Build a citation you can explain

The opening problem

Your source discusses a related issue, but it does not state your conclusion. Adding See may acknowledge an inferential step. Adding Cf. may identify an analogy. Neither can supply reasoning that is absent from the source or your analysis. Decide the relationship before choosing its label.

What you will learn

Distinguish direct support, clear inference, analogy, comparison, contradiction, and background; select and capitalize signals; organize multiple authorities; and write explanatory parentheticals that describe the cited passage accurately. Separate the source's reasoning from your own extension of it.

Signals describe the relationship you actually have

No signal is needed when an authority directly states the proposition, supplies the quoted words, or is identified in the assertion. The chapter's first model illustrates direct quotation: The Supreme Court stated, “There is no federal general common law.” Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64, 78 (1938). The quoted sentence appears in the majority opinion at reporter page 78. Its surrounding discussion concerns the source of substantive law subject to federal constitutional and statutory exceptions. This example reports the sentence; it does not erase those exceptions or purport to teach the entire Erie doctrine.

Use See when the authority clearly supports your proposition but reaching it requires an inferential step. Make that step defensible. If a rule says notice must be sent before action, a writer may infer that action taken before notice fails that timing requirement. The source need not repeat the writer's exact facts, but it must supply a rule from which the inference follows.

Use E.g., to show that the cited authority is an example among other sources supporting the proposition. Do not use it simply because you located only one authority. The signal represents a broader set, even when the citation lists only representative members. In See, e.g., the comma between the signals belongs to the italicized signal phrase; the comma after e.g. is roman under the chapter baseline.

Accord identifies an additional source supporting a proposition where the text quotes or discusses another, and can indicate agreement across jurisdictions. See also supplies additional support after support has already been presented. These signals do not establish the binding force of an authority. A case from another jurisdiction may agree with your position yet remain persuasive in the receiving court.

Cf. presents support by analogy or a related proposition requiring interpretive work. Explain the connection in a parenthetical. A notice decision involving one type of hearing may illuminate notice in another setting, but the factual and doctrinal differences need attention. If your asserted analogy ignores an express limitation, the signal does not make the citation accurate.

Compare ... with ... asks the reader to assess the relationship between authorities. Explain each side when the relevance would otherwise be obscure. A comparison is not a decorative substitute for stating the conclusion drawn from it. When citing several sources on one side, join the final sources with italicized and rather than presenting a sequence that leaves the comparison's boundaries uncertain.

For contrary authority, Contra denotes direct contradiction. But see denotes clear opposition requiring an inferential connection. But cf. denotes a contrary analogy and requires a parenthetical explaining the connection. Use these only after identifying the source's actual position. Contrary authority deserves substantive analysis; choosing its signal is only one part of presenting it honestly.

See generally introduces useful background. It is not a substitute for a pinpoint supporting a contested legal rule. Describe the background's relevance where useful, and obtain a source that actually supports your operative proposition.

The annotated model

Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64, 78 (1938) (stating that there is no federal general common law).

The case name and pinpoint identify the decision and passage. The lowercase participle stating begins a paraphrased explanatory parenthetical. The parenthetical makes a narrow statement about the inspected passage. It does not claim that every form of federal common law is forbidden. The citation's ending period follows the parenthetical. If quoting a complete sentence inside a parenthetical, use the quotation's capital letter and sentence punctuation appropriately.

Parentheticals can serve different functions. A court/year parenthetical identifies the source. An opinion-status parenthetical such as (dissenting) tells the reader whose reasoning is being cited. A quotation parenthetical such as (emphasis added) discloses treatment of the text. An explanatory parenthetical connects the authority to your argument. Keep those functions distinct and order them according to the relevant source convention, as Chapter 8 explains.

Worked signal decisions

Fictional training example — not legal authority. A fictional opinion says, “A notice sent after the hearing does not satisfy the advance-notice rule.” A sentence repeating that rule needs no signal. A sentence applying it to a notice mailed the day after a particular hearing may use See because the writer is applying the rule to supplied facts. If another opinion applies an advance-notice rule to a different kind of proceeding and the writer relies on the similarity, Cf. plus an explanation may be appropriate.

Fictional training example — not legal authority. Two fictional courts adopt conflicting notice rules. A writer claiming that both require mailing should not place both under See also. Revise the discussion to acknowledge the conflict, then use an appropriate contrary signal or a comparison. Even a properly signaled disagreement can undermine a claimed universal rule, so reconsider the sentence itself.

