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How to do legal research in 3 steps

Knowing where to start a difficult legal research project can be a challenge. But if you already understand the basics of legal research, the process can be significantly easier — not to mention quicker.

Solid research skills are crucial to crafting a winning argument. So, whether you are a law school student or a seasoned attorney with years of experience, knowing how to perform legal research is important — including where to start and the steps to follow.

What is legal research, and where do I start? 

Black's Law Dictionary defines legal research as “[t]he finding and assembling of authorities that bear on a question of law." But what does that actually mean? It means that legal research is the process you use to identify and find the laws — including statutes, regulations, and court opinions — that apply to the facts of your case.

In most instances, the purpose of legal research is to find support for a specific legal issue or decision. For example, attorneys must conduct legal research if they need court opinions — that is, case law — to back up a legal argument they are making in a motion or brief filed with the court.

Alternatively, lawyers may need legal research to provide clients with accurate legal guidance . In the case of law students, they often use legal research to complete memos and briefs for class. But these are just a few situations in which legal research is necessary.

Why is legal research hard?

Each step — from defining research questions to synthesizing findings — demands critical thinking and rigorous analysis.

1. Identifying the legal issue is not so straightforward. Legal research involves interpreting many legal precedents and theories to justify your questions. Finding the right issue takes time and patience.

2. There's too much to research. Attorneys now face a great deal of case law and statutory material. The sheer volume forces the researcher to be efficient by following a methodology based on a solid foundation of legal knowledge and principles.

3. The law is a fluid doctrine. It changes with time, and staying updated with the latest legal codes, precedents, and statutes means the most resourceful lawyer needs to assess the relevance and importance of new decisions.

Legal research can pose quite a challenge, but professionals can improve it at every stage of the process . 

Step 1: Key questions to ask yourself when starting legal research

Before you begin looking for laws and court opinions, you first need to define the scope of your legal research project. There are several key questions you can use to help do this.

What are the facts?

Always gather the essential facts so you know the “who, what, why, when, where, and how” of your case. Take the time to write everything down, especially since you will likely need to include a statement of facts in an eventual filing or brief anyway. Even if you don't think a fact may be relevant now, write it down because it may be relevant later. These facts will also be helpful when identifying your legal issue.

What is the actual legal issue?

You will never know what to research if you don't know what your legal issue is. Does your client need help collecting money from an insurance company following a car accident involving a negligent driver? How about a criminal case involving excluding evidence found during an alleged illegal stop?

No matter the legal research project, you must identify the relevant legal problem and the outcome or relief sought. This information will guide your research so you can stay focused and on topic.

What is the relevant jurisdiction?

Don't cast your net too wide regarding legal research; you should focus on the relevant jurisdiction. For example, does your case deal with federal or state law? If it is state law, which state? You may find a case in California state court that is precisely on point, but it won't be beneficial if your legal project involves New York law.

Where to start legal research: The library, online, or even AI?

In years past, future attorneys were trained in law school to perform research in the library. But now, you can find almost everything from the library — and more — online. While you can certainly still use the library if you want, you will probably be costing yourself valuable time if you do.

When it comes to online research, some people start with free legal research options , including search engines like Google or Bing. But to ensure your legal research is comprehensive, you will want to use an online research service designed specifically for the law, such as Westlaw . Not only do online solutions like Westlaw have all the legal sources you need, but they also include artificial intelligence research features that help make quick work of your research

Step 2: How to find relevant case law and other primary sources of law

Now that you have gathered the facts and know your legal issue, the next step is knowing what to look for. After all, you will need the law to support your legal argument, whether providing guidance to a client or writing an internal memo, brief, or some other legal document.

But what type of law do you need? The answer: primary sources of law. Some of the more important types of primary law include:

• Case law, which are court opinions or decisions issued by federal or state courts
• Statutes, including legislation passed by both the U.S. Congress and state lawmakers
• Regulations, including those issued by either federal or state agencies
• Constitutions, both federal and state

Searching for primary sources of law

So, if it's primary law you want, it makes sense to begin searching there first, right? Not so fast. While you will need primary sources of law to support your case, in many instances, it is much easier — and a more efficient use of your time — to begin your search with secondary sources such as practice guides, treatises, and legal articles.

