answering-rule-questions

Rule Q&A

Answer rule-based questions by retrieving rule text from the in-scope documents and grounding every claim in specific rules.

Determine scope

Before retrieving any rules, determine the documents in scope.

1. Call Ruly:list_rulesets to see all available rulesets, each with a label and description.
2. If the user named specific jurisdictions, courts, or rule bodies (e.g., "LA Superior", "FRCP", "California CCP"), match them to ruleset labels and descriptions. If scope isn't stated, ask the user.
3. Call Ruly:list_documents with rulesetIds: [...] for the matched rulesets. The response includes each document's id (use this in subsequent calls) and citationFormat (use this when composing citation labels).

Use the returned ids for all later Ruly:search_rules, Ruly:grep_rules, Ruly:find_rule_by_title, and Ruly:cite calls.

Retrieval

1. Retrieve. Use Ruly:search_rules for conceptual questions. Start with the user's question in natural-language form; rephrase or run variants on follow-ups to widen recall. Use Ruly:grep_rules for keyword/phrase questions or to find rules using specific terminology. Always combine both. Ruly:search_rules accepts a documentIds array — pass all documentIds in one call. Ruly:grep_rules searches one document per call: grep every in-scope document in the same turn (one parallel call per documentId). Don't pre-filter to documents "likely to contain the term" — you can't know what a document contains without searching it, and procedural concepts routinely live across multiple in-scope documents (statutes, federal or state rules, local rules, general or standing orders) even when surface phrasing differs. Skipping documents because they seem unrelated is the exact failure mode this pattern exists to prevent.

2. Follow cross-references with Ruly:find_rule_by_title. When a returned rule cites another rule by number ("as provided in Local Rule 3.9", "see CCP § 1008"), call Ruly:find_rule_by_title with that identifier to retrieve the canonical text. Use this tool only when you have a specific rule identifier from a prior result — do not guess titles.

Cross-references often span documents (e.g., LA local → California Rules of Court → Code of Civil Procedure). Follow each one.

Citations

Every rule referenced in your answer MUST have a verified citation in a trailing ## References section. The number of links under ## References must equal the number of distinct rules referenced in the prose. URLs and page numbers come from the Ruly:cite tool — never type a URL by hand.

For each rule you intend to cite:

1. Find the documentId. Pull from the documentId field returned by Ruly:search_rules or Ruly:find_rule_by_title.
2. Construct the citationLabel. Use the citationFormat field returned for that document by Ruly:list_documents. The format string contains placeholders like [Rule Number] and [Sub-Section(s)]; fill them with the rule's actual identifiers. For documents with multiple variants (e.g., a federal circuit doc carrying both FRAP and circuit local rules), pick the variant whose example matches the rule you're citing.
3. Call Ruly:cite({documentId, page, citationLabel}). It returns {citationLink: "[label](url#page=N)"} — a markdown link grounded by DB lookup. Paste the returned citationLink verbatim under ## References.

If Ruly:cite returns {error: "unknown-documentId"}, re-check the documentId field on the result row. If you can't resolve the documentId, omit the citation rather than fabricate one; it's better to qualify the answer ("I cannot cite this authoritatively from the documents in scope") than to ship a wrong citation.

Output format

Answer in prose. Reference rules naturally where applicable in plain text — for example:

Under Local Rule 3.104(a), the deadline is... The Code of Civil Procedure § 659 requires...

These plain-text rule references are encouraged when they aid the answer. Do not embed citationLink markdown links inline in the prose.

End with a ## References section. Emit one citationLink per line as a markdown list item, in any order:

[answer prose with plain-text rule references]

## References

- [citationLink1]
- [citationLink2]
- [citationLink3]

If no rules are cited (e.g., no rule directly addresses the question), omit the ## References section entirely.

Before responding

Verify before sending your answer:

1. Count the distinct rules referenced in the prose.
2. Count the citationLink entries you intend to put under ## References.
3. The two counts must match. Every rule in the prose has a link under References; every link under References corresponds to a rule the prose actually references.
4. If you called Ruly:cite and got back a citationLink, that link MUST appear under ## References unless you also removed the corresponding rule from the prose.

A response that references rules in prose but ships without a ## References section is incomplete. Re-check before sending.

Do not

• Do not rely on general legal knowledge. If it's not in a retrieved rule, it doesn't exist for this question.
• Do not speculate about deadlines, procedures, or requirements that are not explicitly stated in the rules.
• Do not assume one jurisdiction's rule applies to another. Local rules override state rules only where explicitly stated.
• Do not type rule-document URLs by hand; always go through the Ruly:cite tool.
• Do not embed citation markdown links inline in prose; use plain-text rule references in prose and put markdown links only in the trailing ## References section.