The doctrines that decide cases.
Every claim runs on a legal theory — a chain of elements the two sides fight over. Here they are in plain English: what each requires, when it applies, and how it is proven or broken.
Duty of Care
The threshold legal obligation to act as a reasonably prudent person would, owed to those foreseeably put at risk by one's conduct.
TortBut-For Causation
The threshold factual test asking whether the injury would have occurred absent the defendant's conduct -- distinct from the legal, policy-driven question of proximate cause.
TortContributory Negligence
The traditional common-law rule that any negligence by the plaintiff, however slight, completely bars recovery -- now the minority rule, largely superseded by comparative negligence.
TortAttractive Nuisance Doctrine
A premises-liability exception holding a landowner liable for injuries to trespassing children caused by hazardous conditions likely to attract them, even absent an invitation.
Civil ProcedureRes Judicata
The doctrine barring relitigation of a claim that was, or could have been, raised in a prior action that ended in a final judgment on the merits between the same parties.
ContractNovation
A three-way agreement that substitutes a new party or a new obligation for an existing contract, completely extinguishing the original obligation rather than merely transferring it.
ContractAccord and Satisfaction
An agreement to discharge an existing, disputed obligation by accepting a different performance than originally owed, and the actual performance of that agreement.
Contract & TortMitigation of Damages
The rule that an injured party must take reasonable steps to minimize losses after a breach or injury, and cannot recover damages that reasonable mitigation would have avoided.
ContractStatute of Frauds
The rule requiring certain categories of contracts to be evidenced by a signed writing to be enforceable, designed to prevent fraudulent claims about the existence of an oral agreement.
ContractParol Evidence Rule
The rule that bars extrinsic evidence of prior or contemporaneous agreements to contradict or vary the terms of a final, integrated written contract.
ContractApparent Authority
The doctrine binding a principal to an agent's act because the principal's own conduct reasonably led a third party to believe the agent had authority to act, whether or not actual authority existed.
ContractConstructive Trust
An equitable remedy that treats a defendant as holding specific property as trustee for the rightful owner, used to prevent unjust enrichment when property was acquired through wrongdoing or mistake.
ContractEquitable Estoppel
The doctrine barring a party from asserting a right or fact where its own conduct or representations induced another party's reasonable, detrimental reliance to the contrary.
ContractImplied Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing
The default contract term, read into virtually every agreement, that neither party will act to destroy or injure the other's right to receive the benefits of the contract.
ContractAt-Will Employment Exceptions
The recognized exceptions -- public-policy, implied-contract, and covenant-based -- that narrow the default rule allowing an employer to terminate employment for any reason or no reason at all.
TortNegligent Misrepresentation
A tort claim for pecuniary loss caused by a false statement of material fact that the defendant made carelessly, without the intent to deceive required for fraud.
CorporateSuccessor Liability
The doctrine determining when a company that acquires another company's assets also inherits its predecessor's liabilities, despite the general rule that an asset buyer takes assets free of the seller's debts.
TortFailure to Warn
A products-liability theory holding a manufacturer or seller liable for injuries caused by a product's foreseeable danger that was not adequately disclosed to the user, even when the product itself was properly designed and made.
ContractEconomic Duress
A doctrine that voids an agreement made under an improper economic threat that left the victim no reasonable alternative but to consent.
EquityUnclean Hands
An equitable defense that bars a plaintiff from obtaining equitable relief when the plaintiff's own misconduct is directly connected to the claim.
ContractBreach of Implied Warranty
A claim that goods or services failed to meet quality or fitness standards the law imposes automatically, without any express promise to that effect.
TortNegligent Entrustment
A tort claim against a person who supplies a dangerous instrumentality, like a vehicle, to someone they know or should know is likely to use it unsafely.
TortPrivate Nuisance
A tort claim for a substantial and unreasonable interference with another person's use and enjoyment of their own land.
TortConversion
A tort claim for the wrongful exercise of dominion or control over another's personal property that seriously interferes with the owner's rights.
TortMalicious Prosecution
A tort claim for initiating or continuing a prior legal proceeding without probable cause and for an improper purpose, after that proceeding ended favorably to the plaintiff.
TortAbuse of Process
A tort claim for using legitimately issued legal process for a collateral, improper purpose it was not designed to serve.
TortRespondeat Superior
The doctrine that holds an employer liable for torts an employee commits within the scope of employment.
TortRes Ipsa Loquitur
An evidentiary rule that lets negligence be inferred from an accident that ordinarily would not happen without negligence.
CorporatePiercing the Corporate Veil
The equitable remedy that lets a court hold shareholders personally liable for a corporation's obligations.
TortProximate Cause
The requirement that a defendant's conduct be a legally close enough cause of the harm to justify liability.
