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Page 1: Legal research for non-law librarians

Govnnmrnl Publkwiionr Review, Vol. 6, No. 3, PP. 263 - 273 0 Pugmtmt Press Ltd., 1979. Printed in Great Britain.

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LEGAL RESEARCH FOR NON-LAW LIBRARIANS

SUE VEST McCALLUM University of Tennessee Library, Knoxville, TN 37916, U.S.A.

Ahmact - Questions requiring access to legal publications are often asked in academic and public libraries, as well as in law libraries. Library users ask for infor- mation from statutes, codes, administrative regulations, and court reports. Though some questions should be referred to appropriate legal aid services, many can be satisfied by leading the patron to relevant legal publications. Some familiarity with legal publications and with the basics of legal research enables the librarian to serve library users effectively, and to decide when and where to refer the patron to another source of information.

SECTION I - GENERAL INFORMATION

We seem to have passed the time for debating whether reference questions of a legal nature should be answered in a non-law library. Several articles in professional journals have proposed that basic legal materials should be available to all citizens, as nearly as realities of library budgeting will allow;[‘O. ‘*+l

bibliographies have been published suggesting the titles appropriate for a basic collection in American law for the non-law library.“‘] Every depository library provides, within the reach of the public and the

public librarian, a basic legal collection. The present consideration is how to make use of that basic col-

lection. The kind of questions to expect, judging from reported observations in university and public

libraries, vary greatly. University students and faculty may use statutory or judicial materials to support research in history or social science. Students in school administration courses will be interested in state and federal laws affecting the school systems. Public library users may want information on tax law, landlord-tenant relations, divorce laws, or local zoning regulations. ‘Legal jargon’ has been criticized, with some good reason. But Supreme Court decisions reflect the questions facing society at a given

point, if not necessarily a consensus on their solution. The perspective a court decision offers on the thought prevalent in one slice of time is worth the effort of reading through the ‘legal language’.

In answering reference questions with a legal focus, one may sometimes have to determine the patron’s purpose, in order to avoid the sticky area of legal reference vs practice of law. The traditional advice is to lead the patron to sources of information, but avoid interpretation of the material. Though conservative, this advice is basically sound. Interpreting the text of a law or a case verges on giving legal advice, which not only invades the prerogative of those licensed to practice law, but may also encourage the patron to think he/she has solved a problem without legal counsel - a misconception which may be more costly in the long run than the legal fee he is saving. The librarian does have a responsibility to understand and to interpret the legal bibliography - to know the sources and the indexes to legal sources and to aid the patron in using them. If a patron appears to have a real legal problem, he/she should be referred to the local bar association or to a local legal aid clinic if one exists. Such referral does not moot the question of reference help with legal materials; it recognizes the levels at which a per-

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son may be depending on the information available.

The person with a question may want to know how to find a copy of a public law for which he/she has a number or title, or the patron may want to know ‘the law’ on a particular subject. Easiest to answer, of course, are the ‘where to find it’ questions when the patron is looking for a given document.

(cf. section II for sample questions and search strategies.) Essential to helping a library user find the law is some understanding of what constitutes the law in the United States.

The United States is a common law, as opposed to a civil law, country. In simple, common law large-

ly derives from tradition or past experiences, while civil law is based almost exclusively on a ‘code’ or set

of rules passed by a legislature. The doctrine of stare decisi$ that a principle of law once applied to a certain combination of facts will be adhered to in all future cases with substantially the same facts, re- mains important in the common law context. This tradition of referring back to past decisions necessitates the massive collection of court reports in law libraries - hundreds of volumes for each jurisdiction.

Oversimplification in the preceding statement quickly becomes obvious upon recall that we do in fact

also have a ‘code’ of laws, that is the statutes generated by Congress and by state legislatures. In prac- tice, court decisions and legislation work together. A public law passed by Congress is ‘law’ as it is inter-

preted by the courts. For example, Title VI of the Civil Rights Code of 1964 is effective law as it is ap- plied by courts in the Regents of the University of California v. Bakke and similar cases; and a long standing judicial tradition may be altered specifically by legislation. So the basic structure always need- ed for ‘the law’ is any legislation, together with any applicable court decisions.

