Please Note the Following Changes to the Class Schedule

Civil Procedure

Professor Howard WassermanSpring 2016

Office: RDB 2065e-mail:

Phone: 348-7482

Section ASection B

Monday/Wednesday, 9-10:10 a.m.Tuesday/Thursday, 10-11:10 a.m.

Friday, 10:30-11:40 a.m.Friday, 9-10:10 a.m.

RDB 2005RDB 2006

Please note the following changes to the class schedule:

•No class on Monday, January 18(Section A)

• No class on Tuesday, January 19 (Section B) (Make-up TBD)

Office Hours:Monday, 1:30-2:30 p.m.

Wednesday,2-4 p.m.

Friday, 12-1:30 p.m.

Anytime I am in my office; my door is always open.

Post questions and comments about class discussions, course materials, etc., to the Blog

Course Outline:

This course is designed to provide students with an introduction to the judicial process and to the procedure governing civil litigation, using federal courts and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure as an illustration. The course will combine doctrinal and theoretical components, so students consider not only how the system functions, but why it functions in that manner and whether some other procedural system would be preferable or more effective.

The course focuses on pre-trial and post-trial procedures, including pleading, discovery, summary judgment, judicial case management, and motion practice. The course also will introduce students to the concepts of personal and subject-matter jurisdiction, choice of law, and the effects of final judgment.

Required Materials:

1) Linda S. Mullenix, Leading Cases In Civil Procedure (West 2d ed. 2012)

2) Joseph Glannon, The Glannon Guide to Civil Procedure (Wolters-Kluwer 3d ed. 2013)

3) Federal Rules Of Civil Procedure (2015 ed.) (Compiled By Kevin M. Clermont)

Note: Yes, you must use the most recent version of the rules

4) Civil Procedure Blog: (indicated in syllabus)

Technology and Class Conduct

Use of laptops, tablets, book readers, smart phones, and similar devices during class is absolutely prohibited.

Phones must be turned off when you come into the classroom.

You mustbe in class on time, unless I have previously given you permission to come late. You may not enter the room once class has begun, unless I have given you permission to come late.Once class has begun, you must remain in your seat, unless I have given you permission to leave during class. Exceptions to these policies for medical or similar reasons will be made upon presentation of appropriate documentation.

For those of you who prefer having (or being able to obtain) more precise notes, classes will be audio-recorded and the audio file for each class session will be posted on the Blog. You are welcome and encouraged to review the recording and supplement your notes. This is, in fact, comparable to what you will experience in practice. You will go through a day of trial or deposition working with your own brief notes and your participation in events, then receive a transcript a day or two later.

Final Grade:

Your final grade for the semester will containseveral components, totaling 140 points.

Essay: Everyone will write one essay at some point during the semester, worth twenty-five (25) points. Details can be found on the Essay Information sheet, available on the blog.

Mid-Semester Examination: This will be a take-home exam during the semester, worth sixteen (16) points. It will consist of four short-answer questions, worth four points each. The goal is to check your progress and grasp on the material from early in the semester and to give you a preview of the final exam format. You must work on this entirely on your own; you may not discuss the exam, the questions, or answers with anyone. This will be distributed on a Friday and due the following Monday.

Final Examination: There will be one end-of-semester final examination, worth eighty-four (84) points. It will be comprised of 21 short-answer questions. Details about the exam forthcoming later in the semester. The exam is scheduled for 9 a.m. on Monday, May 9.

Class Participation:Class participation is a mandatory aspect of this class and will account for fifteen (15) points of your final grade.

Although I generally do not cold-call or random-call, I expect the materials in the course to generate discussion and to trigger comments and questions that can be put to the class for consideration. Everyone is strongly encouraged to participate with questions, comments, thoughts, ideas, and views. Questions count as a form of participation, because they often help to drive the overall conversation forward. But when you ask a question, the first step might be for me to try to work through the answer with the questioner. Note that there is one situation in which I will cold-call: If a student makes a point or raises an issue, I will return to that student in the future when that issue or that point arises again in later classes.In evaluating class participation, I will consider both the quality and quantity of your answers and comments and your participating in the broader conversation.

Optional Creative Project: There is an optional extra-credit “creative” project, worth an additional five (5) points and due on the day of our pre-exam review session. Details can be found on the Optional Creative Project sheet, available on the blog. This piece is entirely optional and designed to be fun.

