Concept

The royal prerogative comprises the historic powers of the crown, making war and treaties, dissolving parliament, granting honors,...

Litigants unsatisfied by rigid common law remedies petitioned the Chancellor, the conscience of the king, and their petitions hard...

Habeas corpus, Latin for you shall have the body, commands the custodian to bring a detainee to court and show lawful cause for ho...

Criminal law generally requires a culpable mental state, mens rea, paired with the forbidden act. Doctrine grades it into purpose ...

Actus reus comprises the prohibited act, result, or circumstance, together with any required causation, and must ordinarily be vol...

Tort law spans negligence, intentional wrongs like assault and trespass, and strict liability for dangerous activities and defecti...

Modern negligence analysis asks whether the defendant owed the injured person a duty of care, whether conduct fell below the stand...

Common law requires consideration, something of legal value bargained for, to enforce a promise, distinguishing contracts from gif...

A contract forms when an offer is met with acceptance supported by consideration, creating obligations the law will enforce. Forma...

Strict liability attaches regardless of care in a narrow class of cases, chiefly abnormally dangerous activities like blasting and...

The modern rules date to the 1843 M Naghten case in England, asking whether the defendant knew the nature and quality of the act o...

The jury of ordinary citizens decides contested facts, a lineage running from Athenian panels through Magna Carta to the modern pe...

The trust splits ownership, giving a trustee legal title to manage for beneficiaries holding equitable interest, an invention of m...

Limitation periods, commonly two to six years for civil claims by type, force aggrieved parties to sue while evidence lives and gi...

Called the oldest of the common law confidences, the privilege protects communications made for legal advice so clients may speak ...

Modern discovery lets parties compel documents, answers, and depositions before trial, overturning the old ambush model where evid...

Over ninety percent of American criminal convictions arrive by negotiated plea rather than trial, a practice that grew quietly in ...

Class treatment under Rule 23 aggregates thousands of small claims that no one would bring alone, binding absent members after not...

The Fifth Amendment requires federal felony prosecution to begin with a grand jury indictment, a body of citizens hearing prosecut...

Article Two empowers the President to grant reprieves and pardons for federal offenses, unchecked by Congress or review, except in...

Bail trades release before trial for conditions, historically money bonds, that secure appearance. The Eighth Amendment bars exces...

At-will employment lets either side end the relationship at any time without notice or cause, the default in every American state ...

The 1961 Vienna Convention codified millennia of practice, granting envoys immunity from arrest and jurisdiction, inviolability of...

Rooted in the maxim that equals have no sovereignty over each other, sovereign immunity bars suits against states and their agenci...

Extradition runs on bilateral and multilateral treaties requiring double criminality, the act be criminal in both states, and resp...

Customary international law forms where consistent state practice meets opinio juris, the sense of legal obligation, and binds eve...

Restorative justice convenes victims, offenders, and communities to confront harm, agree reparation, and reintegrate, with New Zea...

Arbitration submits disputes to a chosen private tribunal whose award travels worldwide under the 1958 New York Convention, enforc...

Civil fraud requires a false representation made knowingly or recklessly, intended to be relied on, actually relied on, and causin...

Property law organizes ownership through estates, led by the fee simple absolute, present and future interests, and co-ownership f...

Latin for a matter judged, res judicata holds that once a court has reached a final judgment on the merits, the same parties may n...

Often called squatters' rights, adverse possession allows a person who possesses land openly, continuously, exclusively, and witho...