Study Guides for 2L/3L Classes

The Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction (CALI) provides are computer-based, interactive tutorials that cover narrow topics of law. There are over 1,200 lessons available on 60 different topics. Current W&L Law students can click here for the Authorization Code to sign up for a free account.

The Lexis Digital Library is an e-book collection of primary and secondary legal materials, plus a range of study aids for law school subjects from LexisNexis. Contains over 700 titles on 60+ legal topics, including the Understanding, Skills & Values, and Questions & Answers study aids series. Complimentary access is provided by the W&L Law Library to current W&L Law students.

West Academic offers hundreds of study aids written by top legal scholars that are designed to help you succeed in law school, including Nutshells, Hornbooks, Black Letter Outlines, Sum and Substance Audio Lectures, and more. All are free to view online or download to your mobile device with a valid W&L Law account through the linked heading above.

Online access available through West Academic. Written by Professor Roger A. McEowen, the Kansas Farm Bureau Professor of Agricultural Law and Taxation at Washburn University School of Law, and drawn from his leading, cutting-edge textbook on agricultural law and taxation which is presently in its 40th release (January 2017). This Nutshell is specifically developed to meet the needs of the students, instructors, lawyers as well as farmers, ranchers, rural landowners agri-businesses and lawyers as a handy summary of key areas of the law impacting agriculture. Material covered includes an introduction to agricultural law, contracts, agricultural financing, bankruptcy, real property, cooperatives, civil liabilities, water law, environmental law, and regulatory law. The Nutshell covers the general principles of law for ease of class discussion and provides a balance of textual explanation with case citations.

Online access available through West Academic. This Outline summarizes the basic black letter rules of Environmental Law in a way that allows students to appreciate how different parts of their course material fit together. Ideal for class preparation or as a review before exams. The Outline covers approaches to environmental regulations, constitutional issues in Environmental Law, the National Environmental Policy Act, Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act and other toxic substances statutes. The Outline also discusses the complex intersection of law, sciences such as biology, geology, and engineering, and important economic, ethical, and social issues. It also includes a glossary of environmental terms and practice exam questions.

Online access available through West Academic. Climate Change Law is the first book to offer a concise, readable treatment of this entire rapidly evolving body of law. Climate law runs the gamut from state and local regulations to federal policies and international agreements and includes both public and private sector involvement. This issue is just too important to leave to specialists alone. The focus is on core concepts of climate change law rather than all of the complex details. The book begins by discussing the scientific and policy issues that frame the legal scheme, including the state of climate science, the meaning of the social cost of carbon, and the variety of tools that are available to reduce carbon emissions. It then covers in turn the international, national, and state efforts in this sphere. Finally, the book turns to the challenge of adapting to climate change, before exploring the concept of geoengineering and the potential challenges associated with using geoengineering as a tool for addressing climate change.

Online access available through West Academic. Environmental Law and Policy is a user-friendly, concise, affordable treatment of environmental law. Written to be highly readable and enjoyable rather than a dry reference source, the book provides a broad conceptual overview of environmental law while also explaining the major statutes and cases. The book includes multiple problem exercises, describing a legal or policy conflict in detail and asking students to identify and assess solutions. The new edition is fully updated to include policy initiatives of the Biden Administration, important recent Supreme Court decisions through the 2023-2024 term (Sackett, Loper Bright Enterprises, Jarkesy, Cedar Point Nursery), and the emerging role of Native American tribes in environmental law.

Online access available through West Academic. In the last decade, private environmental governance has exploded in response to public demands for corporate action that helps the planet and over frustration with government gridlock. Private environmental governance is now an accepted and powerful environmental policy tool, from corporate sustainability and ESG goals to seafood and forest certification systems, from net zero emissions to land trusts. This book provides the first user-friendly and comprehensive guide to these innovative new approaches that go farther than government regulation. If you want to understand the future of environmental policy in the 21st century, you need to understand the actors, strategies, and challenges central to private environmental governance.

Online access available through HeinOnline."The purpose of this research guide is to introduce the researcher, whether an attorney, scholar, law student, or information specialist researching in this field, to the primary and secondary resources available on environmental law, in print and online. Specifically, this guide will explore state and federal sources of primary law including the statutes, regulations, case law, and agency decisions. Finding tools such as Digests as well as citators designed to ensure the accuracy of sources will also be discussed. This book will cover most of the numerous secondary sources available because of the complexity of environmental law, particularly its regulatory structure at the federal level. These sources include books, legal encyclopedias, treatises, practice guides, dictionaries, law journals/periodicals, and news/current awareness sources. Online research is also important in the area of environmental law. It includes electronic subscription databases with comprehensive legal research platforms such as Westlaw, Lexis Advance, and Bloomberg Law, as well as the more specialized databases such as the Environment and Energy Daily online publications. Free internet sites, such as government agency websites, provide a wealth of information and documents beyond what is available through the commercial databases"--Provided by the publisher.