Despite the backward reach of tradition, currency of the material used is of major importance in any legal research. Legal books are in a constant process of revision and updating, in order to try to keep

pace with the latest decision or legislation available. No question is ever answered thoroughly until every supplement has been checked. Most legal books will have paperbound supplements, replacement pages, or pamphlet ‘pocket parts’ intended to be inserted inside the back cover of the publication. A specialized means of updating information is ‘Shepardizing’, that is, using the ‘citators’ published by Shepard’s Inc. Through these tools an attorney can check the citation (i.e. the identifying volume, title, and page information) for a case or statute being consulted to ascertain whether any subsequent case has referred to it. This search is invaluable to the attorney in determining whether the law has been over- turned, expanded or otherwise altered. Shepardizing is, however, less likely to be essential in a universi- ty or public library and will not be explained in detail here.

One of the most frequently sought sources of legal information is statutory material: the laws passed by the U.S. Congress and by the state legislative bodies. Public laws, or statutes, take several forms dur- ing their existence. Introduced as a bill, Federal legislation is debated and considered in the House and Senate; with passage and Presidential approval, the bill becomes a Public Law. Both bills and public laws are published in chronological sequence, with subject access only by external indexes.

In the Congress a law may be introduced as a bill in either the Senate or the House; after introduc- tion, it is usually referred to a committee for consideration. During its consideration, a committee may hold hearings to gather information on the topic of the bill. Upon completion of its deliberations, the committee returns the bill to the floor of the chamber, along with a report bearing its recommendations for passage of the bill. Both reports and hearings are published in chronological sequence and distributed to depositories. As a record of deliberations, they can shed light on the intentions of a par- ticular piece of legisation, should a question about its purpose arise after its passage.

Bills are numbered sequentially during each Congress: e.g. S.412 is the 412th bill introduced in the Senate during a given session, and H.R.412 is the 412th bill introduced in the House of Representatives. Senate and House hearings and reports, when printed, are also numbered sequentially: S. Rpt. 94-l 12 is the 112th report issued by the Senate during the 94th Congress.

Bills are printed in pamphlet form, one bill per pamphlet, and are distributed through the depository library system. Access is by bill number and the number of the Congress. When bills are amended

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before passage, amended forms of the bill are published, each bearing the original bill number. House and Senate hearings and reports are also published in pamphlet or booklet format and distributed

through the depository system. Access to these publications is by the hearing or report number. Ordinarily a request for a hearing or report will come from a researcher working with an already iden-

tified bill. In that circumstance he/she may already have a bill number and only location will be necessary. When the patron does not have a number, hearings and reports can be accessed by topic via several sources. The most readily available indexing tool in a Depository library is the Month& Catufog,~3si a document list with monthly indexes (title, subject and author) which cumulate annually. Since 1970, subject access to hearings, reports, and other Congressional documents is available through the CZ,S,4nnu~Zt*~i. The Index volume of this publication gives access in a variety of ways: topic, names of witnesses at hearings, names of sponsoring Congressmen, bill or report number, etc. Each index en- try refers to a corresponding entry in the Abstract volume for the same year. For every treated docu- ment there is an abstract of the contents of the document. This abstract is helpful to the researcher in deciding whether to spend further effort to locate a copy of the document itself. An additional value of the CZS is the accompanying fiche service which is often available in larger libraries: a microfiche copy of the full text of every document indexed and abstracted in the bound volumes. Even when the fiche

service is not available, the abstract provides full bibliographic information for locating the item: title,

applicable report or hearing number and Superintendent of Documents number.

The Congressional Index ~1 published by Commerce Clearing House, provides in its Status Tables an indication of whether any reports or hearings have been issued for a given bill. The Status Tables also indicate what action has been taken on any bill: whether it has been referred to a committee, passed by either house, etc. Since this publication has a subject index, it is a source for determining whether any legislation is currently under consideration on a given topic.

Once reported out of committee onto the floor of a Congressional chamber, a bill is subject to debate on the floor. Debate on a bill, which can provide further insight into the purposes of the legislation, is printed in the Congressional Record, ~1 the proceedings of the Congress. Sometimes the full text of a bill is also printed, providing another source for the bill itself. In addition to the debate, supporting evidence for a point of view (for example, statistical figures or charts of financial figures) may also be printed in the Record. Congressional Record content should be used cautiously, since until recently

there was no way to distinguish how much of the printed material had actually transpired on the floor of the Congress and how much had been inserted by a Congressman in writing prior to the printing of

the Record. Beginning with the issue for 1 March 1978, statements not actually made on the floor are in- dicated with a bullet (0). The Congressional Record is issued daily when the Congress is in session; issues are cumulated and bound at the end of a session. Daily issues of the Congressional Record are page numbered separately for the House and Senate; in the bound volumes, pages are renumbered to fall into one sequence. Daily issues of the Record include a Daily Digest which summarizes the activities of the day; the issues are indexed fortnighly, by topic, title of legislation, and names of members of Congress. In addition, the index issues include a History of Bills and Resolutions, arranged by bill number, which indicates all pages on which debate or other activity relating to a particular bill is printed. All research aids are cumulated into the bound volumes at the end of a session.

