Chapter 2 answers

The HTML item is a statute/code provision; the PDF is a judicial opinion; the deposition is litigation-record testimony; and the article is a secondary source. HTML and PDF are delivery formats and do not change the underlying legal category. The source-specific citation system follows the item being cited. Access information can supplement it, but electronic delivery does not make all four items generic websites.

Citation sentence: The Court rejected separate educational facilities in public education as inherently unequal. Brown v. Bd. of Educ., 347 U.S. 483, 495 (1954). Embedded reference: In Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483, 495 (1954), the Court reached that conclusion. The textual-name convention spells out Board and Education; the citation-sentence name uses the permitted citation abbreviations. Both must describe the same inspected passage.

Fictional training example — not legal authority.

The declaration can support that the witness says mailing occurred. It does not establish the statute's deadline or command. Obtain the applicable statutory text and version, then cite its precise provision for the legal requirement. Keep the declaration for the attributed factual statement. Correct punctuation around a declaration cannot turn witness evidence into statutory authority.

Fictional training example — not legal authority.

Place each citation immediately after the proposition about its own rule, using a citation clause or separate sentences as clarity requires. If the comparison is a single supported analytical proposition, a carefully constructed comparison citation can identify both sources and their differing rules. Do not place a single unexplained citation at the end and require the reader to guess which source supplies which command.

In ordinary prose use Brown v. Board of Education. For a citation sentence retain Brown v. Bd. of Educ., followed by the remaining identifying fields. The distinction concerns placement and name abbreviation, not two different cases. Preserve italics for the case name in both settings. An abbreviated short name such as Brown can be appropriate after clear introduction in the same discussion.

Fictional training example — not legal authority.

Rewrite the statement as an allegation: The complaint alleges that the payment occurred. Cite the relevant complaint paragraph. Alternatively, locate an actual finding or other evidence supporting the stronger sentence before retaining it. A pleading's perfectly formatted citation still identifies a pleading. Its allegations are not automatically judicial findings, and citation editing should expose rather than conceal that difference.

Begin a citation sentence with See and end the sentence with a period. Inside a citation clause use see, ordinarily set off by commas with the surrounding prose. A clause's final punctuation depends on whether it ends the whole sentence. Capitalization follows placement, while the signal's substantive meaning remains the same inference relationship.

The handbook supplies a practitioner foundation and a limited academic comparison. Obtain the instructor's actual note-format requirements, required manual/edition, and any assignment-specific conventions. Check typeface, footnotes, source forms, and cross-reference expectations against those instructions. Do not label the work fully law-review compliant merely because a practitioner citation is recognizable or because you added footnote numbers.

Fictional training example — not legal authority.

First separate the paragraph's statutory proposition, factual testimony, and inference. Second locate and inspect each actual source and the corresponding passage, correcting attribution and unsupported claims. Third place source-specific citations near their propositions and choose signals matching direct support or inference. A final paragraph-level opinion citation cannot substitute for those distinct sources. Recheck the paragraph after editing so its structure remains clear.