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Case Comments: Possible Approaches To Writing A Case Comment

A case comment provides a deeper analysis of a case by peeling back layers to examine the key issues. It involves four steps: 1) re-reading the case with issues in mind, 2) identifying legal problems, 3) extracting relevant details, and 4) reaching a conclusion. There are several approaches a comment can take such as analyzing whether the law is unclear, the judgment is correct/incorrect, or an important issue was not discussed. A comment follows a structure with an introduction, background, analysis examining the decision's appropriateness and implications, and a conclusion. Footnotes can be used to further discuss relevant information.

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497 views2 pages

Case Comments: Possible Approaches To Writing A Case Comment

A case comment provides a deeper analysis of a case by peeling back layers to examine the key issues. It involves four steps: 1) re-reading the case with issues in mind, 2) identifying legal problems, 3) extracting relevant details, and 4) reaching a conclusion. There are several approaches a comment can take such as analyzing whether the law is unclear, the judgment is correct/incorrect, or an important issue was not discussed. A comment follows a structure with an introduction, background, analysis examining the decision's appropriateness and implications, and a conclusion. Footnotes can be used to further discuss relevant information.

Uploaded by

kawalpreet kaur
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Case comments

Unlike a case summary, a case analysis is a technical piece of legal writing


which delves deep into several layers of the case. You are required to peel
these layers off to bring out the issues and analyse the significance of the
case in the light of those issues. You can do this by following four simple
steps:-
1. Re-reading the case keeping in the mind the issues-that you are going to
discuss in the Comment;
2. Comprehending complex situations and identifying the legal problems or
lacunae in the case;
3. Sieving out relevant details and indicators from the case that support
your analysis.
4. Reaching the conclusion by adopting a particular approach.

Possible Approaches to writing a Case Comment


 Law is not clear: Here, you need to focus more on how statutory
provisions and relevant case laws including the present case have
created an uncertainty of law on that particular issue or failed to fill
the legal void.
 The judgment is correct and clears the law: Here you need to focus
more on the positive implications of the case and its bearing on the
future course of law on that particular issue. You may also have to
provide additional reasons for how the counter-arguments do not have
a legal standing.
 The judgment was wrong: In this approach, you try to prove how the
courts take on the issue was-not correct by presenting reasons for the
same. The common mistake which students usually do here is that
they reiterate the dissenting opinion in their own words without
adding their own personal critic of the judgment.

 The judgment was not wrong but the reasoning: Here, you need to
clearly distinguish your reasoning from that of the court and
demonstrate how the court’s reasoning is incompatible with the
reasoning given in prior similar cases on that issue and goes against
the spirit of law or public policy.
 Important issue not discussed: Here, you can identify an issue which
you think the Court should not have ignored or should have discussed
in greater detail.
The above approaches are suggestive in nature and you are free to adopt
your own unique way of presenting the critic of a judgement or come up
with a combination of the given approaches.

Structure of a Case Comment


The body of a case comment or note consists of four limbs. These are:
Introduction
A case comment should ideally begin with a short paragraph identifying the
subject of the case so as to give the reader a fair idea regarding the issues
you are going to address in the comment.
The second paragraph should be a very brief statement of facts stating only
the part of the factual matrix which is essential to the issue being discussed.
Thereafter, you should write the disposition and what was eventually held in
the case in a very precise manner.

Background
The purpose of writing this section is to let the reader get the general idea
about the factual subject matter of the case before you start your analysis.
The very first step to do this is to draw an outline of the development of the
law leading up to the case under review by touching upon landmark cases
and significant statutory developments. This helps the reader to appraise
the court's decision and understand your arguments more clearly.

Analysis
This constitutes the main limb of the case comment. Here you need to ask
yourself four pertinent questions1, namely-
1. Was the Court’s decision appropriate?
2. Does this decision change/conform with existing law? Was the reasoning
consistent
with previous reasoning in similar cases? Is it likely that the decision will
significantly influence existing law?
3. Did the court adequately justify its reasoning? Was its interpretation of
the law
appropriate? Was the reasoning logical /consistent? Did the court consider
all/omit some issues and arguments? And, if there was omission, does this
weaken the merit of the decision?
4. What are the policy implications of the decision? Are there alternative
approaches which could lead to more appropriate public policy in this area?
the sole purpose of the case comment is to dissect a particular legal issue,
you must be extremely careful here as to not touch upon any extraneous or
peripheral issue.

Conclusion
The conclusion to the case comment should encapsulate the main essence
of the author’s findings and arguments. It is not always necessary to reach a
conclusion to decide upon whether or not the court's decision was right. You
can simply end your analysis by briefly stating the impact of the case and
pointing out certain lacunae (if any).
Using Foot-notes in a Case Comment
It is advisable that you use speaking footnotes to briefly elaborate or discuss
other relevant information which might be useful for the reader to know.
Although there is no rule as to how many footnotes should be there, you
must avoid excessive footnoting keeping in with the general policy followed
by most of the reputed law journals in the world. Secondly, though you are
free to use any type of uniform citation method, it is advisable that you use
the Blue Book method which is most commonly used for law journals.

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