Bear in mind that after a bill passes one house it is considered in the other, so any piece of legislation may have debates, reports and hearings from both houses of the Congress.

Upon passage a bill is assigned a public law number identifying its sequence in the current Congress: e.g. P.L. 95-24 is the 24th law passed by the 95th Congress. The first publication of a public law is as a slip law, a pamphlet containing a single law. At the end of a session, the slip laws are cumulated into the volume of the Statutes at Large. [‘w These volumes are sometimes called the session laws, that is, the chronological publication of the laws of each session of the Congress. Faster than the official publica- tion is the commercial U.S. Code Congressional and Administrative News. ~1 Issued in monthly pam- phlets which are cumulated into bound volumes at the end of a year, the USCCANprints the full text of

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most important laws, along with selected legislative history (reports, hearings, etc.) Its text is arranged by public law number and is indexed by topic. It provides the simplest way of locating legislative history, since relevant documents are reprinted in full, not just referred to.

Though volumes of the Statutes at Large are indexed, effective topical approach to the laws currently in force is through the codification of the law. The United States Code[‘gl is the official codification,

distributed to depository libraries. In U.S.C. the text of the laws is arranged under 50 broad topical areas called Titles. For example, Title 2 is Congress and Title 24 is Hospitals and Asylums. Each title is subdivided into chapters and sections. Particularly if a public law is complex, it will not transfer in its entirety into one Title of the code. For instance P.L. 94-205, “Real Estate Settlement Act Amendments of 1975” was slotted into several Titles. Section 2 went into Title 12, under Banks and Banking; section

11 went into Title IS, Commerce and Trade. Tables in the U.S. Code show the disposition into the code of each section of each public law.

Direct subject access to the content of the U.S. Code is through an index which includes subjects,

geographical names, and personal names. The U.S. Code is slow of publication and awkward to use because of its format. The entire code is issued in a new edition every 6 years; the 1976 edition is now be-

ing printed. Between the 6-year editions, U.S.C. is updated by yearly supplements. The previous full edition of U.S.C. was 1970; Supplement I was issued in 1971, Supplement II in 1972, etc. To find full information on a Title not yet reprinted in the 1976 edition, it is necessary to look in the 1970 edition and all supplements through 1975. Even if a Title has been reprinted in the 1976 edition, it is still necessary to determine whether new legislation has been passed to date to affect it.

More quickly published and easier to use because of a simpler supplement format are the unofficial, annotated versions of the code. The United States Code Annotated is published by West Publishing

Company, and United States Code Service by the Lawyer’s Cooperative Publishing Company. Both these versions feature faster updating (by pocket parts and pamphlet supplements), similar research aids (indexes, tables for the disposition and effect of public laws), and annotations. Annotations vary accor-

ding to the publishers, but generally include citations to cases which have referred to a particular section of the code, references to legislative history sources, and references to related materials available in other publications of the respective publisher.

Though no law governs uniformity of state legislative processes, they are in fact very similar to each other and to the Federal Congress. Each state has a legislative body, usually with two houses, in which bills are introduced and considered. By and large, printing and distribution of state legislative materials is less comprehensive than the Federal system. Copies of bills may be printed and made available through a state depository system to the major libraries in the state. New laws as enacted are assigned a sequential number, often called a Public Act number, but are not often available in slip law format. At the end of a legislative session bound volumes of sessions laws are printed, arranged by the sequential numbering of the acts. These volumes usually have topical indexes to the content of the acts, as well as tables showing the Public Act number of each bill passed. All states have some version of a codification analogous to the U.S. Code. It is usually an annotated code printed by a commercial publisher, though some states do have both a commercial annotated code and an unannotated official version authorized (and often published) by the state. Supplementation of the unofficial state codes is similar to the unof- ficial versions of the U.S. Code. Pocket supplements and pamphlet supplements update the bound volumes. Research aids include indexes and disposition tables. In addition, some state codes are accom- panied by ‘legislative service’ pamphlets which provide quick publication of new state acts, often within a week or two after passage. These services usually include their own indexes, for fast topical access to

new laws. The least uniform aspect of state legislative information is in sources of legislative history - reports,

hearings, etc. Debates are infrequently recorded, rarely published. Reports and hearings, if available at all, may be printed only for the use of the legislators. State legislative information offices should be consulted for details of available information.

