This process puts the rule into a format that makes analysis and outlining easier. Extracting and restating the rule can be done within your brief . The easy way to extract the rule is, of course, to go to the commercial outlines and look the rule up. To learn the skills you'll need in your first years as a lawyer, however, it's best to try and extract the rule out of the cases yourself. Furthermore, often the commercial outlines won't state the rule with all of the nuances that you get from parsing through the casebook.
Good professors know the differences between commercial outlines and the casebook.
Commercial outlines and secondary sources are best used as supplements in this instance if you are having trouble extracting the rule. Scholars collect the common law into volumes called the Restatements. Congress or state legislatures write statutes, which results in laws that are primarily influenced by special interest groups. A body of law is sometimes collected in a model code or uniform statute , such as the Uniform Commercial Code or the Model Penal Code. In your first year of law school, you'll primarily be focused on the common law.