Why? Because secondary sources provide a thorough overview of legal topics, meaning you don't have to start your research from scratch. After secondary sources, you can move on to primary sources of law.

For example, while no two legal research projects are the same, the order in which you will want to search different types of sources may look something like this:

• Secondary sources . If you are researching a new legal principle or an unfamiliar area of the law, the best place to start is secondary sources, including law journals, practice guides , legal encyclopedias, and treatises. They are a good jumping-off point for legal research since they've already done the work for you. As an added bonus, they can save you additional time since they often identify and cite important statutes and seminal cases.
• Case law . If you have already found some case law in secondary sources, great, you have something to work with. But if not, don't fret. You can still search for relevant case law in a variety of ways, including running a search in a case law research tool.

Once you find a helpful case, you can use it to find others. For example, in Westlaw, most cases contain headnotes that summarize each of the case's important legal issues. These headnotes are also assigned a Key Number based on the topic associated with that legal issue. So, once you find a good case, you can use the headnotes and Key Numbers within it to quickly find more relevant case law.

• Statutes and regulations . In many instances, secondary sources and case law list the statutes and regulations relevant to your legal issue. But if you haven't found anything yet, you can still search for statutes and regs online like you do with cases.

Once you know which statute or reg is pertinent to your case, pull up the annotated version on Westlaw. Why the annotated version? Because the annotations will include vital information, such as a list of important cases that cite your statute or reg. Sometimes, these cases are even organized by topic — just one more way to find the case law you need to support your legal argument.

Keep in mind, though, that legal research isn't always a linear process. You may start out going from source to source as outlined above and then find yourself needing to go back to secondary sources once you have a better grasp of the legal issue. In other instances, you may even find the answer you are looking for in a source not listed above, like a sample brief filed with the court by another attorney. Ultimately, you need to go where the information takes you.

Step 3: Make sure you are using ‘good’ law

One of the most important steps with every legal research project is to verify that you are using “good" law — meaning a court hasn't invalidated it or struck it down in some way. After all, it probably won't look good to a judge if you cite a case that has been overruled or use a statute deemed unconstitutional. It doesn't necessarily mean you can never cite these sources; you just need to take a closer look before you do.

The simplest way to find out if something is still good law is to use a legal tool known as a citator, which will show you subsequent cases that have cited your source as well as any negative history, including if it has been overruled, reversed, questioned, or merely differentiated.

For instance, if a case, statute, or regulation has any negative history — and therefore may no longer be good law — KeyCite, the citator on Westlaw, will warn you. Specifically, KeyCite will show a flag or icon at the top of the document, along with a little blurb about the negative history. This alert system allows you to quickly know if there may be anything you need to worry about.

Some examples of these flags and icons include:

• A red flag on a case warns you it is no longer good for at least one point of law, meaning it may have been overruled or reversed on appeal.
• A yellow flag on a case warns that it has some negative history but is not expressly overruled or reversed, meaning another court may have criticized it or pointed out the holding was limited to a specific fact pattern.
• A blue-striped flag on a case warns you that it has been appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court or the U.S. Court of Appeals.
• The KeyCite Overruling Risk icon on a case warns you that the case may be implicitly undermined because it relies on another case that has been overruled.

Another bonus of using a citator like KeyCite is that it also provides a list of other cases that merely cite your source — it can lead to additional sources you previously didn't know about.

Perseverance is vital when it comes to legal research

Given that legal research is a complex process, it will likely come as no surprise that this guide cannot provide everything you need to know.

There is a reason why there are entire law school courses and countless books focused solely on legal research methodology. In fact, many attorneys will spend their entire careers honing their research skills — and even then, they may not have perfected the process.

So, if you are just beginning, don't get discouraged if you find legal research difficult — almost everyone does at first. With enough time, patience, and dedication, you can master the art of legal research.

Thomson Reuters originally published this article on November 10, 2020.

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Legal Research Strategy

Preliminary analysis, organization, secondary sources, primary sources, updating research, identifying an end point, getting help, about this guide.