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Due to the interlinking aspect of legal information, statutory sources provide only the first portion of

the answer to many legal questions. The second important portion is the case law. ‘Case law’ describes decisions made in the courts - interpretations of the law made by judges. Cases

are usually initiated in a trial court, sometimes referred to as courts of the first instance. In the trial court, evidence is presented, witnesses testify, and a jury is asked to decide which of the presented ver- sions of a circumstance represents the truth. A judge is present to oversee the legal procedures. Either party to a case, if dissatisfied with the ruling of the trial court, may appeal to a higher court. Appeals may be based only on alleged misapplication of law, not on disagreement with the conclusions of the jury. In the appeals court, a panel of judges examines the records of the court below, along with briefs (summarized arguments) prepared by the attorneys for each party. It is the function of the appellate court to determine whether the law was correctly applied in the lower court. Any facts accepted in the lower court are held to be true in the appellate court; no new evidence is presented, no new witnesses are

heard. Because of the stare de&is principle, it is important to record the decisions of the courts in order to

preserve the way in which a particular situation was analyzed and the way in which the law was applied in that situation. Because it is in the appellate courts that questions of law are decided (as opposed to the questions of fact decided in the trial courts) it is usually the decisions of the appellate courts that are

recorded in the volumes of court reports. The printed report of a law case is much the same regardless of what court it comes from. Typically a

report will include the names of the involved parties, the date of the decision, the court in which the case was decided, and the names of the attorneys and judges. The substantive parts of the report are the decision and the opinion. The decision is brief, indicating whether the action of the lower court was af- firmed or overruled; the opinion records the reasoning of the judges in reaching the decision they have given. Often these two terms are used interchangeably to indicate the whole of the report. A report may show one decision but several opinions. The majority opinion is the official opinion of the case. In a dissenting opinion, a justice disagrees both with the majority decision of the court and with the reasons for that decision; a concurring opinion agrees with the majority decision, but reveals different reasons for reaching that decision.

In the United States we have 51 judicial jurisdictions, each making decisions and publishing reports. The Federal system consists of 94 U.S. District Courts (the trial courts for violations of Federal laws), the ten U.S. Courts of Appeals (second level, or intermediate, appellate courts), and the U.S. Supreme

Court (the ultimate appellate court). Though not governed by national laws, the 50 state systems are generally similar to the federal system. Each state has local trial courts, which may have divisions (e.g.

Civil, Criminal, Chancery); the exact structure depends on the state. Each state also has a high court, usually called either Supreme Court or Court of Appeals. Some states also have an intermediate ap- pellate court which stands hierarchically between the trial courts and the high court. In Illinois, the in- termediate court is the Appellate Court and the high court is the Supreme Court. Cases may be appeal- ed from any state supreme court to the U.S. Supreme Court.

U.S. Supreme Court reports are published in an official version, U.S. Repor&[‘l printed by the Government Printing Office, and distributed to depository libraries. Unofficial, annotated reports ap- pear in two major series: Supreme Court Reporter,[*l and United States Supreme Court Reports. ~1

The official report is released first as a slip decision, a pamphlet containing one report. The slip deci- sion is available within a few weeks of the date of the decision. When a sufficient number has ac- cumulated, they are gathered together in a paperback ‘preliminary print’. Again, after accumulation of sufficient decisions they are reprinted as a bound volume. All three formats are sent to depository libraries.

Both unofficial reporters release decisions first in an ‘advance sheet’, a pamphlet containing several decisions. The advance sheet is usually available faster than the preliminary print of the official report. Upon accumulation, the decisions in the advance sheets are reprinted in the bound volumes of the

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report series.

The text of decisions is identical in the official and unofficial editions, but the unofficial reports con- tain annotations: editorial information supplied by the publisher, syllabi or summaries of the case, and references to related materials in other publications of the same company.

Besides these three major series, Supreme Court decisions are published in two looseleaf services: United States Law Week”] and Supreme Court Bulletin. ~1 Each publishes opinions within a few days, in looseleaf pages for insertion into a binder. Each is valuable not only for fast publication but for related research information: subject indexes, reports on the status of a filed case. U.S. Law Week also

has a section called General Law which reports on significant administrative actions, decions in federal courts, etc. Its reports on trends make it useful as a current awareness service of what is happening in the Court.

Ordinarily a researcher seeking a specific case will have a citation to it. For example, Roe v. Wade,

410 U.S. 113 (1973) is the citation to the case of Jane Roe vs Henry Wade, which was decided in the Supreme Court. The decision was made in 1973, and the report is printed at page 113 of volume 410 of

the United States Reports. (For more complete citation information, see section II.) For patrons who know the names of persons involved in a case, but have no citation, there are Tables

of Cases in every series of law reports. When the approximate date of a decision is known, case tables in

separate volumes can be used. Otherwise, it is necessary to refer to a comprehensive table in a digest (discussed in more detail below).