Civil Procedure Blog

We have a course blog, Wasserman’s Civil Procedure Blog.To read the blog, go to posts can be read going down from most recent to least recent. To post to the blog, go to you log-in with a username and password.

Everyone must register as an author and a reader. To register as an author, please send an e-mail to me (). In the subject line, type “Civ Pro Blog Registration;” in the body of the e-mail, please type your name and your e-mail address. You then will receive an e-mail “Invitation” inviting you to join as an author on the blog. You must follow the steps in the invitation e-mail to register as an author; please register using your full name (first and last) and no handles or usernames. When you register, you also will find out how to draft posts, how to link to sites, how to post files (audio, video, documents), etc. Please register as soon as you receive the “Invitation” e-mail.

The blog serves several purposes. First is to make available the Syllabus and additional reading assignments, to be downloaded and read. I strongly recommend that you print out copies of these documents and bring them to class. Second, all classes will be audio-recorded and the audio file will be posted to the blog. Those of you who are worried about being able to catch everything said in class can go back and listen to the class again and fill-in any gaps.

Third, this is how I will communicate with you about assignments, materials, additional questions, and what you should be thinking about and preparing for the next class. I always do an after-class post (usually up a few hours after the end of class) that will include the audio file, identify assignments for the next class, and offer questions and issues you should be prepared to discuss in the next class. It also may includeclarifications or expansions on class discussions and the course materials that we just covered, including answering in-class questions that we were not able to cover fully in class

Fourth, and most importantly, the blog is a forum for an ongoing conversation about the law of civil procedure. The blog is intended to carry class discussions and conversations on the material outside the classroom, to enhance discussions beyond the limits of a 75-minute class session. This forum enables us to examine and discuss how these issues arise in real-world stories, cases, occurrences, events, as well as in the books you read and the TV shows and movies you watch. This also requires you to look beyond the course materials and to keep up with legal, social, cultural, and political events and link what happens to your own work. You are going to be doing this every day as a practicing lawyer, why not start now.

This discussion will take the form of original posts by class members and me. I frequently will pose questions to be answered and discussed by you in writing rather than in class. Do not use the Comments section of a post; begin a new post with a new title. Topics for blog posts include thoughts, ideas, and commentary on issues and materials discussed in class; questions about the material (I strongly encourage using this forum to discuss questions and concerns that arise in class); and discussion and analysis of news stories, books, movies, and television shows (“Hey, did you see how ‘Parenthood’ dealt with discovery disputes last night?”), current events, and anything else relating to the law of civil procedure and the substance of this class.

All of this is by way of saying that you should get in the habit of checking the blog at least once or twice during the day.

There are no guidelines about length, content, or style, other than to insist that it be relevant to this class, that it be respectful, and that it be somewhat thought-out and well-written. Humor is great. Also, if the post is substantive, it ordinarily should contain some original thought or commentary. In other words, please do not simply cut-and-paste long portions of a case or article into the post; provide a link or cite to the story/article/etc., then give a very brief synopsis or summary, along with your own thoughts on it.

Please put your full name on all posts. You may post as much or as little as you wish; activity here is included in your participation grade.

The site includes a "Blogroll" linking to a number of topical blogs and web sites, most of which highlight and comment on new cases, stories, issues, and legal developments on Evidence. You should get in the habit of checking these information-aggregating blogs during the course of a day; they are going to be important resources in your practice.

College of Law Academic Policies and Regulations

This class is administered and conducted in accordance with all the provisions of the Florida International University College of Law Academic Policies and Regulations, reprinted in the College of Law Student Handbook. Students are expected to be familiar with and to conduct themselves in line with those policies and regulations.

Class Assignments

Some thoughts on Civil Procedure:

The focus of this class is a code—the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, along with provisions of the United States Code governing jurisdiction and procedure in the federal courts. The goal of the course is to understand what individual rules require, how rules relate to one another and to the body as a whole, and how rules apply to particular litigation situations.

Working through the issues in this course requires you to see how many different rules and principles fit together. You must be ready, in class, to discuss the plain textual language of a rule, as well as its underlying history, policy, and purpose. You also must be ready to jump around to different provisions to find applicable rules. Your rules pamphlet should become tabbed, dog-eared, and well-marked to allow you to locate key provisions easily and quickly. You also must see how cases interpreting and applying rules and statutes fit and affect our understanding of the rule.

