ChatGPT Prompts for Lawyers: Draft, Analyze and Verify

Useful ChatGPT prompts for lawyers define the jurisdiction, permitted sources, document purpose and attorney review required before use. The templates below organize drafting and analysis; they are starting points for your review, and have not themselves received attorney review. Keep privileged facts and confidential matter material out of these examples.

A reusable procedure is easier to maintain than a collection of successful chats. fenbs can hold generic prompts and a firm’s approval rules without holding privileged matter details. For the broader daily workflow, use the separate ChatGPT for lawyers guide.

What should every legal prompt specify?

Start with a hypothetical or public-source exercise. Identify the document’s audience, the question to organize and the limits of the assignment. A request for an internal issue outline needs a different result from a client-facing explanation, even when both concern the same public statute.

Include the jurisdiction, relevant date and approved source identifiers. Tell ChatGPT what to do when a necessary fact is missing: ask a question, label an assumption or stop. A command to be accurate cannot supply missing authority. OpenAI recommends clear instructions and iterative refinement↗ (opens in a new tab); the practical legal addition is a boundary around the evidence.

• Purpose: internal preparation, training or a draft for attorney review.
• Sources: public excerpts labeled S1, S2 and so on, with exact section or page references.
• Limits: no invented authorities, facts, quotations, deadlines or procedural rules.
• Deliverable: a specified outline, comparison table or list of questions, with uncertainty visible.

Decide which tools and data uses your firm permits before using a template on real work. Removing a client’s name alone does not establish that a narrative is safe to disclose. The ABA’s Formal Opinion 512↗ (opens in a new tab) discusses competence, confidentiality, communication and supervision; check the rules that actually govern your practice.

How can you organize a memorandum without inventing law?

Ask for an outline before asking for polished prose. That gives you a chance to notice that the proposed structure skips an element or blends different jurisdictions. Supply public sources you have selected yourself rather than asking the model to construct a research universe from memory.

Prepare an internal outline for attorney review.
Question: [narrow hypothetical legal question]
Jurisdiction and relevant date: [fill in]
Audience: [junior attorney / supervising attorney]
Permitted material: [public excerpts labeled S1, S2...]

Use only the supplied material. First list missing information.
Then create: issue, source-supported propositions, application
questions, competing interpretations, and unresolved research.
For every proposition, identify its source and section or page.
Separate source text from inference. Do not invent cases, rules,
facts, quotations or deadlines. If the excerpts cannot support
a conclusion, write "Not established by the supplied sources."

Inspect the outline against the original source before expanding a section. Suppose a hypothetical vendor dispute involves notice language: distinguish what the quoted provision says from what you still need to research about enforceability. The output should expose that gap rather than write around it.

For other drafting formats, the work prompt collection provides a general structure. Keep the legal template’s source and review requirements when adapting that structure to your own internal documents.

Which prompt helps compare contract language?

Use a fictional pair of clauses to compare wording, scope and unanswered questions. Do not ask whether a clause is legally safe. That question needs the full agreement, the facts, applicable law and professional judgment beyond a text comparison.

Compare these fictional clauses for an attorney’s review.
Clause A: [paste fictional language]
Clause B: [paste fictional language]
Stated commercial objective: [fill in]

Return a table: exact wording difference; possible practical
effect; ambiguity; question for the attorney or business owner.
Preserve exceptions, defined terms, conditions and negations.
Do not assess enforceability, recommend acceptance or insert
new obligations. Identify any reference whose definition or
related provision is missing. End with a list of matters that
cannot be evaluated from these excerpts alone.

Read every changed word yourself. A useful comparison may reveal that one version has a notice exception or a broader definition; it does not establish what that difference means across the entire transaction. Check cross-references and definitions in the authorized document system.

Keep the generic comparison procedure and its approval gate together in fenbs’s Skills and prompts library. Save a rule about human approval without copying the contract, negotiation position or client-specific conclusion into the library.

How do you separate source statements from inference?

For analysis, request an evidence map rather than an authoritative-sounding answer. Give each supplied excerpt a stable identifier. Have the output distinguish a proposition expressly stated in the source, an inference from it and a question requiring additional research.

Evaluate these proposed statements against public sources only.
Statements: [numbered statements]
Sources: [S1, S2... with excerpts and reference details]

For each statement return: supported, partly supported,
contradicted, or not established. Identify the exact source
location and explain the gap in plain language. Do not treat
a source’s silence as proof. List relevant limitations in the
provided material. Do not add authorities from memory.
Finish with targeted research questions for an attorney.

This makes a reviewable assignment, but it does not certify that the excerpts are complete or controlling. Open the full source and check context, subsequent treatment, applicability and the date yourself through your approved research process. A real quotation can still support the wrong proposition.

Avoid a single confidence score. It compresses distinct uncertainties into a number with no established legal meaning. Separate missing facts, incomplete sources and disputed interpretation so the next reviewer knows what work remains.

What must an attorney check before using the output?

Review is a task with specific checks, rather than a final instruction saying “verify everything.” Formal Opinion 512 explains that lawyers need to examine AI output for accuracy and completeness. It does not make these prompts a substitute for applicable professional duties or local court requirements.

A second ChatGPT response is another generated response, not independent verification. Ask it to identify possible omissions as a drafting aid, then do the underlying checks. Record unresolved issues clearly so a polished paragraph cannot silently become a final conclusion.

How can a firm maintain prompts without matter records?

Store reusable instructions, fictional examples and the role responsible for approving each procedure. A good library entry describes its purpose, required inputs, prohibited information, expected format and last review. Keep client communications, factual narratives and substantive work product in the firm’s approved systems.

The system prompt examples explain how to organize standing instructions. Regardless of where instructions live, test a revision with a fictional example containing a missing definition or conflicting sources. Reject a version that confidently fills those gaps.

How to do this with fenbs

1. Create a free account and add a project for generic legal drafting procedures.
2. Save one prompt in Skills and prompts with fictional inputs, its purpose and required attorney checks.
3. Record the rules a person approved in Decisions and rules: permitted sources, prohibited matter details and who may approve use.
4. Follow the integration guide for your supported assistant and ask it to read the procedure before drafting.
5. Save the next review step in Where we left off and update the prompt when a reviewer identifies an improvement.

fenbs does not validate legal citations, supply attorney review or replace a legal document system. It fits the generic procedure layer when your firm permits it. The AI prompts hub has more examples of making reusable instructions explicit and reviewable.