Online access available through West Academic. Farber's Environmental Law in a Nutshell provides an up-to-date foundation for understanding environmental law. Expert text includes coverage of the full range of environmental issues, from climate change and air pollution, to waste disposal and wetlands. Surveys the many statutory and common-law regulations shaping the world in which we live.

A favorite classroom prep tool of successful students that is often recommended by professors, the Examples & Explanations (E&E) series provides an alternative perspective to help you understand your casebook and in-class lectures. Each E&E offers hypothetical questions complemented by detailed explanations that allow you to test your knowledge of the topics in your courses and compare your own analysis. Here's why you need an E&E to help you study throughout the semester: Clear explanations of each class topic, in a conversational, funny style. Features hypotheticals similar to those presented in class, with corresponding analysis so you can use them during the semester to test your understanding, and again at exam time to help you review. It offers coverage that works with ALL the major casebooks, and suits any class on a given topic.

Online access available through West Academic. Percival’s High Court Case Summaries on Environmental Law, 8th contain well-prepared briefs for each major case in this casebook. High Court briefs are written to present the essential facts, issue, decision and rationale for each case in a clear, concise manner. While prepared briefs can never substitute for the insight gained by actually reading a case, these briefs will help readers to identify, understand, and absorb the core “take away” knowledge from each case. Moreover, these briefs are followed by a useful legal analysis, which provides extra tips and contextual background about each case, connecting the case to the broader concepts being developed throughout the casebook. This book also supplies case vocabulary, which defines new or unusual legal words found throughout the cases.

Online access available through West Academic. This well received book, informed by its interdisciplinary framework, succinctly yet accurately traverses and illuminates the full gamut of international environmental issues, laws and policies challenging the world today. The sixth edition responds to important developments arising subsequent to the fifth edition, relating, inter alia, to sustainable development, climate change, and energy. These developments include the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of 2015, the 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change that replaced the Kyoto Protocol, and the challenges posed by renewable energy and global poverty. In sum, the book offers a synoptic overview, and instructive analysis of the relevant treaties, customary law, and soft law instruments governing all areas of international environmental law.

Online access available through West Academic. With an increase in fishing, energy extraction, and shipping activity, U.S. ocean and coastal areas are under increasing pressures from even more intensive use and development. This Nutshell, now in its 5th Edition, provides short summaries of state, national, and international law and policy relevant to practitioners and academics interested in the field of ocean and coastal law. The most recent edition, updating legal developments from previous editions, also offers new material on renewable energy, current beach access controversies, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill litigation, coastline adaptation to sea-level rise, climate change, marine litter, international law of the sea negotiations, and policy changes under President Trump's administration.

Online access available through West Academic. Written in a conversational tone, this book familiarizes readers with the basic mechanics of the major environmental statutes, including, among others, the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Endangered Species Act. It also includes a separate chapter on how these environmental statutes are enforced by the Government and through citizen suits.

Online access available through the Lexis Digital Library. This study guide uses multiple-choice and short-answer questions to test your students' knowledge of environmental law doctrine. Each multiple-choice question is accompanied by a detailed answer that indicates which of four options is the best answer and explains why that option is better than the other three options. Each short-answer question (designed to be answered in no more than fifteen minutes) is followed by a thoughtful, yet brief, model answer. Q & A: Environmental Law also includes a comprehensive topical index.

Online access available through the Lexis Digital Library. Understanding Environmental Law is designed to provide a basic understanding to law students as well as lawyers unfamiliar with environmental law. However, it is also intended to provide a fast and accessible resource for lawyers who need a ready review for incoming cases. It is both an overview as well as a desk reference, comprehensive where necessary but without distracting the reader with excessive details. Most of the content addresses the most seminal and widely litigated federal environmental statutes, which have served as the template for the majority of state environmental laws. However, the discussion includes salient state laws when they help to inform particular topics. Early chapters provide a basic summary of the building blocks of environmental law: its constitutional underpinning; federal versus state regulatory authority; common law antecedents; and how the process for the environmental review of government (typically agency) actions operates. Later chapters have been revised to address updated developments involving air pollution and controls, the Clean Water Act, Hazardous Waste regulations and cleanups, and various statutes governing classes of chemicals that collectively can be termed toxic substances.