Reports from Federal courts are published less comprehensively than Supreme Court reports. Reports from the ten courts of Appeals are currently printed in the Federal Reporter, 2nd Series;[81

reports from the 94 District Courts can be found in the Federal Supplement[81. District Court cases are selectively reported, even though they are trial level cases. Note the use of “2nd series” with the Federal Reporter. A law report series for one jurisdiction will eventually fill hundreds of volumes. Law

publishers, in order to prevent volume numbering from becoming too unwieldy, have adopted a series numbering system: at an arbitrary point, volume numbering begins a new series, starting over again at 1. The Federal Reporter stopped with Vol. 300, and the Federal Reporter, 2nd Series, began over again with Vol. 1. This system of numbering volumes will be seen in many legal publications.

Reports of state courts are generally available in several sources. Some states still have an official series of reports, with publication authorized by the state courts. Other states have discontinued official

reports and rely on reports published in an unofficial annotated version by one of the commercial publishers. The annotated state reports are similar to the annotated Supreme Court reports, offering aids to finding cases, and editorial information.

State reports are also available in the massive National Reporter System [151. This set divides the states

into seven regions, loosely organized along geographical lines; e.g. Pacific Reporter, Northeastern Reporter, etc. Each reporter prints the appellate court reports of all the states within its region.

All reports are published in chronological order of their decision by the court. Each bound volume

has tables of case names and sometimes indexes to aid in locating a particular case. But reported cases number in the thousands every year, and the total collection of reported cases for the United States numbers in the millions. Given the principle that past decisions are valid until they are specifically

overruled, subject access to the body of case law is essential. Primary subject access is by digests of cases, which have no real equivalent in non-legal research. A

digest combines the functions of abstract and index in one tool. The most comprehensive digest is the American Digest”“, which uses the Key Number System. In the creation of this complex digest, each reported case is analyzed by West editors; every important point of law is summarized in a short abstract, usually one or two sentences long. In the West reporters, these abstracts are listed at the beginning of the opinion and are called headnotes.

In making the digest, these headnotes are classified under 400 broad areas of law called Topics, each of which is subdivided by specific sub-topics designated by Key Numbers. For example, Libel and

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Slander is a West Topic; Libel and Slander with the Key Number 9 is a specific sub-topic, Words

Tending to Injure in Profession and Business. In the publication of the digest the abstracts or headnotes for all cases dealing with this specific sub-topic will be listed together. Each abstract in the digest gives a

complete citation to the volume and page where the complete report of the case can be found. To use the digest for locating cases on a particular topic, a researcher should begin with the

Descriptive Word Index. While the Topics are often legal terms (Perpetuities, Vendor and Purchaser) the Descriptive Word Index uses prosaic terms (automobiles, parents in law). Each index entry refers to a Topic and Key Number within the Digest; under the Topic and Key Number are listed the abstracts

for all cases reported which concerned the given combination of circumstances. A reading of the digest entries makes it easier to choose which cases to select for a full reading.

The American Digest is a comprehensive digest covering all cases reported in West publications. In

addition, West publishes smaller separate digests for the U.S. Supreme Court and the Federal courts, regional digests corresponding to the regional reporters, and several state digests.

Though West’s digest publications are the most comprehensive, Lawyer’s Cooperative also publishes a digest to the cases of the U.S. Supreme Court: Digest of United States Supreme Court Reports.[”

Lawyer’s Cooperative also publishes American Law Reports [131 and its companion set, American

Law Reports, Federal. ~1 These publications combine the functions of case reporter, digest and source

index of articles. The rationale for the ALR, as it is called, is that selective reporting of cases is more helpful than comprehensive reporting. The editors of ALR attempt to select from the thousands of cases each year those which address an important point or introduce a new interpretation of a point. They forego publication of the majority of cases, and attempt to pick out only the essential cases in any area of law. Because of its selectivity, ALR is less overwhelming, since it offers fewer cases to choose

from on any point. The ALR has its own indexes and tables of cases. In addition it prints annotations, or articles

summarizing developments in certain areas of law. These annotations range from a few paragraphs to treatments of monograph length, and can provide a good introduction for the student without previous acquaintance with an area.

