Transcript Federal Legal Print Materials Legal Writing Prof. Glassman - - Spring 2010

Federal Legal Print Materials
Legal Writing
Prof. Glassman - - Spring 2010
US Supreme Court Print
• United States Reports – Official
– Citation format :410 US 113
• Supreme Court Reporter (West’s)
– Citation format: 93 S. Ct. 705
• United States Supreme Court Reports
(Lawyer’s Edition)
– Citation format 35 L.Ed.2d 147
Federal Reporter and Federal
Supplement
• 13 U.S. circuit courts of appeal
• The decisions of the circuit
courts are published in the
Federal Reporter® Citation
format: 37 F.3d 300
• Federal district (trial) level
courts selectively published in
Federal Supplement, 1932Citation format: 75 F Supp2d
881
Other Federal Cases
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Federal Appendix
Federal Rules Decisions
Federal Cases
Bankruptcy Reporter and Digests
Print Finding Tools for Federal
Cases
• US Supreme Court Digest
• Federal Practice Digest (for all federal cases)
• Digest of US Supreme Court Reports, Lawyer’s
Ed
• Shepard’s US Citations
• U.S. Law Week
• References in treatises, encyclopedias, annotations
in codes
Federal Court Rules - Print
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Title 28 USCA
Rules volumes USCS
Federal Local Court Rules
Soft cover annual compilations
Federal Practice treatises
Statutes and Annotated Codes
• Enacted law first published officially as slip law, assigned
Public Law Number
• Public laws compiled in chronological order in The
Statutes at Large
• The public law then changes the statutory code to:
• bring all laws on the same topic together
• eliminate all repealed or expired statutes
• unite amendments with the original statute
• This process is called codification
• the United States Code is divided into 50 titles, often
called codes
• Title 17 is the Copyright law
• Title 26 is the Tax Code
United States Code (USC)
• Issued every six years with annual update :
drawback lag time (but see Internet sites)
• Arranged into 50 titles
• References the Statutes at Large citation,
historical notes
• Includes index, table of acts cited by
popular name, conversion tables
• NO references to interpreting case law,
regulations
Annotated Codes: USCA (West),
USCS (Lexis)
Cross-references
(to other USCA sections)
Library references (to
many secondary sources)
References to topic
and key numbers
Law review and journal
commentaries
Texts and treatises
History and Notes of Decisions
• Note citation to Statues at
Large, and historical notes
• Notes of decisions,
summaries of cases
interpreting the statute.
• For some statutes,
decisions notes may be
hundreds of pages long.
Print Research Aids
• An alphabetical General Index aids
you in finding relevant statute
sections.
• Popular Name Table to help you
determine where a statute is
codified
United States Code Annotated Updates
• Cumulative pocket parts
• Interim pamphlets and statutory supplements
that include the public law changes to the
code and recent notes of decisions from
cases that have construed the statute since
the last supplement was published
Most Current Print Public Law (Statutes at
Large and Legislative Histories)
• U. S. Code Congressional and Administrative
News ( USCCAN) issues monthly pamphlets.
• After each session, the monthly USCCAN
pamphlets are reissued in a bound volume.
Federal Register
Administrative Sources – Regulations Federal Register
• Published every week day, except federal holidays
• All daily issues from a year constitute a single volume with
consecutive pagination throughout the year
• A single issue contains about 300 pages
• Annual volumes of the Federal Register can exceed
60,000 pages
• Contents are required to be judicially noticed by 44 USCA
1507
Federal Register
In Each Issue of the Federal Register
• Table of Contents
• CFR Parts Affected section
• Presidential Proclamations, Executive Orders,
Reorganization Plans, and Administrative Orders
• Agency Final Rules, Proposed Rules and Notices
• Sunshine Act Meeting notices
• Unified Agenda of Federal Regulations
• Reader Aids
Federal Register
Federal Register Table of Contents
Federal Aviation Administration
Flightcrew compartment
• arranged by agency name.
• lists regulations (rules), proposed regulations (rules), and
notices.
Federal Register
CFR Parts Affected in This Issue
• Lists document in numerical order by CFR title and part
• Appears at the front of each print issue after the Table of
Contents
• Indicates whether documents
affecting CFR parts are
regulations or proposed
p.2112
regulations
• Cites the page numbers
where relevant documents
begin
CFR
Code of Federal Regulations
• Regulations published chronologically in the Federal
Register are codified and arranged by title, then by chapter
(one agency’s regulations) and finally by subject in the
CFR
• CFR is divided into 50 titles, just like the USCA
– Some titles covering the same subjects are numbered
the same in the CFR and in the USCA; others are not
• Each title is divided into chapters, subchapters, parts, and
sections
• A regulation is cited by title, part, and section, i.e.,
37 CFR 2.167 (Title 37, Part 2 Section 167)
CFR
• Soft-cover volumes of the CFR are issued each year in sets
on a staggered, quarterly basis:
– Titles 1– 6 are current through January 1
– Titles 17 – 27 are current through April 1
– Titles 29 – 41 are current through July 1
– Titles 42 – 50 are current through October 1
• Each new set contains the text of all regulations in force as
of the current through date.