This guide will walk a beginning researcher though the legal research process step-by-step. These materials are created with the 1L Legal Research & Writing course in mind. However, these resources will also assist upper-level students engaged in any legal research project.

How to Strategize

Legal research must be comprehensive and precise.  One contrary source that you miss may invalidate other sources you plan to rely on.  Sticking to a strategy will save you time, ensure completeness, and improve your work product. 

Follow These Steps

Running Time: 3 minutes, 13 seconds.

Make sure that you don't miss any steps by using our:

• Legal Research Strategy Checklist

If you get stuck at any time during the process, check this out:

• Ten Tips for Moving Beyond the Brick Wall in the Legal Research Process, by Marsha L. Baum

Understanding the Legal Questions

A legal question often originates as a problem or story about a series of events. In law school, these stories are called fact patterns. In practice, facts may arise from a manager or an interview with a potential client. Start by doing the following:

• Read anything you have been given
• Analyze the facts and frame the legal issues
• Assess what you know and need to learn
• Note the jurisdiction and any primary law you have been given
• Generate potential search terms

Jurisdiction

Legal rules will vary depending on where geographically your legal question will be answered. You must determine the jurisdiction in which your claim will be heard. These resources can help you learn more about jurisdiction and how it is determined:

• Legal Treatises on Jurisdiction
• LII Wex Entry on Jurisdiction

This map indicates which states are in each federal appellate circuit:

Getting Started

Once you have begun your research, you will need to keep track of your work. Logging your research will help you to avoid missing sources and explain your research strategy. You will likely be asked to explain your research process when in practice. Researchers can keep paper logs, folders on Westlaw or Lexis, or online citation management platforms.

Organizational Methods

Tracking with paper or excel.

Many researchers create their own tracking charts.  Be sure to include:

• Search Date
• Topics/Keywords/Search Strategy
• Citation to Relevant Source Found
• Save Locations
• Follow Up Needed

Consider using the following research log as a starting place: 

• Sample Research Log

Tracking with Folders

Westlaw and Lexis offer options to create folders, then save and organize your materials there.

• Lexis Advance Folders
• Westlaw Edge Folders

Tracking with Citation Management Software

For long term projects, platforms such as Zotero, EndNote, Mendeley, or Refworks might be useful. These are good tools to keep your research well organized. Note, however, that none of these platforms substitute for doing your own proper Bluebook citations. Learn more about citation management software on our other research guides:

• Guide to Zotero for Harvard Law Students by Harvard Law School Library Research Services Last Updated Aug 9, 2024 408 views this year
• Zotero by Daniel Becker Last Updated Aug 30, 2024 27681 views this year

Types of Sources

There are three different types of sources: Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary.  When doing legal research you will be using mostly primary and secondary sources.  We will explore these different types of sources in the sections below.

Secondary sources often explain legal principles more thoroughly than a single case or statute. Starting with them can help you save time.

Secondary sources are particularly useful for:

• Learning the basics of a particular area of law
• Understanding key terms of art in an area
• Identifying essential cases and statutes

Consider the following when deciding which type of secondary source is right for you:

• Scope/Breadth
• Depth of Treatment
• Currentness/Reliability

For a deep dive into secondary sources visit:

• Secondary Sources: ALRs, Encyclopedias, Law Reviews, Restatements, & Treatises by Catherine Biondo Last Updated Apr 12, 2024 6646 views this year

Legal Dictionaries & Encyclopedias

Legal dictionaries.

Legal dictionaries are similar to other dictionaries that you have likely used before.

• Black's Law Dictionary
• Ballentine's Law Dictionary

Legal Encyclopedias

Legal encyclopedias contain brief, broad summaries of legal topics, providing introductions and explaining terms of art. They also provide citations to primary law and relevant major law review articles.  

Here are the two major national encyclopedias:

• American Jurisprudence (AmJur) (Westlaw)
• American Jurisprudence (Lexis)
• Corpus Juris Secundum (CJS)

Treatises are books on legal topics.  These books are a good place to begin your research.  They provide explanation, analysis, and citations to the most relevant primary sources. Treatises range from single subject overviews to deep treatments of broad subject areas.