Of increasing importance to private citizens, as well as to attorneys, is the class of information referred-to as administrative regulation. This ‘delegated legislation’ is important because of its immediate impact on citizens. Administrative regulations are ‘delegated’ in that Congress, in creating a government agency, often authorizes that agency to make and enforce regulations governing a specific set of actions: e.g. business transactions, food processing or credit applications. The regulations promulgated by the agency have the force of law. The Federal Register, ~1 where these regulations are printed, is a daily publication, analogous to the session laws (the Statutes at Large) in that it is a

chronological listing of new regulations. Proposed regulations are printed in the Register, offering the public a period of time to comment to the responsible agency. New regulations are printed in full in the Register as they are promulgated. The extent and consequently the importance of administrative regulation is indicated by the bulk of the Register: the 1977 issues ran to more than 60,oOtJ pages. With such bulk of material, topical access becomes essential. That access is provided through the Code of Federal Regulations,[281 a codified arrangement similar in its function to the U.S. Code. The CFR is divided into 50 titles, which are subdivided into chapters and sections. For examples, Title 10 is Energy and Title 14 is Aeronautics and Space. Each Title is republished at least once a year; in between it is updated by a supplement volume. The Titles of the CFR are indexed by subject and by personal and geographical names. Other research aids include tables which show the existence and location of regulations applying to any particular public law. Both the Register and the CFR are available in depository libraries.

Each state also has a network of administrative agencies authorized to issue and enforce regulations. Publication of state regulations is not uniform, however, and state regulations can be difficult to acquire. Some states issue an equivalent to the Federal Regkter, with a chronological listing of new

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regulations; for example, the Illinois Register. In only about 15 states are the regulations published in a codified form. In states where publication is not regular, it is necessary to contact each agency individually in order to ascertain the current status of regulations.

Potentially the most helpful legal materials for the researcher unacquainted with the language of the law are the secondary materials - the encyclopedias, law reviews, etc. Secondary materials contain writings about the law - expository and explanatory materials. For the researcher in history or political science they can be a valuable adjunct to the primary sources.

With some minor differences, legal secondary materials are very similar to research materials in other fields.

Law reviews contain the current writings on the trends and developments in the law. Though often couched in legal language, the articles and case notes provide background information on a particular topic, as well as citations to current cases and pertinent legislation. Law reviews and other legal periodicals are indexed in the Index to Legal Periodicalst3zl.

Legal encyclopedias are another source of background material for the researcher investigating a law- related subject. Initially the format looks unfamiliar: one third of an ordinary page in a legal

encyclopedia contains text of the article; the balance of the page is citations to cases and statutes. The two major legal encyclopedias are Corpus Jur& Secundum[3’l and American Jurisprudence, 2nd EditionIzgl. Each title has specific word indexes, with reference from commonly used words to the

topics of the articles. No article as brief as this can pretend to offer more than a superficial introduction to the sources and

strategies of legal research. Each tool has its own vagaries (the date at which it began to include reports from a court, its supplementation pattern, etc.) and there are many more sources available than have been mentioned here. For more detailed guides to legal research, several very good handbooks exist. An

excellent concise title is Legal Research in a Nutshell [W by Morris Cohen. More comprehensive and detailed is Fundamentals of Legal Research ~1 by Myron Jacobstein and Roy Mersky. The classic among older publications is Effective Legal Research [“I by Miles Price and Harry Bitner. Complete bibliographic information for these and other titles is given in Section III.

SECTION II - SPECIFIC EXAMPLES

Citation forms Understanding legal citation form is a basic skill for helping library patrons locate legal materials.

The citations listed below exemplify the patterns used in legal citations; further details can be found in Harvard’s A Uniform System of Citation LJal, the most widely used citation manual. Tables of the

abbreviations used in citations are printed in the Harvard citator, in Black’s Law Dictionary1301,

Jacobstein and Mersky’s Fundamentals of Legal Research r3’), and Price and Bitner’s Effective Legal

Research[381. The examples given are for Federal materials; state law citations follow the same general patterns.

Cases. Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U.S. 1, 96 S. Ct. 612, 46L. Ed. 2d 659 (1976). ‘Buckley v. Valeo’ is the case name, the names of the parties in the dispute; ‘424 U.S. 1’ is the essential part of the citation: 424 is the volume number, U.S. the abbreviation for United States Reports, and 1 the page number on which the report of this case begins. The parallel citations, ‘96 S. Ct. 612’ and ‘46 L. Ed. 2d 659’ are references to volume and page in other sets in which the same report may be found. The date, ‘(1976)‘) is the year of the court’s decision.

Bills. H.R. 8402, 95th Cong., 1st Sess. (1977). This is a citation to House bill number 8402, introduced in the House of Representatives in 1977, during the first session of the 95th Congress.

