Civil Procedure: Model Problems and Outstanding Answers / Edition 2

by Scott Dodson

Overview

Students deem Civil Procedure to be one of the hardest classes in law school for good reason. Doctrines from personal jurisdiction to res judicata are difficult to apply to exam fact patterns, and the policies underlying the federal rules can be difficult to grasp. The course is a complex hybrid of common law, statutes, rules, and some constitutional doctrine.

For the first time, Oxford University Press equips students with an accessible guide to acing this most challenging of law school tests. In Civil Procedure: Model Problems and Outstanding Answers, Scott Dodson helps students demonstrate their knowledge of civil procedure in the structured and sophisticated manner that professors expect on law school exams. This book includes clear introductions to the major topics in civil procedure, provides hypotheticals that students can expect to see on an exam, and offers model answers to those hypotheticals. Professor Dodson then gives students the opportunity to evaluate their own work with a comprehensive self-analysis section. This book prepares students by challenging them to use the law they learn in class while also explaining the best way to express an answer on law school exams.

This second edition has been updated to reflect recent changes to the federal rules of civil procedure. It incorporates new paradigm cases, including Wal-Mart, Goodyear, and McIntyre. The second edition also reflects the new rule and statutory amendments, including the Federal Courts Jurisdictions and Venue Clarification Act of 2011.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199965229
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	11/19/2012
Series:	Model Problems and Outstanding Answers
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	194
Product dimensions:	8.50(w) x 10.90(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Scott Dodson is a Professor of Law at University of California Hastings College of the Law. He is a graduate of Duke Law School, where he was an editor of Duke Law Journal. He also has written over twenty articles on jurisdiction and procedure, appearing in such journals as Stanford Law Review, Michigan Law Review, California Law Review, University of Pennsylvania Law Review, Virginia Law Review, and Northwestern University Law Review.

Table of Contents

About the Author
Acknowledgments
Introduction

1. Personal Jurisdiction
2. Notice
3. Hearing
4. Federal-Question Jurisdiction and Subject-Matter Jurisdiction Generally
5. Diversity Jurisdiction
6. Removal and Remand
7. Venue
8. Erie
9. The Complaint, the Answer, and Rule 12(b)(6)
10. Service
11. Amending the Complaint
12. Joinder and Supplemental Jurisdiction
13. Class Actions
14. Discovery and Privilege
15. Summary Judgment
16. Judgment as a Matter of Law
17. Motions for New Trials
18. Relief from Judgment
19. Appellate Review
20. Issue and Claim Preclusion

Editorial Reviews

"Civil Procedure: Model Problems and Outstanding Answers takes the mystery out of Civil Procedure. Professor Scott Dodson puts the issues in context by showing how they might arise in the real world of litigation. By presenting realistic problems, he breaks down complex aspects of Civil Procedure into defined problems that can be more easily understood. Professor Dodson provides clear black and white examples and answers where they exist. He also explains where there are gray areas, which is just as important to a law student who must understand where the law both is and isn't clear. This is an easy to read resource that connects the classroom to what students need to know and understand."

—TOM METZLOFF, Professor of Law, Duke University School of Law

"Civil Procedure: Model Problems and Outstanding Answers is a unique and very effective study guide that systematically spans the content of a typical first-year civil procedure course. Professor Dodson's book is a wonderful resource for students who are looking both to test and to expand their understanding of civil procedure. The hypotheticals are accompanied by excellent sample answers and additional tools for enhancing student learning. The format and structure are very well suited for practicing exam-taking skills."

—ADAM STEINMAN, Professor of Law, Seton Hall University School of Law

"Professor Dodson's Civil Procedure is a 'must have' for law students and young lawyers alike. As always, Professor Dodson's writing is crisp and the substance is accurate and deep. In this study aide, rather than the conventional synopsis of the law followed by short hypotheticals, Professor Dodson provides students with a nuanced fact pattern against which they may hone their civil procedure skills. Most helpfully, Professor Dodson supplies sample answers—in the form of memoranda—for comparison. These sample memoranda will be a boon for students preparing for that long-essay question, as well as summer interns and young attorneys who are still perfecting their legal writing."

—LUMEN N. MULLIGAN, Professor of Law, The University of Kansas School of Law

"This is the most effective exam-preparation resource that I could recommend to students of Civil Procedure. Professor Dodson quite literally shows students how it's done by offering a model exposition of law and analytical method for every topic that might arise on a Civil Procedure exam. Students who make a careful study of Professor Dodson's suggested approaches will find themselves capable of adapting those approaches to virtually any hypothetical situation that their instructors can conjure. In so doing, those students will dramatically increase their chances of excelling on an exam."

—PHILIP A. PUCILLO, Visiting Professor of Law, Michigan State University College of Law

From the Publisher