The one-bite rule often arises in lawsuits involving bites from domesticated animals (e.g. dog bites). This rule is a scienter requirement under common law that requires the plaintiff to first bear the burden of proof in pleading and proving...
lawsuits-court
One-person, one-vote refers to the rule that one person’s voting power ought to be roughly equivalent to another person’s within the same state.
The rule comes up in the context of strategically drafting voting laws and...
In contract disputes, parol evidence is any agreement that is not contained within the written contract. Under the parol evidence rule, these agreements made outside of the contract are inadmissible in court unless there is evidence...
The term penitentiary is derived from the Latin term paenitentia, meaning repentance. A penitentiary refers to a prison or place of confinement used to hold and correct criminals who have been convicted of felonies. In the Roman Catholic...
Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) is the Supreme Court case that had originally upheld the constitutionality of “separate, but equal facilities” based on race. It was subsequently since overturned by Brown v. Board of Education (1954).
...Political question is a subject matter that the Supreme Court deems to be inappropriate for judicial review because discretionary power over it should be left to the politically accountable branches of government (i.e., the President and...
Ponzi schemes are a type of investment fraud in which investors are promised artificially high rates of return with little or no risk. Original investors and the perpetrators of the fraud are paid off by funds from later investors, but there...
A proffer is a mechanism to offer or present evidence at trial for immediate acceptance or rejection. In State v. Boyd, 25 P.3d 985, the court held that “proffer is a mechanism by which a party may create an appellate record of what the...
Res gestae is a Latin term meaning “things done” or “things transacted.” It refers to the events or circumstances at issue, as well as other events that are contemporaneous with or related to them. Courts previously employed this term in...
Retainers are a type of compensation agreement with lawyers either for reserving their employment or as compensation for future services.
General retainers are the traditional type of retainers where a lawyer agrees to...