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Pritzker Legal Research Center


Transactional Law & Drafting Resources

A Guide to Transactional and Drafting Resources at Northwestern University School of Law

Overview

Practice notes consist of how-to guidance on legal issues written by practitioners. Practice notes are concise and easy to read (often in Q&A format) and tend to be very up-to-date. 

Practice Notes on Practical Law (Westlaw)

Practical Law provides access to standard documents and clauses, checklists, legal updates, and how-to guides. To access Practice Notes from Practical Law's homepage, select the "Resources Types" tab, then click on "Practice Notes." Browse across the practice notes by practice area or jurisdiction or conduct a keyword search to find relevant content. If you choose to browse practice notes by practice area or if you run a keyword search, make sure to take advantage of the jurisdiction filter in the left sidebar of your search results. Some of the practice notes cover the law on a national scope, but many of them pertain to particular states or non-U.S. countries. This is a useful resource for those who are engaged in cross-border litigation or transactions, as it contains various practice notes pertaining to doing business in and the law of foreign jurisdictions. 

To compare laws across two or more states or across two or more foreign jurisdictions, use the State Q&A Comparison Tool or Country Q&A Comparison Tool in the right sidebar. You will be prompted to select a topic, select questions, and select jurisdictions to compare. These tools pull information from the practice notes. 

Practical Guidance on Lexis

Lexis Practical Guidance also provides access to various practice notes. These practice notes are different than the practice notes found on Practical Law. To access Practical Guidance, select the Practical Guidance from the left menu on the Lexis homepage. Browse or search across practice notes by practice area or jurisdiction.

Practical Guidance on Bloomberg Law

The Practical Guidance Library on the Transactional Intelligence Center contains a collection of drafting guides and overviews of corporate law topics.

The Due Diligence Toolkit contains checklists, timelines, and forms pertaining to Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A), Antitrust Compliance/Merger Review, Joint Ventures, Securities Offerings, Supply Chain & Third-Party Risk, Corporate Compliance, Finance, Private Funds, and Health Care Transactions.