Predict the likely legal result and explain uncertainty neutrally: the reader is deciding what to do next based on your analysis alone, so a memo that hides genuine uncertainty behind confident-sounding language actually does more damage than one that states plainly where the law or the facts leave real room for doubt.
Objective work product
How to write an MPT objective memorandum
The objective memorandum is the default Multistate Performance Test assignment: a supervising lawyer hands you a client file and a small library of cases and statutes and asks what will probably happen. Because the reader will decide whether to sue, settle or advise on your analysis alone, the memo has to say what you think the outcome is and where the answer is uncertain. High scores come from using only the supplied library, applying each authority to specific facts from the file, and dealing honestly with the facts that hurt your client. Low scores come from restating the rules without applying them, or from writing as if you were arguing a side. Give the reader a conclusion first, then the reasoning, and confine yourself to the questions the assignment memo actually asks. The framework below lays out the skeleton, what to read for, and a self-grading rubric.
AUDIENCESupervising attorney or internal legal team
Balanced, candid, precise, and nonadvocative.
Supervising attorney or internal legal team
Build this structure before drafting
- 1
Question presented if requested
- 2
Brief answer
- 3
Facts if requested
- 4
Discussion organized by legal issue
- 5
Conclusion or recommended next inquiry
What to extract
- Controlling rule and hierarchy
- Facts that make authorities analogous or distinguishable
- Arguments supporting each reasonable outcome
- Missing facts that affect confidence
Format-specific traps
- Writing as an advocate
- Hiding adverse authority
- Summarizing cases without synthesizing a rule
- Giving business advice the task did not request
A usable opening
The court is likely to ___ because ___. The strongest contrary argument is ___, but ___.
Score the finished product analytically
How NCBE frames the assignment
NCBE lists a memorandum to a supervising attorney among the tasks an MPT may require. It says each MPT gives you a File and a Library, and that the specific assignment is described in a memorandum from a supervising attorney. The instructions say the first document in the File is that memorandum. It tells you the task you must complete.
NCBE's instructions say the performance test is graded on your responsiveness to the task memo's instructions. It is also graded on the content, thoroughness and organization of your response. Follow every constraint the memo states, including length, headings and what to leave out.
The legal-analysis skill behind the memo
NCBE's skills document says legal analysis and reasoning includes identifying and formulating legal issues and identifying relevant legal rules within a given set of legal materials. It also includes formulating, elaborating and evaluating legal theories, and criticizing and synthesizing legal arguments. An objective memo exercises each of those abilities.
NCBE also says the MPT is not a test of substantive law. The Library materials provide enough substantive information to complete the task. Build your rule from the Library alone.
Practice walk-through: a memo on a late-delivery clause
This scenario is invented for practice and is not NCBE material. The task memo asks for an objective memorandum on whether a buyer may cancel a shipment of restaurant ovens that arrived nine days after the contract date. The File holds the sales contract, two emails and a delivery log. The Library holds a one-page invented statute, Franklin Code section 41-2, which lets a buyer cancel for late delivery only if time was made essential in the contract or the delay defeated the buyer's purpose, plus one case applying it. Before writing, list what the memo controls: audience (the supervising attorney), length, whether it wants facts restated, and the single question.
A strong discussion opens with the answer and the rule in one paragraph, then splits the rule into its two routes. Under the first route, write: "The contract says delivery 'on or about' March 1, and nothing in the File makes time essential, so the first route is unlikely to succeed." Under the second, use the delivery log: the restaurant's opening date was March 20, so a nine-day delay did not defeat its purpose, and that fact cuts against the client. A point-losing version of the same paragraph says the buyer 'probably wins' without naming the route or the March 20 fact, and never says which side of the question the log favors. The memo is objective, so state the weak facts as plainly as the strong ones.
Targeted format drill
15-minute drill
Write a 120-word brief answer that includes the predicted result, decisive rule, best fact, and principal uncertainty.
Questions about this format
What tone should an MPT objective memorandum use?+
Balanced, candid, precise, and nonadvocative.
What is the biggest trap?+
The most common failure in this format is writing as an advocate.
Where does the MPT tell me what to write?+
In the first document in the File, a memorandum from a supervising attorney that contains the instructions for the task, according to NCBE's instructions for taking the MPT.
How is an MPT response graded?+
On responsiveness to the task memo's instructions and on the content, thoroughness and organization of the response, according to NCBE's instructions.
Do I need to know the substantive law for the MPT?+
No. NCBE says the MPT is not a test of substantive law and that the Library materials provide sufficient substantive information to complete the task.
Which legal-analysis abilities does the MPT test?+
Identifying and formulating issues, finding the relevant rules in the given materials, and formulating, elaborating and evaluating legal theories, plus criticizing and synthesizing arguments, per NCBE.
Should my objective memo include facts the task memo did not ask for?+
Only if the memo asks for them. This format's checklist says to include facts if requested, and to follow every task-memo constraint.
How long are the MPT items?+
Each MPT consists of two 90-minute items, according to NCBE. Jurisdictions may select one or both items, and jurisdictions that administer the Uniform Bar Examination use both.
Primary and official sources
NCBE: preparing for the MPT↗NCBE: instructions for taking the MPT↗NCBE: MPT skills tested↗NCBE: the Multistate Performance Test↗Legal writing (Wikipedia)↗More from the MPT document library
This objective memorandum is one of 14 formats in the MPT document library. Compare it against the Persuasive brief or memorandum format and the Client advice letter format to see how structure and tone shift by document type.