Transactional Law Resources

Many attorneys never set foot in a courtroom.  Instead, their practice is devoted to transactional, deal or compliance work.  These attorneys may work in areas such as real estate, securities law, or mergers and acquisitions.  This guide is designed to point students to databases and resources that are most helpful for transactional practice areas.

The Boston College Law Library's subscription to the MCLE OnlinePass provides BC Law students and faculty access to transactional training resources. MCLE (Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education) offers live and on-demand recorded conferences and presentations on a wide variety of practice issues sucah as "Handling Commercial Loan Transactions" or "Drafting and Negotiating Licensing Agreements" or "advanced Contract Challenges and Solutons."   Select MCLE OnlinePass from the Law Library's list of databases.  Contact a reference librarian with questiosn regarding MCLE OnlinePass.

One key task junior corporate attorneys are often asked to undertake is due diligence. Due diligence is the gathering of information about a company and the review of this information. When conducting due diligence on a public company, the first place you would start to collect information is the company's public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.  For key resources containing this type of information use the Public Company Information page of this guide.

One of the key tasks that all transactional attorneys understake is the drafting of legal documents.  Whether it be a Purchase & Sale Agreement for a single family home or Merger Agreement between two multibillion dollar companies, these documents not only have to reflect the terms of the negotiation but also have to comply with applicable law. There are many resources that can inform the attorney drafting such agreements such as forms and checklists.  If you are beginning a drafting task at work, you will probably have access to similar documents drafted by attorneys in the firm.  If you do not have law firm precedent or are looking for annotated forms that explain key provisions of legal documents, use the resources on the Transactional Forms page for a collection of helpful resources.