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Session laws. Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1%7, Pub. L. No. 90-X2,54,81 Stat. 603. ‘Age

Discrimination in Employment Act of 1%7’ is the title of the law. ‘Pub. L. No. 90-202’ is its public law

number, in this example the 202nd law passed by the 90th Congress; ‘$4’ is the section of the law being cited. ‘81 Stat. 603’ indicates the volume (81) and page (603) where 84 begins in United States Statutes ot Large.

Codified laws. Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, 54, 29 U.S.C. $623 (1976). This is a citation to a law as it appears in the United States Code, the subject arrangement of U.S. law. The title Df the act is given, and the specific section referred to ($4). ‘29 U.S.C. $623’ is the title (29) and section ($623) of the United States Code at which $4 of the original law is reprinted. The date, ‘(1976)‘, refers to the edition of the United States Code being cited.

Congressional reports. S. Rep. No. 959, 95th Cong., 2d Sess. 6 (1978). This citation is for p. 6 of the 959th report issued by the Senate during the 95th Congress. It was issued during the second session, in

1978.

Congressional hearings. International Activities of the Energy Research and Development Administration: Hearing Before a Subcommittee of the House Committee on Government Operations, 95th Cong., 1st Sess. 33 (1977). ‘International. . . Operations’ is the full title of this hearing, held in 1977, during the first session of the 95th Congress. The citation is to p. 33.

Federal Register. 43 Fed. Reg. 25, 337 (1978). This citation is the Vol. 43, p. 25, 337 of the Federal

Register, issued in 1978.

Code of Federal Regulations. 13 C.F.R. $120.2 (1978). A citation to Title 13, section 120.2 of the Code of Federal Regulations. The date here (1978) is important, since titles of the C.F.R. are revised and reissued once a year.

Sample legal questions The following examples are intended to outline the sources to use to answer particular types of legal

questions. This section refers only to source materials which have been mentioned in this article. Sources not used here will suggest themselves to librarians familiar with legal or legislative reference, but these are, I think, the most commonly used tools for these types of questions.

1. To find a law referred to only by name, e.g. Title VII, Civil Rights Act of 1964. The following list laws by name, and give citations to text in Statutes at Large or United States

Code (or one of its annotated versions). a. United States Codel’gl, Popular Names volume. b. United States Code Annotatedlzol, Popular Name Table. c. Shepard’s Acts and Cases by Popular Namela41.

2. To find federal law by subject, e.g. on the topic of development of solar energy. a. U.S.C. Indexr’@J. (Check the current edition and all applicable supplements.) b. U.S.C.A. Indexr201. c. U.S.C.S. Indexr”]. d. Congressional Record Index[2s1. Reference to bills. e. Congressional Znde.x[*“. Senate volume has topical index to pending bills. f. Statutes at Large 1181. Topical index in each volume. g. Digest of Public General Bilk and Resolutions We. Indexes and summarizes legislation.

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272 SUE VEST MCCALLUM

h. U.S. Code Congressional and Adminhtmtive News tz*l. Subject index in each volume and each supplement.

To find administrative regulations by topic or by promulgating agency, e.g. what government regulations apply to provision of services for handicapped persons? a. C.F.R. Indextz81. Under topic, gives a list of C.F.R. sections. Must always be updated by Federal

Register.

b. If a relevant U.S. C section is known, use the C.F.R. “Parallel Table of Statutory Authorities and

Rules.” c. Federal Register’“‘. No adequate subject index, but does have highlights, contents by

Department or Agency, list of C.F.R. parts affected.

To locate court cases by topic, e.g. Abortion. a.

b.

C.

d.

Descriptive Word Indexes of digests. American Digestt’6’ is most comprehensive; others treat specific jurisdictions. Abortion, as a term in the index, leads to several digest entries. Digest abstracts will, in turn, give citations to full reports of cases. Encyclopedias. General indexes of C.H.S. 13’1 and Am. Jur. 2nd Editiontzgl discussing aspects of the topic. Each article gives citations to cases.

Index to Legal Periodicals t3zl. Articles on the topic will yield citations to important cases.

For recent Supreme Court cases, U.S. Law Week”’ and U.S. Supreme Court Bulletintsl have topical indexes to pending and decided cases.

To locate a case known only by name, use case name tables in digests to get a volume citation to a reporter. a. If jurisdiction is known, use a specific digest, e.g. Marchus v. Druge (U.S. Supreme Court) -

Digest of U.S. Supreme Court Reportst”, or U.S. Supreme Court Digest’“‘. b. If the jurisdiction is not known, use the appropriate span of the American Digest[‘61. This set is

published in decade spans, with a case table for each IO-year period, supplemented by tables for years since the end of the last span. This search is much more efficient when the approximate date

of the case is known.

