Contract, as we will use that term, ordinarily connotes an agreement between two or more persons—not merely a shared belief, but a common understanding as to something that is to be done in the future by one or both of them. Sometimes, the term contract is used also to refer to a document—the set of papers in which such an agreement is set forth. For lawyers, contract usually is used to refer to an agreement that has legal effect; that is, it creates obligations for which some sort of legal enforcement will be available if performance is not forthcoming as promised. Thus, it will sometimes be necessary to distinguish among three elements in a transaction, each of which may be called a “contract”: (1) the agreement-in-fact between the parties, (2) the agreement-as-written (which may or may not correspond accurately to the agreement-in-fact), and (3) the set of rights and duties created by (1) and (2). Without trying at this point to state a short but comprehensive definition of law (if that were possible), it is perhaps sufficient to suggest that we will be surveying the ways in which such agreements are made and enforced in our legal system—the role of lawyers and judges in creating contracts, in deciding disputes that may arise with respect to their performance, and in fashioning appropriate remedies for their breach.

当我们使用“合同”一词的时候，通常是说它是一份存在于两方或三方之间的契约。它不是一种简单的信任，而是通常理解为合同的一方或双方在将来要去做的某种事情。有时候，“合同”也用来指一套包括协议的文件。对于律师而言，合同通常是指具有法律效力的协议，即设置了一种法律义务，当某行为没有按照预先约定的那样去履行时，可以依照合同去依法强制履行。因此，有时候，在一次交易中，区分三种不同的因素就变得非常必要，这些因素中的每个因素都可以叫做合同：（1）双方之间的事实合同（2）书面合同，它可能与事实合同不完全一致（3）基于前（1）、（2）两项中合同所产生的权利和义务。

在权利义务问题上，如果情况可以允许，我们可做到不用去努力阐明这种短少但包含法律意义的界定情况，那么它就强烈建议我们在早己设定好的合同和现行法律柜架下的去审视在（订立）创制合同中律师和法官的（角色）作用，他们会解决各方行为引发的争执以及对违约行为以恰当的形式进行补偿。

In the Anglo-American legal system, a great number of things—both tangible and intangible—are susceptible of “ownership.” A bull dozer, a diamond ring, the Empire State Building, “Gone With the Wind”—all may be the “property” of one person or group of persons, which means that the state will protect the right of the“owner” to use, enjoy, and even consume that thing, to the exclusion of all other persons. The first-year property course traditionally focuses on the detailed rules that in Anglo-American law govern the ownership of “real property” (land and the buildings on it), as well as some types of “personal” property, such as “goods” (tangible moveable property). Later you will have the opportunity to explore bodies of law relating to ownership of other, less tangible kinds of property such as copyrights, patents, shares of corporate stock, and negotiable instruments.

在英美法律体系中，很多事物—有形的和无形的—都涉及“所有权”问题。一台推土机、一枚钻戒、帝国大厦、小说《飘》，都可能是一个人或者一些人的财产。这意味着国家将保护所有权人对其所有物的使用、享受甚至是毁灭的权利，同时排除他人对此行为的干涉。按照惯例，第一年的财产课程会侧重于英美法律对财产保护的详细规定，诸如土地和地上物等不动产的所有权的细化性规定。然后，你将会学习到基本是对版权、专利权，股权，可转让票据等无形财产的所有权的法律保护。