CONTRACTS
PROFESSOR MARK DENBEAUX
Welcome to Seton Hall Law School and to the study of Contract Law.
The casebook for this course is:
Problems in Contract Law: Cases and Materials
Knapp, Crystal, and Prince,
Aspen Publishers, 2007
In addition to the casebook, we will also use the supplement that accompanies it. The supplement
contains the most relevant and up to date statutes and other authorities.
There are also several very good contracts treatises which I will recommend later in the course.
The case method is still the central pedagogical device for legal education. Mastery of the case
method and mastery of statutory construction are still the two most important skills for young
lawyers. For those reasons a significant portion of this course will be taught using the Socratic
Method
Before you begin your legal education you might want to consider the following:
1)
For every lawyer who wins a case, another lawyer must lose. What insights does the
fact that the profession can never have better than a 50% batting average provide about the
nature of law, the nature of legal education and your expectations about law school
2)
Nineteenth century British cases are cited by and relied upon by American Courts. Why
is it that an 1850 case in England is authority for judicial decisions in 21st century California
court?
FIRST ASSIGNMENT.
Pages 1-51.
For the first class(es) please concentrate upon:
Ray v. William G. Eurice & Bros., Inc.
Lonergran v. Scolnick
Izadi v. Machado (Gus) Ford, Inc.
Normile v. Miller