Proposition usability
The property of a legal proposition, as distinct from the case that contains it, of being safe to rely on: still valid, governing in the forum and procedural posture, helpful to the represented party, and not already rejected in the jurisdiction.
First used in Good Law for What?
Verification as usually taught asks whether a case is good law. Attorneys cite propositions, not cases, and a single opinion holds many propositions that can favor opposite parties, address different stages, and have different futures.
Proposition usability replaces one question with four. Is the proposition still good law? Does it govern in this forum and posture? Whom does it help? Has the argument already been rejected here? The third is the question the profession's verification vocabulary never named; the fourth is the one no mainstream research product prompts.
The model also marks a class of change that escapes treatment records altogether. A doctrine can remain "good law" while the direction of its practical effect shifts, as the paper argues happened to Auer deference after Kisor v. Wilkie.