Legal Research Guide
ALRs
Category: Book Research--Secondary Sources
So, today, as promised, how to use the ALRs. As you will see the more of these sources I detail the more you will see patterns, like pocket parts. But for now, I want to continue to give you the full treatment as to how to use these books.
Legal Encyclopedias
Category: Book Research--Secondary Sources
So the next step in my explanation of secondary sources is how to actually use them in paper. My first advice for any book is that there is probably a page somewhere, usually up front, which tells you exactly how to use the book. This simplifies thing immensely. At times, if your book is obscure enough, when you bring it to a librarian to ask for help he or she will point, and cry "Look, the Winged Victory of Samothrace!" and while you are distracted read this page so they can use the book by the time you return your attention to them. This should always be the first place to look if you are unsure. But I will try to give you a guide anyway.
Secondary Sources
Category: Book Research--Secondary Sources
I have been horrible, and I apologize. On top of that, I lied as to what I would be writing about next. I have decided to write about secondary sources in books. Secondary sources are often the place that you want to start in your research, particularly if you don't know much about your area of law, because it will give you good grounding.
Headnotes
Category: Book Research--Case Law
Forgive my long hiatus. Turns out that graduating from law school actually takes some work. What do you know? I will be a little tied up for another two weeks while I get this out of the way, and then I hope to update more regularly. I would like to talk about case headnotes today, though, while I'm here.
Anatomy of a Case
Category: Book Research--Case Law
So today I thought we'd talk about what you are actually looking at when you look at a case. There are many different sections of a case, and to properly use it, both when you are researching and when you are actually in court, you should know what everything is saying, and who wrote it. Knowing the different parts will help you research, knowing who wrote what will help you use the case.
Digests
Category: Book Research--Case Law
So all cases are published in reporters, and reporters are organized chronologically. This is wildly unhelpful. It's easy if you have a specific case and a specific page number, but if you are looking for information about, say, dog bites this does nothing for you. And you usually are--rarely do you only need one particular case in research. You usually want to find something topically.
Reporters
Category: Book Research--Case Law
So today's topic is cases and the books that love them. The first and most important books are Reports. These are the books where cases are actually published. Cases are published in reporters chronologically as they are decided.
The Court System
Category: Book Research--Case Law
Greetings, dear reader. I will start off with a word about myself, and then jump right into it. My name is Cindy, and I am in my final semester of law school at the University of New Mexico, barring something going horribly, horribly wrong. I'm a student rep for and a huge fan of Westlaw, which is one of the things that made me so interested in legal research. I'm looking to go to library school next year, seal my future as a law librarian, I've been accepted to one of my schools and am waiting to hear beck from the other. My lifelong ambition is to be interviewed on The Colbert Report.