ContractPromissory Estoppel
A doctrine that enforces a promise, even without a bargained-for exchange, when the promisee reasonably relied on it to their detriment.
ContractUnjust Enrichment
An equitable claim requiring a party who has been unfairly benefited at another's expense to make restitution.
TortNegligence Per Se
A doctrine treating violation of a safety statute as itself the breach element of negligence when the plaintiff is in the class the law protects.
TortAssumption of Risk
A defense that bars or reduces recovery when a plaintiff knowingly and voluntarily accepted a known danger.
TortComparative Negligence
A system that reduces a plaintiff's recovery in proportion to the plaintiff's own share of fault for the harm.
ProcedureDoctrine of Laches
An equitable defense barring a claim when a plaintiff's unreasonable delay in suing has prejudiced the defendant.
ContractQuantum Meruit
A claim to recover the reasonable value of services or goods provided when no enforceable contract fixes the price.
TortTortious Interference
A tort claim against a third party who wrongfully disrupts another's contract or prospective business relationship.
TortStrict Liability
Liability imposed without proof of fault, chiefly for defective products and abnormally dangerous activities.
CorporateBreach of Fiduciary Duty
A claim that someone who owed a heightened duty of loyalty or care violated it and harmed the person who trusted them.
TortNegligent Infliction of Emotional Distress (NIED)
A claim for emotional harm caused by another's carelessness, with elements that vary sharply by state.
TortIntentional Infliction of Emotional Distress (IIED)
A claim for severe emotional harm caused by conduct so outrageous it exceeds all bounds tolerated in a civilized society.
TortFraudulent Concealment
Fraud committed by actively hiding a material fact a party had a duty to disclose, rather than by an affirmative lie.
TortCivil Conspiracy
A theory holding two or more people jointly liable for agreeing to and furthering an underlying wrong -- not a standalone tort.
EvidenceSpoliation of Evidence
The destruction, alteration, or loss of evidence relevant to litigation, which can trigger sanctions or an adverse inference.
TortJoint and Several Liability
A liability rule letting a plaintiff collect a full judgment from any one defendant, regardless of that defendant's share of fault.
CorporateAlter Ego Doctrine
A doctrine holding an owner or parent liable by treating them and a controlled entity as legally the same when unity of interest exists.
ContractEconomic Loss Rule
A rule generally barring tort recovery for purely economic losses arising from a contract, absent injury or damage to other property.
ProcedureCollateral Estoppel (Issue Preclusion)
Issue preclusion doctrine barring relitigation of an issue actually litigated and necessarily decided in an earlier case.
TortEggshell Skull Rule
A tort principle making a defendant liable for the full extent of an injury, even when a pre-existing condition makes it unusually severe.
InsuranceDuty to Defend vs. Duty to Indemnify
The distinction between a liability insurer's broad obligation to defend an insured against a lawsuit and its narrower obligation to actually pay a judgment or settlement.
InsuranceOccurrence vs. Claims-Made Trigger
The two dominant methods liability policies use to decide which policy period applies to a loss: when the injury happened, or when the claim was reported.
TortMarket Share Liability
A limited, minority tort doctrine that lets a plaintiff recover from multiple manufacturers of a fungible, defective product in proportion to their share of the relevant market when the plaintiff cannot identify which specific manufacturer's product caused the injury.
TortEnterprise Liability
A rarely-adopted tort theory holding an entire group of manufacturers in an industry jointly liable for an injury caused by a defective product when the specific manufacturer cannot be identified and the group jointly controlled the relevant risk, such as through shared industry-wide safety standards.
TortApparent Agency
A doctrine holding a principal liable for the acts of someone who is not actually its employee or agent, when the principal's own conduct led a third party to reasonably and justifiably believe an agency relationship existed and the third party relied on that belief.
TortNegligent Supervision
A doctrine holding an employer, school, or other institution directly liable for its own failure to adequately monitor, oversee, or control a person under its authority, where that failure allowed the person to cause foreseeable harm to a third party.
TortNegligent Training
A doctrine holding an employer directly liable for injuries to a third party that were proximately caused by the employer's failure to provide adequate training reasonably necessary for an employee to safely perform a role that carries a foreseeable risk of harm.
TortPremises Liability: Invitee, Licensee, and Trespasser
The traditional common-law framework classifying visitors to land into three categories — invitee, licensee, and trespasser — each owed a different duty of care by the person or entity in possession of the property.
TortOpen and Obvious Danger Doctrine
A doctrine limiting or eliminating a landowner's duty to warn of, or in some jurisdictions to remedy, a danger so apparent that a visitor exercising reasonable care should be expected to discover and appreciate it without a warning.
