Contracts or Property (4 Credits)
Contracts
Examines the purpose and scope of the legal protection accorded agreements. The course focuses on:
- Problems of contract formation and interpretation
- Remedies for breach of contract
- The offer and acceptance of a contract
- The effect of changed circumstances, and more complicated questions, such as contracts that are impossible to perform.
Property
Focuses on basic principles governing private and public control over tangible and intangible resources, especially land. The course addresses concepts and policies concerning property and special concepts concerning real estate, such as estates in land, future interests, and the rule against perpetuities. The course also studies real estate transactions, recording, methods of title assurance, easements, covenants, and land use controls.
Torts (4 Credits)
Considers the issues involved in assessing whether the law should require a person to compensate another for harm intentionally or unintentionally inflicted. It analyzes the public policy positions implicit in the legal concepts that courts use in tort cases, as well as the ways in which social problems and the law of torts interact.
Civil Procedure (3 Credits)
An introduction to the process of civil litigation, emphasizing questions of jurisdiction, pleadings, discovery, remedies, and appellate review.
In addition to the above traditional, required first-year courses, all entering students also take:
Elements of Law (3 Credits)
Focuses explicitly on legal institutions, the theories underlying them, the process of legal reasoning, and the ways in which the law evolves.
Legal Communication & Research Skills I (2 Credits)
In the fall, law students are introduced to foundational lawyering skills. They learn to read judicial opinions, analyze the law, and apply the law to a set of facts. Students write objective legal memoranda of the type that a junior associate or judicial clerk might be asked to write. They also learn how to communicate with clients.
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