Ordering multiple authorities

The practitioner baseline places signal groups in the order supporting, comparison, contrary, and background. Within a signal, choose a helpful and logical ordering. Semicolons separate authorities. Citation sentences place different signal categories in separate sentences; citation clauses can place categories within one clause separated by semicolons. More elaborate academic ordering rules are outside this book's main scope.

A string citation should do useful work. Two sources may establish different steps, demonstrate a split, or show agreement. Ten citations that all repeat a proposition may hide the best authority and burden the reader. Remove redundant sources only after checking that a deletion does not erase a needed jurisdiction, exception, or line of reasoning. Do not treat brevity as permission to suppress adverse authority.

Edition comparison: contrast

The relationship comes first: are you comparing an important similarity or an important difference? The governing convention then determines the signal. When Bluebook 22 B1.2 governs, it separately uses contrast for materially different rules and comparison for important similarity. This chapter's supplied comparison assignment expressly requires compare ... with ... to place two different completion rules side by side. Follow that instruction for the exercise; do not carry it into a differently governed document without checking the applicable convention. The source note records the edition difference.

Common mistakes and corrections

Replace a vague parenthetical such as (discussing law) with a concrete description of the source's relevant point. Use holding only when the proposition was actually part of the court's holding. Use describing, noting, rejecting, or reasoning where those verbs fit better. Identify a dissent if the passage belongs to it. Do not add See mechanically to every citation. Do not use Cf. without explaining the analogy. Do not let a direct quotation's accuracy conceal a misleading removal of context.

Reference summary

Worked editing session: test the relationship before the signal

Fictional training example — not legal authority. Opinion A states that a signed electronic request meets Harbor's writing requirement. Opinion B decides a different statute and treats a typed name as a signature when the sender intended to authenticate the message. Opinion C holds that an anonymous form lacking authentication does not satisfy Harbor's requirement. Each item is an invented source excerpt; no real court, reporter, or holding is asserted.

Suppose your sentence says, “A signed electronic request can meet Harbor's writing requirement.” Opinion A directly supports that sentence as supplied. A signal announcing inference would add no useful precision if the opinion states the point itself. Opinion B offers an analogy because its statute differs. Opinion C concerns an important limit. Selecting a signal requires identifying these relationships first. The words electronic, typed, and form are not enough to establish that all three opinions address the same proposition.

An explanatory parenthetical can make the analogy visible: describe Opinion B as addressing authentication under a different statute. Do not describe it as holding that Harbor's statute accepts typed signatures, because that is exactly what the excerpt does not establish. A parenthetical should reduce the risk of an inaccurate inference. When it contains a narrower and more accurate proposition than the surrounding sentence, revise the sentence too. Otherwise the parenthetical merely documents the gap without repairing it.

Opinion C creates a second decision. If the paragraph argues that electronic requests qualify regardless of authentication, C is contrary support that must be assessed. If the paragraph instead distinguishes authenticated and anonymous requests, C may support the limit being described. The signal depends on the sentence you actually wrote, not on a permanent label attached to the case. One authority can support one proposition and contradict another within the same document.

Fictional training example — not legal authority. The same source can change jobs when you change the sentence. Test Opinion C against three claims:

An explanatory parenthetical should let the reader reconstruct that choice. “(rejecting an unauthenticated form)” is useful because it identifies the feature doing the analytical work. “(electronic requests)” merely names the topic. If the passage and parenthetical are narrower than your sentence, narrow the sentence before adding more citations.

Punctuation that shows the signal's boundaries

The final comma after e.g. is roman; the comma joining see to e.g. belongs to the italicized signal phrase. This produces See, e.g., followed by the authority. Italicizing a signal does not italicize the entire reporter citation. When a signal begins a citation clause inside a sentence, its first letter is lowercase unless some independent reason requires capitalization.

Put a comma before with in the compare-with construction. Each side may contain more than one authority. Commas separate authorities within a side, and italicized and joins its last two authorities. Keep each explanatory parenthetical beside the authority it explains. A reader should be able to identify the left side, the right side, and the relationship without parsing an undifferentiated series of semicolons.

