uncreative, and comprising a series of intellectual puzzles scattered among large areas of description’. This chapter therefore presents a welcome opportunity to explain the actual nature of legal research or ‘legal scholarship’ as it is more usually described to researchers from the other component disciplines within the built environment. The built environment is usually considered to be an interdisciplinary or, at the very least, a multidisciplinary field linking the disciplines of management, economics, law, technology and design chynoweth, 2006.

The field as a whole can benefit from an improved understanding of each of its component disciplines, and from the greatest possible involvement of each of these in its collective research agendas. The current chapter aims to assist this process in the context of the law discipline. Specifically, it attempts to describe the nature of research within that discipline by reference to the epistemological, methodological and cultural features which distinguish it from other forms of built environment research. The legal academic skills centre is the hub for student support and resources relating to legal writing, legal research, study skills and wellbeing. The legal academic skills centre provides support for students interested in improving their legal research, writing and academic skill.

Writing for law requires specific skills, here you will find resources and advice on meeting expectations in the law school. Here you will find webinars, and written advice on how to work with the legal databases. workshops: registration and materials workshops are a useful way to get some practice with legal skills and receive feedback in the moment. This page has information on the schedule, registration and materials from the workshops.

Access the facilitated study groups and self directed learning university of melbourne which includes academic skills, legal writing, exams and more. You can book an appointment with someone in the lasc to discuss drafts of essays and academic skills. Discuss and critically assess the benefits and disadvantages of at least two different research methodologies as tools for conducting independent legal research at postgraduate level legal research methodology denotes the exposition, the description or the explanation and the justification of methods used in conducting research in the discipline of law. At the postgraduate level, legal research may be carried out by utilising one or more of number of different techniques or methodologies.

These different methodologies include, inter alia, doctrinal or library based research, comparative law methods, socio legal methods and philosophical legal methods. In this discussion we focus on two methodologies that are often employed by legal researchers. Doctrinal or library based research is the most common methodology employed by those undertaking research in law.

In a nutshell, library based research is predicated upon finding the lsquo one right answer rsquo to a particular legal questions or set of questions. Thus, the methodology is aimed at specific enquiries in order to locate particular pieces of information. For example, an investigation may be conducted into the legislation encompassing child abuse in a particular jurisdiction. It may also be sought to find out what specific section within the said legislation is actually applicable.