It is important to check the date when the treatise was published. Many are either not updated, or are updated through the release of newer editions.

To find a relevant treatise explore:

• Legal Treatises by Subject by Catherine Biondo Last Updated Apr 12, 2024 6232 views this year

American Law Reports (ALR)

American Law Reports (ALR) contains in-depth articles on narrow topics of the law. ALR articles, are often called annotations. They provide background, analysis, and citations to relevant cases, statutes, articles, and other annotations. ALR annotations are invaluable tools to quickly find primary law on narrow legal questions.

This resource is available in both Westlaw and Lexis:

• American Law Reports on Westlaw (includes index)
• American Law Reports on Lexis

Law Reviews & Journals

Law reviews are scholarly publications, usually edited by law students in conjunction with faculty members. They contain both lengthy articles and shorter essays by professors and lawyers. They also contain comments, notes, or developments in the law written by law students. Articles often focus on new or emerging areas of law and may offer critical commentary. Some law reviews are dedicated to a particular topic while others are general. Occasionally, law reviews will include issues devoted to proceedings of panels and symposia.

Law review and journal articles are extremely narrow and deep with extensive references. 

To find law review articles visit:

• Law Journal Library on HeinOnline
• Law Reviews & Journals on LexisNexis
• Law Reviews & Journals on Westlaw

Restatements

Restatements are highly regarded distillations of common law, prepared by the American Law Institute (ALI). ALI is a prestigious organization comprised of judges, professors, and lawyers. They distill the "black letter law" from cases to indicate trends in common law. Resulting in a “restatement” of existing common law into a series of principles or rules. Occasionally, they make recommendations on what a rule of law should be.

Restatements are not primary law. However, they are considered persuasive authority by many courts.

Restatements are organized into chapters, titles, and sections.  Sections contain the following:

• a concisely stated rule of law,
• comments to clarify the rule,
• hypothetical examples,
• explanation of purpose, and
• exceptions to the rule  

To access restatements visit:

• American Law Institute Library on HeinOnline
• Restatements & Principles of the Law on LexisNexis
• Restatements & Principles of Law on Westlaw

Primary Authority

Primary authority is "authority that issues directly from a law-making body."   Authority , Black's Law Dictionary (11th ed. 2019).   Sources of primary authority include:

• Constitutions
• Statutes 

Regulations

Access to primary legal sources is available through:

• Bloomberg Law
• Free & Low Cost Alternatives

Statutes (also called legislation) are "laws enacted by legislative bodies", such as Congress and state legislatures.  Statute , Black's Law Dictionary (11th ed. 2019).

We typically start primary law research here. If there is a controlling statute, cases you look for later will interpret that law. There are two types of statutes, annotated and unannotated.

Annotated codes are a great place to start your research. They combine statutory language with citations to cases, regulations, secondary sources, and other relevant statutes. This can quickly connect you to the most relevant cases related to a particular law. Unannotated Codes provide only the text of the statute without editorial additions. Unannotated codes, however, are more often considered official and used for citation purposes.

For a deep dive on federal and state statutes, visit:

• Statutes: US and State Codes by Mindy Kent Last Updated Apr 12, 2024 4982 views this year
• 50 State Surveys

Want to learn more about the history or legislative intent of a law?  Learn how to get started here:

• Legislative History Get an introduction to legislative histories in less than 5 minutes.
• Federal Legislative History Research Guide

Regulations are rules made by executive departments and agencies. Not every legal question will require you to search regulations. However, many areas of law are affected by regulations. So make sure not to skip this step if they are relevant to your question.

To learn more about working with regulations, visit:

• Administrative Law Research by AJ Blechner Last Updated Apr 12, 2024 835 views this year

Case Basics

In many areas, finding relevant caselaw will comprise a significant part of your research. This Is particularly true in legal areas that rely heavily on common law principles.

Running Time: 3 minutes, 10 seconds.

