Self-study
Legal rules are expressed in general terms. ████ ███████ ███████████████ ██ ███████ ███ ███████ ███ ████ █████████ █████ ████████████ ███ ███████ ███ ███████ ███████ ████ ███ ████████ ███████████ ███ ███████████ ██ █ ████ ██ █ ██████████ █████ ██████████ ████████ █ ████████ ██ ███████ ███ █████ ██ ████ ████ ████ ██████ ███ ██████████ █████████ ██ ███ █████ ████ ████████ ███████████ ███ █████ ██████ ██ ████ ████████ ██████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ █████
Stimulus Summary
The stimulus describes how legal rules operate. It starts by stating that legal rules classify people and actions into certain categories, with legal consequences associated with each category. Thus, applying these rules to a specific case means deciding if a case's facts fit those legal categories. Such a decision ultimately decides the "legal effect" of what happened, and not "any matter of fact."
Possible Inferences
If you're trying to find a conclusion in this stimulus, you might notice that while there is a "therefore" in the third sentence, the fourth sentence seems to stand on an equal footing with that sentence — it expands on the third sentence rather than supporting it per se. But since this is a Most Strongly Supported question, we're not too interested in the conclusion/support structure of the stimulus. We can treat the whole thing as potential support for the correct answer choice.
Since it's hard to know what specific inferences we're looking for before looking at the answer choices, it can be useful on the first go-around to establish what cannot be inferred — anything that is ruled out according to the stimulus. Notice that the last sentence uses some strong language: legal decisions establish "legal effect" rather than any "matter of fact." So there's a contrast here between "legal effect" and "matters of fact." The stimulus seems to assume that these are not the same thing — i.e., it rules out the possibility that legal effects are matters of fact.
19.
The passage provides the most ███████ ███ █████ ███ ██ ███ ██████████
a
Legal rules, like ███████ ██ █████ ███ █████████ ████ ███████████████ ██ ██████ ████ ██ ████████
While we're told explicitly that legal rules are concerned with classifying actions, the stimulus tells us nothing about what "matters of fact" are concerned with. So, because of the phrase "like matters of fact," this answer choice isn't supported.
b
Matters of fact, ████ █████ ██████ ███ █████████ ██ █████████ ██ ███████ ██████
The stimulus doesn't tell us anything about how matters of fact can be expressed. This answer choice isn't supported.
c
Making a legal ████████ ████ ███ ███████ ███████ ██ █████
This is a tricky answer choice, because the last sentence does seem to contrast the result of a legal decision with "matters of fact." But to say that the outcome of a legal decision doesn't establish matters of fact isn't the same as saying that the process of making the decision doesn't involve matters of fact, whatever the term "involve" means here. Legal decisions might be made with reference to certain facts, without themselves establishing new matters of fact. Ultimately, since we don't know the full scope of what making a legal decision involves, we can't say that this answer choice is supported by the stimulus.
d
The application of █ ████ ██ █ ██████████ ████ ████ ███ ██ ████ ██ █ ██████
The stimulus doesn't make any suggestions about who makes, or can make, legal decisions. This answer choice is irrelevant.
e
Whether the facts ██ █ ████ ████ ████ █ ████████ ████████ ██ ███ ██████ █ ██████ ██ █████
This is correct. The stimulus states that deciding whether the facts of a case fall into certain legal categories will establish a legal effect, and will not establish any matter of fact. This implies that whether the facts of a case fall into a relevant category is not itself a "matter of fact."