OBJECTIVE: To prepare an appellate brief based on primary and secondary legal information -- including relevant cases, statutes, and legal periodicals.
 

BACKGROUND RESEARCH

ENCYCLOPEDIAS: Excellent sources for overviews of American Law, as well as finding key cases on your topic.

West's Encyclopedia of American Law
Langson Reference KF 154 W47 1998

Encyclopedia of the American Constitution
Langson Reference KF4548 .E53 2000

American Jurisprudence, 2nd edition
Langson Bound Periodicals KF154 A 42

West's California Jurisprudence 3d: Based on California statutes and regulations, and case law, state and federal
Langson Reference KFC 80 C34
 

ONLINE RESEARCH

LEXIS-NEXIS ACADEMIC
Library Homepage -- Article Databases -- L -- Lexis-Nexis Academic

Full-text state and federal case law

Full-text state and federal codes

Hundreds of full-text law review and other legal periodicals

CASES
• Finding a case by party name (Tinker v. Des Moines)
• Shepard's Citations for Supreme Court cases
• Example: Scott v. Board of Education -- FOCUS: Union Free School
• Finding a case by citation
• Finding cases by topic (Education Law -- Example: dress code and (first amendment or free speech)

STATUTES
• Find references to statutes in the cases you read
• State codes -- California -- Guided Search (Example: Education Code in Heading and dress in full-text)

SECONDARY SOURCES
• Law reviews and legal news about a case or topic
• Searching only news from relevant journals (Example: Your School and the Law)

Search by keyword and use subject terms to refine search (Example: school dress code* as a keyword leads to Students - Clothing as a subject term, as well as more results.)

To find the full-text of these articles in the UCI Libraries, search ANTPAC by journal title.

Example:
The Journal of Law and Education, Jan 2000 v29 i1 p31-49
Dress codes in the public schools: principals, policies and precepts. Todd A. DeMitchell; Richard Fossey; Casey Cobb.

Ask at the Reference Desk for an up-to-date guide to our printed legal materials for the U.S. and California

CASES - DIGESTS
Consult digests, or subject indexes to case law. The following digests provide subject indexing to federal case law published in the Supreme Court Reporter, Federal Reporter, and Federal Supplement, from 1961-present. To search for case law on a particular topic, begin by consulting the Descriptive Word Index volumes at the end of the set. If you know the name of a case, each digest series also contains a "Table of Case Names." All are in the Langson Library - Bound Periodicals.

West's Federal Practice Digest 4th, 1989 -  KF 127 W48
West's Federal Practice Digest 3rd, 1975-1988 KF 127 M621
West's Federal Practice Digest 2nd, 1961-1975 KF 127 M625

United States Reports - KA 90 - official reporter containing text ofU.S. Supreme court decisions
Cited as ___U.S.____

West's Supreme Court Reporter - KA 90 A1 - Unofficial reporter
Cited as ___S.Ct.___

Federal Reporter - KF 105 F4 - unofficial reporter containing text of U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeals decisions
Cited as ___F.___ or ___F2d.___ (for later years, 1925+

Federal Supplement - KF 120 F4 - unofficial reporter containing text of selected U.S. District Court decisions
Cited as ___F.Supp.___

Subject arrangement of federal laws currently in effect, with annotations containing citations to applicable court decisions and law review articles.
 

THE EXTRA MILE -- ADDITIONAL RESEARCH RESOURCES

SHEPARD'S CITATIONS SERVICE
Library Homepage -- Online Research -- Selected Resources A-Z -- S -- Shepard's Citations Service

U.S. law is based on the concept of precedent. Citators trace the history (what happened to the case on appeal) and subsequent treatment of cases and statutes.

In Lexis-Nexis Academic, students have access to Shepard's for Supreme Court cases only. Shepard’s Citations Service includes information about U.S. federal statutes and cases, statutes and cases for all 50 states plus Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia, the Code of Federal Regulations, federal rules, patents, and law reviews.

To Shepardize a case, code, law review article, regulation, etc.:

• Enter the citation of the document you want to study (e.g. 393 U.S. 503)
• If you are unsure of the citation format for the document, click on Citation Formats and find the publication in the alphabetical list. This will bring up a form to fill in the volume and page number in the proper format (e.g. ___U.C. Davis L. Rev. ----___)

SUPREME COURT RECORDS AND BRIEFS
The Orange County Public Law Library has U.S. Supreme Court Records and Briefs on microfom from 1952 – present.
See: http://www.oc.ca.gov/lawlib/Index.htm for location and hours of service.
 

LIBRARY ASSISTANCE AND CONSULTATION

• Call (949) 824-4976 or visit the Reference Desk in person at the Langson Library. During certain weeks of the quarter, you can sign-up for a 30 minute research consultation appointment
• Use Ask a Librarian EMAIL or LIVE
• Follow up with Judy Ruttenberg directly -- jruttenb@uci.edu