Unpublished Cases

Up to  86% of federal case opinions are unpublished. You must determine whether your jurisdiction will consider these unpublished cases as persuasive authority. The Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure have an overarching rule, Rule 32.1  Each circuit also has local rules regarding citations to unpublished opinions. You must understand both the Federal Rule and the rule in your jurisdiction.

• Federal and Local Rules of Appellate Procedure 32.1 (Dec. 2021).
• Type of Opinion or Order Filed in Cases Terminated on the Merits, by Circuit (Sept. 2021).

Each state also has its own local rules which can often be accessed through:

• State Bar Associations
• State Courts Websites

First Circuit

• First Circuit Court Rule 32.1.0

Second Circuit

• Second Circuit Court Rule 32.1.1

Third Circuit

• Third Circuit Court Rule 5.7

Fourth Circuit

• Fourth Circuit Court Rule 32.1

Fifth Circuit

• Fifth Circuit Court Rule 47.5

Sixth Circuit

• Sixth Circuit Court Rule 32.1

Seventh Circuit

• Seventh Circuit Court Rule 32.1

Eighth Circuit

• Eighth Circuit Court Rule 32.1A

Ninth Circuit

• Ninth Circuit Court Rule 36-3

Tenth Circuit

• Tenth Circuit Court Rule 32.1

Eleventh Circuit

• Eleventh Circuit Court Rule 32.1

D.C. Circuit

• D.C. Circuit Court Rule 32.1

Federal Circuit

• Federal Circuit Court Rule 32.1

Finding Cases

Headnotes show the key legal points in a case. Legal databases use these headnotes to guide researchers to other cases on the same topic. They also use them to organize concepts explored in cases by subject. Publishers, like Westlaw and Lexis, create headnotes, so they are not consistent across databases.

Headnotes are organized by subject into an outline that allows you to search by subject. This outline is known as a "digest of cases." By browsing or searching the digest you can retrieve all headnotes covering a particular topic. This can help you identify particularly important cases on the relevant subject.

Running Time: 4 minutes, 43 seconds.

Each major legal database has its own digest:

• Topic Navigator (Lexis)
• Key Digest System (Westlaw)

Start by identifying a relevant topic in a digest.  Then you can limit those results to your jurisdiction for more relevant results.  Sometimes, you can keyword search within only the results on your topic in your jurisdiction.  This is a particularly powerful research method.

One Good Case Method

After following the steps above, you will have identified some relevant cases on your topic. You can use good cases you find to locate other cases addressing the same topic. These other cases often apply similar rules to a range of diverse fact patterns.

• in Lexis click "More Like This Headnote"
• in Westlaw click "Cases that Cite This Headnote"

to focus on the terms of art or key words in a particular headnote. You can use this feature to find more cases with similar language and concepts.  ​

Ways to Use Citators

A citator is "a catalogued list of cases, statutes, and other legal sources showing the subsequent history and current precedential value of those sources.  Citators allow researchers to verify the authority of a precedent and to find additional sources relating to a given subject." Citator , Black's Law Dictionary (11th ed. 2019).

Each major legal database has its own citator.  The two most popular are Keycite on Westlaw and Shepard's on Lexis.

• Keycite Information Page
• Shepard's Information Page

Making Sure Your Case is Still Good Law

This video answers common questions about citators:

For step-by-step instructions on how to use Keycite and Shepard's see the following:

Additional Shepard's Resources

• Shepard's Video Tutorial
• Shepard's Handout
• Shepard's Editorial Phrase Dictionary
• Shepard's Signal Indicators & Analysis Phrases
• Shepard's Citation Services User Guide
• Lexis+ Support and Training Additional online videos and handouts for Lexis+.

Additional KeyCite Resources

• How to Ensure I'm Citing Good Law (Westlaw Video)
• KeyCite Handout
• KeyCite Editorial Phrase Dictionary
• Understanding Next Generation KeyCite
• How to Check the Status of a Case with KeyCite
• Westlaw Precision Support Additional videos and handouts to support your Westlaw research.

Using Citators For

Citators serve three purposes: (1) case validation, (2) better understanding, and (3) additional research.

Case Validation

Is my case or statute good law?

• Parallel citations
• Prior and subsequent history
• Negative treatment suggesting you should no longer cite to holding.