Fictional training example — not legal authority. The comparison packet below supplies two opinions under different fictional statutes. Court A treats receipt as the completion event; Court B treats mailing as the completion event. A useful comparison describes that difference without claiming that the courts interpreted identical text. Place an explanatory parenthetical beside each citation so readers can see which event belongs to which source. Exercise CC-03-09 asks you to build the complete comparison under the packet's receiving instruction.

Put source status before your explanation

Parentheticals should answer their questions in a useful order. After the court/year identification, show a relevant opinion status, then the required quotation-treatment information, then an explanatory account of the passage. Case history follows the explanatory material. The chapter source note identifies the rule with the fuller sequence for unusual combinations. Do not include every possible parenthetical just because a template provides a field for it.

Fictional training example — not legal authority. A supplied source card identifies Judge Vale's dissent; its quoted sentence contains emphasis added by the writer. The applicable sequence after the date parenthetical is (Vale, J., dissenting) (emphasis added), followed by any useful explanation of the dissent's argument. Calling the passage a dissent only after a parenthetical describing what “the court held” would not repair the false description. Source status and characterization must agree throughout.

A parenthetical quoting a complete sentence begins with the quotation's capital letter and includes its sentence punctuation. A phrase paraphrasing the source ordinarily begins in lowercase and has no independent final period inside the parentheses. Use a present participle such as explaining or rejecting when it states the relevant action precisely. A neutral-sounding word such as noting still needs a passage that actually makes the noted point.

Source laboratory: name the holding at the right level

Read Erie from the question presented to the disposition before choosing a characterization. The majority described the lower court's use of federal general law instead of resolving the disputed Pennsylvania rule. It rejected the Swift v. Tyson approach, explained at page 78 that there is no federal general common law, and reversed and remanded because the appellate court had declined to decide the state-law issue. Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64, 69-73, 78-80 (1938). At page 78, the majority expressly preserved matters governed by the Federal Constitution or Acts of Congress. At page 80 and footnote 24, it did not decide the disputed Pennsylvania-law issue or the alternative argument about the accident's location.

That context supports a holding-level description: “The Court held that the federal appellate court erred by applying federal general common law instead of resolving the governing state-law issue. Id. at 78-80.” The word held accurately identifies a decision the Court made. The sentence “The Court held that no federal law exists” fails because it changes the subject and erases an express qualification. Replacing held with noted would leave that error intact.

For a parenthetical focused on page 78, use “(holding that there is no federal general common law)” or the less interpretive “(stating that there is no federal general common law).” Both can be accurate in this context. For the procedural application and reversal, expand the pinpoint to 78-80 and describe that application. A citation teacher should not turn a preference for modest verbs into a rule against identifying holdings. Ask instead: what proposition was necessary to the decision, how does the passage express it, and which qualifications must travel with your sentence?

The lesson also separates direct support from scope. No signal is needed for the exact quotation at 78. That direct relationship does not authorize broadening the quotation into a denial of federal constitutional or statutory law. Signal choice describes the connection to your actual sentence; it does not excuse an inaccurate sentence.

Complete comparison packet

Fictional training example — not legal authority. All names, statutes, courts, dates, reporters, and excerpts in this packet are invented. Fiction Rep. is the assigned training reporter. Court A and Court B are the complete court abbreviations for these exercises, and the reporter does not identify either court. Both are opinions of the court, not separate opinions. Receiving instruction for this exercise: use compare ... with ... to place the two completion rules side by side, with an explanatory parenthetical for each. This assignment uses that comparison convention even though the rules differ.

The two statutes use different completion events. These excerpts do not establish a split over one statute, identical wording, or the same receiving jurisdiction. Their exact words are supplied so you can check both your comparison and your parentheticals without an outside search.

Takeaway

Choose the signal after reading the source and articulating the connection. A parenthetical should expose that connection to the reader without overstating the source.

Chapter source note

Indigo 2.0 R4, R10, R13. Real authority EX-002: Erie opinion, majority at 69-80 and its 24 footnotes reread for this revision (RA-EX-ERIE), with particular attention to 78-80 and footnote 24. The CourtListener lead payload also includes a separate Butler opinion; it was not treated as majority reasoning. Signal choices for fictional applications are teaching judgments under the stated baseline.

Convention note: Indigo 2.0 R4 supplies the broader compare-with convention used in the assigned packet. The licensed Bluebook 22 B1.2 comparison consulted for this edition distinguishes important similarity from material difference through its separate contrast signal. These conventions are not presented as identical; the fictional instruction chooses one for a solvable exercise.