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Civil Procedure β’ Introduction
CIVPRO#000
Legal Definition
Civil Procedure is the set of procedural rules the courts will follow when conducting civil trials. In other words, Civil Procedure is the study of what authority a court has to force citizens to obey it, and which rules it must follow when rendering judgment on a civil issue between two or more people.
In law school, you will learn two types of civil procedure: Federal and State (usually your state, or at least the state that you plan on taking the bar exam in). Unless otherwise specified in a card you are reviewing here, this deck focuses on general and federal rules of civil procedure. So what should you expect?
At its core, Civil Procedure is invoked when someone wants to sue someone else. Sometimes exams will ask you broadly whether or not it is possible for a lawsuit to be filed between those parties under the facts you are given, and sometimes exams will ask you to put yourself in the robe of a judge (not in a creepy way) and defensibly decide the fate of the parties from the fact pattern. Ultimately, you will need to be detail oriented and focused. It is common to be presented with a fact pattern that seems obvious and benign, but is ultimately flawed by some subtle failure to properly follow the rules of civil procedure.
With that in mind, here is some common shorthand you should be familiar with:
- "Jx" = Jurisdiction
- "PJ" or "PJx" = "Personal Jurisdiction"
- "SMJ" or "SMJx" = "Subject Matter Jurisdiction"
- Ο = Plaintiff
- β = Defendant
In law school, you will learn two types of civil procedure: Federal and State (usually your state, or at least the state that you plan on taking the bar exam in). Unless otherwise specified in a card you are reviewing here, this deck focuses on general and federal rules of civil procedure. So what should you expect?
At its core, Civil Procedure is invoked when someone wants to sue someone else. Sometimes exams will ask you broadly whether or not it is possible for a lawsuit to be filed between those parties under the facts you are given, and sometimes exams will ask you to put yourself in the robe of a judge (not in a creepy way) and defensibly decide the fate of the parties from the fact pattern. Ultimately, you will need to be detail oriented and focused. It is common to be presented with a fact pattern that seems obvious and benign, but is ultimately flawed by some subtle failure to properly follow the rules of civil procedure.
With that in mind, here is some common shorthand you should be familiar with:
- "Jx" = Jurisdiction
- "PJ" or "PJx" = "Personal Jurisdiction"
- "SMJ" or "SMJx" = "Subject Matter Jurisdiction"
- Ο = Plaintiff
- β = Defendant
