Prof. Emily Ryan PA 101

 Primary sources are actual statements of the law.  Enormous amounts of primary source materials available are issued chronologically rather than by subject.

 Statutes are organized by topic and are published in a series of volumes called the United States Code (U.S.C.).  The 50 titles are divided into chapters and sections.  Each title contains the statutes that cover a specific subject.  Title 20 contains education statutes  The U.S.C. is considered the official version of federal statutes, and is available on the internet.  There are also two annotated versions of the U.S.C., which contain information pertaining to each statute.  They are the United States Code Annotated (U.S.C.A.) and the United States Code Services (U.S.C.S.)

Since federal statutes are frequently amended, it is important to locate the most recent version. A paper supplement, called a packet part, is included in the back of each book of annotated codes to update it annually. If the statute being researched is recent or currently pending in Congress, it will not be available in the annual pocket part. U.S.C.A. is updated between pocket part publications by its Interim Pamphlet Service. Several methods can be used to find federal statutes.

A reference to a primary law source is a citation. 78 So.2nd 558 (Miss. 2010) A citation tells where the law source is located. The standard form for citations is the title number, letters referring to the code, the section number, and subsection.

State Statutes  Some states organize their statutes in volumes according to subject by name  Most states assign a title or chapter and section number to each subject, similar to the U.S. Code.  Most collections have indexes for all laws and for each subject.

Federal Regulations  Federal administrative agencies produce regulations to implement and enforce federal statutes.  These regulations are published in the Federal Register and the Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R.) Finding Regulations by Citation  Regulations also have citations that tell where the regulation is located.  The citation is in standard format, which is the title number, C.F.R., section number, and subsection letter and number.

State Regulations  State regulations can be difficult to locate.  In many states, regulations are published in loose-leaf form by the promulgating agency.  Unannotated state regulations and registers are also available on state government websites.

 An important part of legal research is finding cases that interpret statutes and regulations  Cases are published in volumes, called reporters, which are available in all law libraries

Federal Cases There are no official publications by the government for federal district or appellate court decisions. West publishes reporters on decisions of the lower federal courts, and this information is located in electronic databases. The published decisions of the U.S. District Courts are collected in the Federal Supplement. The published decisions by the U.S. Court of Appeals are collected in the Federal Reporter.

Federal Cases, cont. The complete decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court are published in three sources: United States Report (U.S.) Supreme Court Reporter (S.Ct.) United States Supreme Court Reports, Lawyers’ Edition (L.Ed.) The last two are unofficial publications, which include editorial enhancements

Federal Cases, cont. During the lag period between the date the case is decided and when it is published, new cases can be located in weekly updates called advance sheets. The most recent slip opinions may also be kept in the reference section of law libraries located within that particular court’s jurisdiction. Opinions are accessible from official federal court websites daily.

How to Find Cases Cases are published chronologically rather than according to subject. Finding Cases by Citation Every published decision has a citation that makes it possible to locate it in the reporters. Citations follow a standard format of name of case, volume number, name of reporter, page number, and court and year of decision.

 Several finding tools are designed to help the researcher locate primary sources.  These tools include annotated codes, digests, indexes, legal encyclopedias, American Law Reports (ALR) annotations, and Shepard’s citators.

 The annotated versions of the United States Code are powerful research tools.  These can contain valuable information such as legislative history, cross references to other federal statutes and regulations, references to the American Digest System topics and key numbers, citations to secondary sources, and abstracts of relevant cases that have interpreted a statute.

 It is critical that the case of interest is still valid, meaning that it has precedential value and hasn’t been overruled or reversed.  A search of a case in Shepard’s citators will direct the researchers to other cases and secondary authorities that have cited in it.  The process of “shepardizing” is an essential part of legal research.

 Once a citation for a case is located in Shepard’s, the citatory lists every case that has referred to it.  Every case, important or not, that cites the case being researched will be listed.  This can lead to numerous listings, especially landmark cases that are cited frequently.

Secondary sources are materials that describe and explain the law. They are unofficial, so they have no formal authority, but may have significant persuasive authority. Secondary sources have two functions: to provide citations to primary source material to introduce the researcher to a particular area of the law by explaining the issues involved Secondary sources of information include legal encyclopedias, legal newspapers, legal periodicals and law reviews, loose-leaf services, and Internet resources.

 Legal periodicals can be the best place to begin researching a legal issue, because of their extensive coverage and footnoting to primary authorities and other secondary sources.  Law reviews are periodicals that contain articles on legal developments, legal issues, historical research, and empirical studies.  Law review articles are often cited by legal scholars as well as by the courts and can have great persuasive authority.  Many law schools publish one or more specialized academic journals in addition to general law reviews.  Some examples are: Journal of Law & Education, Index to Legal Periodicals (ILP), Current Law Index (CLI)

 There are also online databases available to university faculty and students using legal periodicals to research particular legal issues.  Many law reviews are now maintaining a web presence and including the full text of articles from recent issues on their websites.  Shepard’s citators can be used to find journal articles that cite a particular case or statute and to shepardize law review articles.

 Loose-leaf services may contain analysis of legal issues and reprints of primary source material in specific subject areas.  They may serve as both a finding tool for primary authorities and as a secondary source.  A loose-leaf service is a publication that is issued in a binder with

Legal research is rapidly becoming computerized. The two primary computer-assisted legal research (CALR) systems are West’s Westlaw system and Reed Elsevier’s Lexis-Nexis. Advantages: contain enormous amounts of information legal researcher can access the databases and navigate between them quickly the databases are updated constantly searching within particular databases is simplified the ease of moving from one primary or secondary source to another through links CALR does not replace traditional legal research. CALR does not replace traditional legal research.

Step 1: Analyze the Problem  The first task of the researcher is to analyze the problem and determine the most efficient manner to proceed.  The researcher must decide what legal sources will be needed to answer the question Step 2: Conduct the Research  The researcher must locate relevant primary source materials.  The most important element is the location of one good case on the subject being researched.  If a statute or relevant case citation is not available, the researcher should begin with secondary sources.

Step 2 cont. The ability to move between the sources of law and pull together the relevant information is critical in this stage of research. Step 3: Evaluate the Results The final step of the research process is to evaluate the results. Since the law is constantly changing, it is critically important that the research be current. Bringing research up to date should be a continuous part of the process and a distinct part of the evaluation process.