TortPrimary vs. Secondary Assumption of Risk
The distinction between risks so inherent to an activity that they negate the defendant's duty altogether (primary assumption of risk) and a plaintiff's voluntary encounter with a risk created by the defendant's own negligence (secondary assumption of risk), which merely factors into comparative fault rather than barring the claim.
Tort / Statutory LiabilityDram Shop Liability
Liability imposed on bars, restaurants, and other commercial alcohol sellers for harm an intoxicated patron causes to a third party after being served.
Tort / Medical MalpracticeLoss of Chance Doctrine
A doctrine, mainly in medical malpractice, that lets a patient recover for a defendant's negligent destruction of a chance at a better outcome, even when that chance was already under 50%.
Tort / Medical MalpracticeInformed Consent Doctrine
The physician's duty to disclose material risks, benefits, and alternatives of a proposed treatment so the patient can make a genuinely informed decision.
Procedural / EquitableJudicial Estoppel
Bars a party from taking a position in litigation that clearly contradicts a position it successfully persuaded a court to accept in an earlier proceeding.
ProceduralLaw of the Case Doctrine
Once a court decides an issue at one stage of a case, that ruling governs later stages of the same litigation, including on remand or appeal.
PropertyAdverse Possession
A doctrine that lets a person who occupies another's land openly, continuously, and without permission for a statutory period acquire legal title to it.
Property / Landlord-TenantConstructive Eviction
A doctrine that relieves a tenant of the duty to pay rent when a landlord's acts or failures render the premises unfit, forcing the tenant to abandon it.
Property / Landlord-TenantImplied Warranty of Habitability
An implied promise in residential leases that the premises meet basic standards of safety and livability throughout the tenancy, regardless of the lease's terms.
ContractUnconscionability Doctrine
A contract defense letting a court refuse to enforce a contract or clause so one-sided or unfairly procured that enforcing it would shock the conscience.
ContractAnticipatory Repudiation
A doctrine allowing a party to treat a contract as breached, and to sue immediately, when the other side clearly indicates before performance is due that it will not perform.
ContractSpecific Performance
An equitable remedy ordering a breaching party to actually perform its contractual promise, available only when money damages cannot adequately fix the harm.
ContractRescission of Contract
An equitable remedy that unwinds a contract entirely, restoring both parties to the position they occupied before the agreement, rather than enforcing or compensating for it.
ContractReformation of Contract
An equitable remedy in which a court rewrites the written text of a contract to match the parties' actual agreement, then enforces the corrected version.
ContractImpossibility and Impracticability of Performance
Doctrines excusing contract performance when an unforeseen supervening event makes performance objectively impossible, or, more flexibly, commercially impracticable.
ContractFrustration of Purpose
A doctrine excusing performance when a supervening event destroys the principal purpose both parties understood the contract to serve, even though performance itself remains possible.
ContractCondition Precedent vs. Condition Subsequent
The distinction between an event that must occur before a contractual duty arises (condition precedent) and one that, if it occurs, extinguishes a duty that already existed (condition subsequent).
ContractThird-Party Beneficiary Rights
The doctrine determining when a person who is not a party to a contract can nonetheless enforce it, distinguishing an intended beneficiary with enforceable rights from a mere incidental beneficiary with none.
ContractAssignment and Delegation of Contract Rights
The distinction between transferring a contract right to receive performance (assignment) and transferring a contract duty to render performance (delegation), and the different rules governing each.
ContractPerfect Tender Rule
The UCC rule letting a buyer reject a single-delivery shipment of goods that fails to conform to the contract in any respect, without the common-law materiality threshold.
ContractRisk of Loss in Sale of Goods
The UCC framework deciding which party bears the loss when goods are damaged or destroyed after contracting but before risk has shifted, independent of who holds title.
ContractCover (UCC Buyer's Remedy)
The UCC remedy letting a buyer, after a seller's breach, purchase substitute goods in good faith and without unreasonable delay, then recover the difference between the cover price and the contract price.
ContractCourse of Dealing and Usage of Trade
UCC interpretive tools that fill gaps and clarify ambiguous contract terms using the parties' own prior conduct and the established practices of their trade.
ContractBattle of the Forms
The UCC 2-207 framework for deciding which terms govern when a buyer's and seller's standardized forms don't match, replacing the common-law mirror-image rule.
ContractIntegration Clause / Merger Clause
A contract provision declaring the written agreement the complete and final expression of the parties' deal, intended to bar reliance on prior or contemporaneous statements not included in the writing.
ContractWaiver vs. Estoppel in Contract Performance
Two distinct doctrines excusing strict contract performance: waiver is the intentional, voluntary relinquishment of a known contract right, while estoppel bars enforcement of a right because the other party reasonably and detrimentally relied on conduct suggesting it would not be enforced.
ContractTime Is of the Essence Clause
A contract provision making strict, punctual performance a material term, so that even a minor delay can constitute a breach excusing the other party's performance.