• Color of each set of volumes is changed every year; a
current full set may contain different colored volumes,
depending on the time of the year
• Title 3, which contains Presidential Proclamations and
Executive Orders, is always white
CFR
Research Tools in Each Volume of the
CFR
• Table of Contents listing all material within the book:
titles, subtitles, chapters, subchapter(s), parts, and sections
• Material Approved for Incorporation by Reference ,which
is regulatory material not published in the Federal Register
or CFR
• Table of CFR Titles and Chapters
• Redesignation Tables to help trace new location of parts
and sections of a regulation
• List of CFR Sections Affected in the volume
CFR Tables of Contents
Title 14
Parts 60-139
Title 14
Subchapter D
Part 121
121.313
Table of Contents
• Agencies are broken down by chapter (part) and then by
subchapter.
• Immediately preceding each part is a Table of Contents for
the individual regulations contained within that part.
CFR
Title 14
Parts 60-139
List of CFR Sections Affected
List of CFR Sections Affected in each volume indicates
the type of change that was made.
CFR
Updating Regulations in Print
• LSA: List of CFR Sections Affected
– Issued monthly
– Indicates final and proposed
changes made since the last
publication of the CFR set
CFR
Updating Regulations in Print
• CFR Parts Affected
– In each volume of the Code of
Federal Regulations
– Incorporated in the cumulative
list in the Reader Aids section
• CFR Parts Affected in this Issue
– In each daily issue of the Federal
Register
Agency Decisions, Orders
Opinions
• Publication patterns vary – check for
official reporter
• Commercial looseleaf services
• Agency websites – e.g.: National Labor
Relations Board Decisions and Orders ;
- US Environmental Protection Agency
Environmental Appeals Board Decisions
Federal Secondary Sources
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Finding tools
Commentary and analysis
Persuasive authority
Forms and practice aids
Legal Encyclopedias
• Provides a broad overview of a topic
• Identifies specialized vocabulary
• Provides citations to primary
materials and ALR annotations
• Cross-references other
secondary material
American Jurisprudence 2d (Am Jur 2d)
• The print version of Am Jur 2d consists of
– 120 volumes
– more than 430 titles
• Each volume contains a
– Table of Contents
– Table of Parallel References
– Table of Statutes and Rules Cited
– Index for articles in the volume
• Topics are preceded by a detailed scope note, general
cross-references, and an outline of the topic
Corpus Juris Secundum
(C.J.S.)
• C.J.S. contains 400 broad topics, each divided into
subtopics, which are sub-divided into sections
• There are 150 volumes.1
1 The last volume is numbered 101 because more than one volume may
have the same number
AMERICAN LAW REPORTS; ALR FED
• ALR editors select and report cases/topics that represent
specific legal issues that are unsettled or changing
and that are of interest to to many lawyers.
• A legal scholar writes an “annotation,” often
called an ALR article, often using a case as the
basis of the annotation.
• The annotation explores the law of the
jurisdictions that have dealt with this issue.
• The author uses this law to provide an
objective analysis of this area of the law.
• In print, American Law Reports consists of eight series
– Federal Series (ALR Fed. ALR Fed 2d), 1969 to
date, analyzes only federal issues
-- Sixth Series (ALR6th), Fifth Series (ALR5th), Fourth
Series (ALR4th), 1980 – to date, analyze only state
issues
– Third Series (ALR3d), Second Series (ALR2d), First
Series (ALR) 1919 - 1980 analyze both state and
federal issues
Finding Aids
ALR Indexes
• Multivolume ALR Index
– lists articles by subject matter
– includes all ALR volumes, except
those in the First Series
– is updated with annual pocket parts
• ALR Federal Quick Index
• ALR Quick Index for ALR 3d, 4th, and 5th series
Finding Aids
ALR Digest
• ALR Digest is divided into more than 400 topics arranged
alphabetically.
• Under each topic are headnotes from cases reported in the
entire ALR family along with a list of the annotations that
deal with the particular subject in question.
• ALR and ALR2d have digest sets
• ALR3d, ALR4th, ALR5th, ALR6th and ALR Fed are
combined in one digest set.
Superseding and Supplementing
Annotations
• The analysis of the law as presented in an early
annotation may be changed by later cases.
• Annotations in the first and second series were
often supplemented by a later annotation and the
original and the supplementing annotations had to
be read together.
• Annotation History Table in the last volume of the
ALR Index gives the history of Annotations in all
the ALR series.
Superseding and Supplementing
Annotations
• The analysis of the law as presented in an early
annotation may be changed by later cases.
• Annotations in the first and second series were
often supplemented by a later annotation and the
original and the supplementing annotations had to
be read together.
• Annotation History Table in the last volume of the
ALR Index gives the history of Annotations in all
the ALR series.
Treatises
• Treatises are
– written by legal scholars
– good resources for discussions of cases and statutes
relating to a particular area of the law
– can be critical, analytical, explanatory, or practical in
nature
• Wright and Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure; KF
8840.W68) Nimmer on Copyright: a treatise on the law of
literary, musical and artistic property, and the protection of
ideas. Bender, 1963- KF2991.5 .N5 1978
Research Guides
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Federal Legal Materials
Legislative History Research Guide
Civil Procedure Resource Guide
Congressional Information Service
Legislative Resources
• Evidence Law Resource Guide