Because much of the discussion focuses on the various rules, you should never enter this classroom without the Rules pamphlet, as well as any additional assigned rules or statutes, which should be open and in front of you at all times. Many of the answers to the issues we will discuss in class are contained in the rules and statutes themselves.When we discuss a rule or statute, everyone should be reading along.

This course builds on itself. It is important that you grasp the rules, statutes, and material that we discuss early in the semester in order to grasp the material that we discuss later in the semester. Do not simply forget or disregard what we do in the beginning of the semester, because that information will come up again and again throughout the class. You cannot understand much of what we do later in the course unless you understand and recall what we did earlier in the course.

Locating Assignments:

Unless otherwise indicated, assigned cases are in Leading Cases in Civil Procedure; commentary, detail, elaboration, explanation, and examples are in Glannon’s Guide (“Glannon”). All Rules, Statutes (from Title 28 of the United States Code), constitutional provisions, and legislative history can be found in Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, unless indicated otherwise:

• Part 1: Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (without committee notes)

• Part 2: Advisory Committee Notes from past amendments to FRCP

• Part 4: Selected provisions of the Constitution and procedural statutes from 28 U.S.C.

• Part 6: Sample Local Rules of Civil Procedure

Additional assigned cases, articles, statutes, and other materials will be downloaded from the Blog.

Book and page numbers are in parentheses after each assigned case. Provisions are found in the relevant Part of the FRCP book. Items found on the Blog are indicated.

Sample Pleadings are available on the Blog. Please download, print, and bring them to class whenever assigned on the syllabus.

You must have your FRCP pamphlet with you and open on your desk in every class. You must have any assigned statutes, provisions, cases, or pleadings with you and open on your desk in every class.

Preparing for Class:

A few words about preparing for this class. Your starting point on any assignment always should be the applicable language and history of the applicable rule or statutory provision listed in the assignment; you then should proceed to the explication, elaboration, and application of the rules in a given case. Whenever a case discusses a rule or statute, be sure to cross-reference the language and history of that rule or statute, and understand how the rule is being read, interpreted, and applied by the court. In reading cases, pay attention to the procedural posture of the case, as that (rather than substantive outcomes) will be our primary focus.

Class discussions will focus on how all the materials—the relevant rule or statute, the case, and the commentary and examples—all fit together. Do not simply read and brief or take notes on individual rules, statutes, cases, and articles. Rather, after reading each individual piece, spend some time thinking about how the readings relate to one another—what are the common themes and principles, how do the cases complement or conflict with one another (and can any conflicts be reconciled?), how has a case interpreted and applied the plain language and history of a rule or statute? Generally, our discussions will not proceed case-by-case, but instead will focus on overarching themes. Preparing for class means thinking about the connections among the themes in the material.

All rules, statutes, and constitutional provisions are found in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure pamphlet, unless otherwise indicated.

You must read and familiarize yourself with the text of all assigned rules, as well as the Advisory Committee Notes, which provide necessary background and detail about meaning and application. When a rule is assigned, you should read the text of the rule first, then read the Advisory Committee Notes, then go back and read the rule again. “Reading” a rule means understanding the rule; by the time you come to class, you should be able to paraphrase the rule in plain English and discuss and explain what it says and means and how it will apply. Again, you must have your rules pamphlet with you for every class and it should be tabbed and marked-up.

TheSample Pleadingsshow what court documents look like. You should download, print, and review them; become familiar with the basics of each case, as we will be referring back to their facts and posture throughout the semester. You must print all four and have them with you in class whenever assigned. Bring them with you to class when the syllabus indicates. These samples will illustrate how the rules operate and what the rules require; they also will provide good factual hypotheticals that we will come back to throughout the semester.

Glannon is, by far, the best supplement on the market. It will help you synthesize and understand the materials from the rules and cases, providing brief exposition followed by “worked problems,” multiple-choice questions with detailed explanations of why each choice was correct or incorrect. We also will work with some of the problems from the book in class. If you do the hard work of carefully reading the assigned primary materials (rules, statutes, and cases), supplemented by Glannon’s, you will be prepared for class and for learning and understanding this material. I strongly encourage you to not look for or use other study guides or supplements; you are much better served putting in extra time with the assigned materials than with looking for extra stuff to read.