legal memo 法律备忘录(12)

legal memo

be a stand-alone document that can fully inform any colleague in your law office who may read it; therefore, the facts section should always contain a full and coherent recitation of the relevant facts, whether or not the principal reader of the memo already knows them (unless, of course, you were instructed to do otherwise).

9) It is helpful to the reader to present the facts according to some organizational scheme. In this memo, the writer has addressed the heart of the incident — the advertisement, the sale of the coats, the arrival of the unhappy shopper — in chronological order in the first paragraph; a second paragraph collects relevant background information about the client.

In your own memo, you can recount the facts completely chronologically, you can put the most important incidents or facts first, or you can cluster the facts into discrete topics if the facts are complex and if this is the easiest way to understand them. Choose the organizational scheme that you think will make the facts most clear and memorable to the reader.

10) In your fact section, be sure to specify what legal claims are being considered or are being brought, and be sure to describe any legal proceedings that have already taken place.

11) Identify your client and briefly describe your client’s goal or problem.

12) Since memo writing is predictive writing, you should try to maintain an objective and impartial tone as you recount the facts. This is not to say that you should omit facts that have an emotional impact. Rather, the facts section of an office memo should not be written in a tone that conveys a preference for a particular theory of the case, that implicitly advocates for one side in the dispute, or that telegraphs any of the legal conclusions to be drawn in the discussion section. Since you are not advocating for any side, you ought not color or characterize the facts as you would if you were writing a brief. Also, do not comment upon the facts in the facts section or discuss how the law will apply to them.

13) The umbrella section of the discussion introduces or prefaces your first section of in-depth legal analysis; for example, it restates the key facts and issue presented, and introduces the overarching legal rule. Note how the writer alerts the reader to the key point of the doctrine, that general advertisements are treated in law as invitations to negotiate, not offers.

14) The rule statement synthesizes key elements of the cases relevant to the issue in your case into a general statement of the rule. To produce an accurate and well-crafted rule statement, you must have a good understanding of the existing legal authority on which your rule statement is based.

15) Note how the writer pulls together key cases that comprise the rule, then identifies the standard of inquiry by which courts apply the rule.

16) If the rule statement serves as the thesis sentence for a longer discussion about a legal rule that has developed over time in

a series of cases, the rule proof serves as your explanation and elaboration of that thesis sentence.

Note as you read this section how the writer fleshes out the facts, holding, and reasoning of the Schenectady Stove Co. and Lovett cases, focusing on facts that are similar to the Loman case.

17) A good application section weaves the cases into your facts. Language from the cases should be prominent and woven into your discussion of these facts. In the rule proof you discuss cases to support the rule statement. In the application section, you might draw analogies or contrasts between the cases discussed in the rule proof and your facts as a way to reach your conclusion.

18) Note how the writer focuses on the specifics of the language of the advertisement.

19) Note how the writer draws a direct comparison to similar facts in the Lovett case.

20) The use of a counterargument is a good way to convey that the existing legal authority is not clear, unequivocal, or unified when applied to facts like yours. It may be the case that you cannot predict with certainty the outcome of your case, given your facts.

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