Civil RightsQualified Immunity
A doctrine shielding individual government officials from personal-capacity liability for constitutional violations unless the right they violated was 'clearly established' at the time of the conduct.
Civil RightsBivens Claims
A judicially implied damages remedy allowing an individual to sue a federal official personally for certain constitutional violations, in the absence of any authorizing statute.
ConstitutionalState Action Doctrine
The threshold doctrine holding that most constitutional protections restrain government conduct, not private conduct, so a plaintiff must first show the challenged conduct is fairly attributable to the state before a constitutional claim can proceed.
Civil RightsMonell Municipal Liability
The doctrine governing when a local government entity itself -- rather than an individual official -- can be held liable under Section 1983 for a constitutional violation, limited to harms caused by the entity's own policy or custom.
Civil RightsDeliberate Indifference Standard
A demanding state-of-mind standard, sitting between ordinary negligence and purposeful intent, requiring proof that an official or entity was subjectively aware of a substantial risk of harm and consciously disregarded it.
ConstitutionalProcedural Due Process
The doctrine requiring that before government deprives a person of life, liberty, or property, it must provide fair procedures -- generally notice and a meaningful opportunity to be heard.
ConstitutionalSubstantive Due Process
The doctrine holding that certain government actions are unconstitutional regardless of the fairness of the procedures used -- either because they infringe a fundamental right, or because they are so arbitrary that they shock the conscience.
ConstitutionalRational Basis vs. Strict Scrutiny Review
The tiered framework courts use to evaluate constitutional challenges to government action, ranging from highly deferential rational-basis review to the exacting strict-scrutiny standard, with intermediate scrutiny occupying the middle tier.
InsuranceBad-Faith Failure to Settle Within Limits
The liability doctrine an insured or excess carrier invokes when a primary insurer rejects a reasonable within-limits settlement demand and a judgment later exceeds the policy limits.
InsuranceExcess Verdict and Insurer Exposure
How a judgment exceeding the policy's limits shifts financial exposure between the insured and the insurer, and what determines who ultimately bears the excess amount.
InsuranceDuty to Cooperate Insurance Clause
The policy condition requiring an insured to assist the insurer's investigation and defense, and the circumstances under which a breach can forfeit coverage.
InsuranceNotice-Prejudice Rule
The rule determining whether an insured's late notice of a claim defeats coverage, and whether the insurer must show actual harm from the delay to enforce a notice condition.
InsuranceExhaustion of Primary Coverage
The general requirement that an underlying primary (or lower-layer) policy pay out its full limits before an excess or umbrella policy's coverage obligation is triggered.
InsuranceHorizontal vs. Vertical Exhaustion
The two competing rules for how an insured must exhaust multiple applicable insurance policies -- across policy years or across coverage layers -- before a given excess policy must pay.
InsuranceAdditional Insured Endorsement Scope
The doctrine governing how far a policy endorsement extending coverage to a party beyond the original named insured actually reaches, and what limits its scope.
InsuranceReservation of Rights Letter
The written notice an insurer sends when it agrees to defend a claim while preserving its right to later contest coverage, and what that letter must accomplish to be effective.
PropertyRes Nullius and Abandonment of Property
The doctrine governing ownerless property: things never owned (res nullius) and things an owner intentionally gave up (abandonment) both become available to whoever first takes possession.
PropertyAccession and the Fixtures Doctrine
The property-law rules that decide who owns something once one owner's material has been added to, mixed with, or annexed to property belonging to another.
TortTortious Interference with Inheritance Expectancy
A tort claim, distinct from a will contest, for intentionally and wrongfully interfering with an expected gift or inheritance -- available only where the wrongdoing goes beyond simply changing the testator's mind.
TortNegligent Spoliation Doctrine
The unsettled question of whether negligent, unintentional destruction of evidence can support its own tort claim for damages -- distinct from spoliation sanctions available inside the underlying case.
TortSudden Emergency Doctrine
A doctrine that judges a defendant's conduct during a sudden, unforeseen emergency by what a reasonable person would do under those same emergency conditions -- an adjusted standard of care, not a defense that excuses liability outright.
TortLast Clear Chance Doctrine
A doctrine that lets a plaintiff's claim survive contributory negligence's harsh, complete bar when the defendant had a final, real opportunity to avoid the harm and failed to take it.
DefamationMere Conduit Defense
A defamation defense for parties who only passively transmit or distribute content authored by someone else, without editorial control over or knowledge of its defamatory character.
DefamationInnocent Construction Rule
A threshold defamatory-meaning rule under which, if a statement is reasonably capable of a non-defamatory interpretation, some jurisdictions require courts to adopt that innocent reading and dismiss the claim rather than let a jury choose among competing meanings.
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