SECTION III - BIBLIOGRAPHY Legal Sources

Court reports, Digests, etc.

1. 2. 3.

United Stotes Reports. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1789 - . Supreme Court Reporter. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1882-. United Stotes Supreme Court Reports. Lawyers’ Edition, 1st and 2nd Series. Rochester: Lawyers Cooperative Publishing Co., 1790 - .

4. United States Low Week. Washington: Bureau of National Affairs, 1933 - . 5. United Stoles Supreme Court Bulletin. Chicago: Commerce Clearing House, 1936 - . 6. United Stotes Supreme Court Digest, 1754 to date. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1944-. 7. Dig& of United States Supreme Court Reports. Rochester: Lawyers Co-operative Publishing Co., 1948 - . 8. Federol Reporter. 1st and 2nd Series. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1880-. 9. Federol Supplement. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1932 - .

10. Fedeml Digest. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1940- 55. 11. Modern Federal Practice Digest. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1960 - 75. 12. West’s Federol Practice Digest.‘2nd Edition. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1976-. 13. American Low Reports. lst, 2nd, and 3rd Series. Rochester: Lawyers Co-operative Publishing Co., 1919-. 14. American Low Reports. ALR Federal. Rochester: Lawyers Co-operative Publishing Co., 1%9 - . 15. Notional Reporter System. (i.e. Atlantic Reporter, Poe@ Reporter, etc.) St. Paul: West Publishing Co. 16. American Digest. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1658/18%-.

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Legal research for non-law librarians

Statutory and administrative

213

17. Slip Laws. Washington: Government Printing Office. 18. United States Statutes at Large. Washington: Government Printing Office. 1845 - . 19. United States Code. Washington: Govermnent Printing Office. 1925 - . 20. United States Code Annotated. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1927 - . 21. United States Code Service. Rochester: Lawyers Co-operative Publishing Co., 1972 - . 22. United States Code Congressional and Administrative News. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1941- . 23. CIS Annual. Washington: Congressional lnformation Service, 1970-. 24 Congressional Index. Chicago: Commerce Clearing House, 1938 - . 25. Congressional Record. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1873 - . 26. Digest of Public General Bills and Resolutions. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1936 - . 21 Federal Register. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1936-. 28. Code of Fedeml Regulations. Washington: Office of the Federal Register, 1938 - .

Encyclopedias, etc. 29. American Jurisprudence. 2nd Edition. Rochester: Lawyers Co-operative Publishing Co., 1962 - . 30. Black, Henry C. Black’s Law Dictionary. Rev. 4th Edition. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1968. 31. Corpus Jurb Secundum. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1936 - . 32. Index to Legal Periodicals. New York: H.W. Wilson, 1908 - . 33. Monthly Catalog of United States Government Publications. Washington: Government Printing Office,

1895-. 34. Shepard’s Acts and Cases by Popular Name. Colorado Springs: Shepard’s Inc., 1968 - .

Legal research handbooks 35. Cohen, Morris L. How to Find the Law. 7th Edition. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1976. 36. Cohen, Morris L. Legal Research in a Nutshell. 3rd Edition. St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1978. 37. Jacobstein, J. Myron and Mersky, Roy M. Fundamentals of Legal Research. Mineola: Foundation Press,

1977. 38. Price, Miles 0. and Bitner, Harry. Effective Legal Research. Hackensack: Rothman Reprints, 1%9. 39. A Uniform System of Citation. 12th Edition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Law Review Association, 1976.

Articles on legal reference in non-law libraries 40.

41. 42. 43.

44. 45.

46.

Coleman, K. L. “Problems in Legal Reference in the Academic Library”, California Librarian, XXXVII (October 1976), 36-38. Donnelly, F.D. “Basic Law Collection”, American Libraries, IV (June 1973), 360 - 363. Dykstra. G. “Answering Questions on the Law: Opinions” , Emergency Librarian, IV (January 1977), 18 - 20. Dykstra, G. “How and Why: Legal Information Referrals”, Emergency Librarian, IV (January 1977), 14- 15. Ginger, A. F. “Rights of the People and the Role of Librarians”, Library Trends, XIX (July 1970), %- 105. Henke, D. F. “Law for Citizens; How to Meet Their Needs in Academic and Public Libraries”, Caltfornia Libmrian, XXXV (April 1974). 50 - 62. Jewett, L. J. “Libraries and Access to the Law”, Emergency Librarian, IV (January 1977). 11 - 13.