Better Understanding

Has the law in this area changed?

• Later cases on the same point of law
• Positive treatment, explaining or expanding the law.
• Negative Treatment, narrowing or distinguishing the law.

Track Research

Who is citing and writing about my case or statute?

• Secondary sources that discuss your case or statute.
• Cases in other jurisdictions that discuss your case or statute.

Knowing When to Start Writing

For more guidance on when to stop your research see:

• Terminating Research, by Christina L. Kunz

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A Step-by-Step Guide on How to Do Legal Research

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When it comes to the practice of law, we often think about court appearances. But crafting a winning legal argument requires a lot of research.

Well-conducted legal research empowers your arguments and gives substance to your legal work, leading to a better outcome for your clients.

To become a pro, you need to understand the tools available to you, and developing a research strategy. Learning to conduct effective legal research isn’t glamorous. That said, it will save you time while helping you conduct stronger outcomes.

This guide reviews the fundamentals of the legal research process, including what sources you should turn to—and when. We’ll also discuss how and why you should check that you’re using “good” law, and offer tips for how you can improve your legal research skills—at any stage in your career.

Click here to watch our on-demand webinar with our lawyer in residence, Joshua Lenon, to learn how to take your legal research to the next level. 

What is legal research?

Legal research involves identifying, finding, and cite-checking information and applicable laws needed to support your legal decision-making. The primary and secondary legal sources for this research include statutes, constitutions, regulations, court orders, and more.

How to do legal research

While the techniques and tools you use may vary, the goal of legal research is simple: You want to find the relevant information and resources (i.e. laws) that apply to the facts of your case, so you can support legal decision making.

With this in mind, the legal research process can be broken down into three basic elements:

• Understanding the key details and questions of your legal issue
• Finding laws and information to support your legal argument checking that what you’ve found is still relevant
• Achieve your research goals in seven easy to follow steps:

Gather critical information about your legal issue

When presented with a legal issue, it’s natural to want to dive in and start looking for cases. But it’s in your best interest to first collect key details about the legal issue at hand.

Pausing to gather and record critical details (like the who, what, when, where, and how of your case) lays the foundation for a more focused, streamlined legal research process.

Establish your legal issue and your goal

Next, use your case’s critical information to pinpoint your legal issue. By establishing legal issues and your client’s ideal outcomes before you start researching, you can construct a well-defined framework that allows you to:

• See what you know about your legal issue—and what you need to find out
• Narrow the field of potential search terms
• Identify the jurisdiction you need to focus your research within

Learn and understand the precedent in your jurisdiction

While researching, pay special attention to the geographical location where your legal issue will be resolved. Is the precedent controlling already in your jurisdiction? Or is it merely a persuasive precedent that has not yet been adopted in your jurisdiction?

Determine the type of legal sources you need

Each of the three types of legal sources you’ll work with has a purpose in the legal research process. Here’s a quick overview:

Primary legal sources are key to legal research because they establish the current law on whatever legal issue you’re working with. You can find primary sources by searching legal research databases like Fastcase or Casetext , include:

• Federal and state constitutions
• Statutes or legislation (such as laws enacted by legislative bodies like Congress and state legislatures)
• Regulations (such as rules or regulations made by either federal or state agencies)
• Annotations
• Case law (such as court opinions or decisions issued by federal or state courts)

Secondary legal sources explain or interpret legal principles in detail, or summarize the current state of the law—giving a better understanding of a particular area of law. These sources are also useful for identifying primary sources for your case (more on that later). Examples include:

• Law review articles and journals
• Practice guides
• Legal treatises

Learn more about the best free legal research tools available.

Begin your legal research with secondary sources

When it comes to legal research sources, start in the middle with secondary sources.

In addition to providing important background information on your legal issue, secondary sources save time: Instead of starting from scratch, you can leverage the expert work that’s already been done.

Think of it this way: In order to create and publish the material, experts had to go through a legal research process themselves. If a secondary source is reputable, the writer reviewed all of the available primary resources to determine what was most applicable. So, by noting the primary sources that are cited in law reviews, law journals, and case-law documents, you can take advantage of the research already done.

