--- name: moonlit-reasoning description: "Method for legal analysis: how law is analyzed against facts once the sources are established. Decomposition of the governing norm into its elements, subsumption per element, interpretation methods deployed in order, weighing of divergent authority, five skeptic lenses, grounded risk assessment and reasoned position-taking. Load whenever a legal question is analyzed rather than merely reported: advice, assessment, review, or any answer that applies law to facts. Works standalone or alongside moonlit-operator, which governs how sources are found, verified and cited; this file governs what is done with them; the calling instruction governs what is produced." metadata: version: "1.0" pairs-with: "moonlit-operator" updated: "2026-08-01" --- # moonlit-reasoning These are the operating rules for legal analysis. They govern one thing: how law is analyzed once the sources are established, so that the movement from source and fact to conclusion can be followed and checked step by step by a qualified reader. They sit between the sourcing discipline, which decides what counts as a source and what a citation must be, and whatever calls this file, which decides what is produced. ## Decompose before analyzing **Break the governing norm into its cumulative elements before any element is applied.** Take the elements from the article tree or from the provision's own structure: its paragraphs, its conditions, its enumerated requirements. Where the provision enumerates, the enumeration is the decomposition; where it does not, the elements are the conditions its wording sets. Each element is analyzed against the facts separately. The conclusion follows from the elements and never precedes them. **Subsumption runs per element, in four steps:** the test as the sources state it; the facts that engage it; the application of the one to the other; and which facts would change the outcome. Name the dispositive element, the one the answer turns on. An element no one would contest is stated and closed; the dispositive element is worked in full, and the analysis earns its depth there. ## Interpretation **Methods are deployed in order, not listed.** The text decides first. Where the text underdetermines the question, the system of the instrument, its legislative history and its purpose carry the analysis. Where a supranational instrument stands behind the provision, the provision is read in conformity with it, within the limits the national method allows. Where the methods diverge, name the method that carries the conclusion; an analysis that cannot say which method carries it is not finished. ## Divergent authority **Where authority genuinely diverges, the divergence is worked, never flattened.** State position A with its sources, position B with its sources, and then a reasoned weighing: by the system of the law, by the legislative history, and by the direction of the apex court. Where the weighing closes the question, say what closed it. Where it does not, say the question is open and say exactly what keeps it open. Never flatten a genuine controversy into false certainty; never manufacture a controversy where the law is settled. ## The skeptic lenses A position stands only after it has met five challenges. Each is a question any careful reader could put, and each has a defined check: 1. **Definition.** Does the term mean what the argument assumes? Checked at the defining provision, never at the ordinary meaning of the word, however ordinary the word looks. 2. **Scope.** Does the norm reach these facts in time, in person and in subject matter? A norm outside any of the three decides nothing here, whatever its words suggest. 3. **Ratio.** Does applying the norm here serve what the norm is for? An application its purpose does not carry needs stronger textual footing, and that footing is stated. 4. **Counter-authority.** What is the strongest source an opponent would cite? It is dealt with in the answer, or the question is declared open. An analysis that has not looked for its opponent has not looked. 5. **Fact-assumption.** Which unverified fact carries the conclusion? Name it, and state what changes if it fails. The lenses are method. They shape the analysis; they never appear as a section, a heading or a note in what is delivered. ## Risk **Risk is a function of four factors, not a mood:** the clarity of the norm; the strength and consistency of the authority; the fact-sensitivity of the outcome; and the enforcement posture of the body that would act. A stated risk level traces to those four, and a shift in risk names the factor that moved. Whether risk appears in the deliverable is decided by the calling instruction; where it appears, this is how it is assessed. ## Position **Blanket precaution and over-flagging are not analysis.** Where the elements, the interpretation and the weighing point one way, take that position and give its grounds. Where they do not, state precisely what makes the question open: the element unresolved, the authority divided, the fact unestablished. A recommendation to seek advice, or a conclusion that it depends, is where the work starts, never where it ends. ## Composing with other instructions This file governs how law is analyzed. The sourcing discipline governs how sources are found, verified and cited, and nothing here relaxes it: every step of the analysis rests on sources established under it, and a step that rests on none is marked as your own reasoning. The calling instruction governs the deliverable: its genre, structure, format and language, and whether the analysis appears in full, in summary, or only in its conclusions. A caller may tighten this method and may not lower it. When this file travels as a fragment inside a larger prompt, these rules govern the legal analysis within it all the same.