How-to tips, in two parts
You’ve identified someone as a potential fact witness in a dispute that involves or may involve your client. You want to find out what subjects the witness knows about. You don’t yet need to depose the witness, present the witness for deposition, or attend the other side’s deposition of the
Vexing judges
Bryan Garner writes in his ABA Journal column that "[t]here's a disconnect between what judges say they want" in briefs "and what lawyers give them."
He offers three reasons to favor the judges' view — "the 'halo effect'", "less is more", and "easy is better".
While Blawgletter agrees with each point
Keys to the court house
The contingent-fee option enables a claimant who has a valuable claim but can't afford hourly fees to hire a lawyer. He pays with a promise to share his recovery with the lawyer in return for the lawyer's sharing the many risks of pursuing a claim — including the risk of
Surface damage – what must operators do to accommodate existing uses of the surface estate?
Today we conclude Blawgletter's seven-part series on the Hottest Oil & Gas Claims for 2015, a paper we co-wrote for the 66th Oil & Gas Law Conference in Houston. This last piece deals with maybe the hardest claim to make
Short-payment of royalties – when do post-production costs cross the line into unreasonableness?
This next-to-last entry in Blawgletter's seven-part series on the hottest oil & gas claims for returns to the theme of royalty owners who receive less than they believe the lease entitles them to. Part 6 addresses what happens when the operator deducts
Blawgletter's seven-part exposition of the hottest oil and gas claims for 2015 (which we co-wrote for the Institute for Energy Law's 66th Oil & Gas Law Conference in Houston) moves into an area that plaintiffs hate and defendants love — the exculpatory clause. Specifically, the ones that the American Association of Petroleum Landmen put in
Blawgletter offers the fourth installment in the seven-part series on the Hottest Oil & Gas Claims for 2015. This time, we address whether flaring gas qualifies as "use" on which the operator must pay royalties.
Legal backdrop
Royalty clauses typically require payment of royalty for oil and gas “produced from the Leased Premises and sold or
Oil and gas and the Empire State
Does a state's years-long ban on the fracking of oil and gas wells extend the "primary" term of a lease until the ban ends, allowing the frackers who couldn't frack more time to come back and frack?
This week, the highest court of an important commercial state that
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-68).
I know you are asking today, "How long will it take?" Somebody’s asking, "How long will prejudice blind the visions of men, darken their understanding, and drive bright-eyed wisdom from her sacred throne?" Somebody’s asking, "When will wounded justice, lying prostrate
Time to assess Twombly
Has the United States Supreme Court backed away from its landmark toughening of the test for pleading a claim in Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007)?
Seven years after Blawgletter said that "[w]e'll save our assessment of [Twombly's] impact until the impact becomes clearer", we can now