Note: Also keep in mind that useful cases don’t necessarily have to have the same legal outcome as your goal. If you find relevant case law where the outcome didn’t match your client’s desired outcome, you shouldn’t necessarily disregard it. If the laws are aligned, you can use that case to show how the fact patterns in your client’s case are different to strengthen your own argument.

Check that you’re using “good” law

Another key step to legal research is verifying that any cases and statutes you come across in your legal research are still “good” law—that is, that any legal decision you’re looking to is still valid and relevant. Using an overruled or unconstitutional statute won’t help you win your case.

Can older cases be “good” law?

While more recent cases are preferred (after all, they’re more likely to reflect the current legal changes that could impact the case law—and are thus less likely to have been rendered obsolete), recency isn’t mandatory.

A decades-old case could be considered “good” law—if it hasn’t been overruled in court or otherwise made irrelevant, an older case that fits with your case’s fact pattern and applicable law could be helpful.

Verify you’re using “good law” with a citator

How can you check if you’re using “good” law? Use a citator. Citators let you verify a case’s authority by giving you a cataloged list of cases, statutes, and legal sources—along with a history and precedential value for those sources—so you can then check that it hasn’t been overruled, questioned, or made irrelevant.

When using a citator, focus on the negative material (by checking a case in a citator, you can look for flags that indicate any negative history). Specifically, use a citator to check that you don’t miss a case that invalidates your argument—which could undermine your credibility.

Major legal databases all have their own citator tools. For example, Casetext offers SmartCite , which “uses a system of flags to indicate the treatment of cases.” Casetext can also “help you evaluate whether a case is good law and find other relevant cases citing that opinion.”

Report your results to check for gaps

Compiling your research into a legal memorandum is a necessary part of conducting legal research, as it allows you to identify any gaps in information that may present consequences at a later stage. Legal writing presents challenges within itself, and it’s not a bad approach for you to supplement your legal case research with a book from a local law library on how to present your findings. Generally speaking, a legal memorandum does five things:

• States the facts of the case
• Identifies the issue
• Applies “good” law to the facts
• Predicts any counterpoints
• Makes an assessment of the outcome of the case

How can I improve my legal research skills?

Whether you’re new to legal research or you’ve conducted legal research for years, once you have a solid understanding of the process, take advantage of strategies and tools to maximize legal research efficiency. Here are three strategies to consider:

Conduct more efficient research remotely

In the past, the legal research process was arduous—partly because it tied the researcher to a physical location—whether that was a local law library or a law office computer—to access resources through legal databases.

Today, online legal research software can be used remotely when integrated with a cloud-based practice management software like Clio Manage. Having the flexibility to research from anywhere streamlines the legal research process and enhances efficiency. Here are a few examples:

• By signing into an online legal research service like Fastcase with Clio, for example, you can remotely access resources and primary sources like cases and statutes, as well as secondary sources like law review articles. CourtTrax provides real-time online access to State and Federal courts across the United States. With CourtTrax’s Clio integration, you can link your search results to specific client matters, and have the results injected directly into Clio as a document.
• Cloud-based online research software like Tracers lets you search for pertinent information (such as contract information or social media activity) remotely. You can also request a Tracers search directly from a matter in Clio for an even more efficient process.

Double-check your memos and briefs with advanced legal research AI

Casetext Logo

Effective legal research needs to be thorough and accurate—which, traditionally, is time-consuming. Legal research AI can help speed that process up without sacrificing the quality of your research.

Here are a few tools to help streamline your legal research process:

• ROSS Intelligence is an AI-driven legal research platform with an automated review tool that allows you to do more thorough research in a fraction of the time. ROSS lets you highlight statements in your pleadings and briefs to instantly search for cases and statutes discussing similar points of law. You can also use ROSS to identify negative case treatment in your pleadings and law briefs—without the manual searching.
• Casetext’s CARA artificial intelligence search technology and automated review tool enhance and speed up your legal searches. You can use Casetext to start your research with a complaint or legal brief from a matter in Clio to find highly relevant, tailored search results and resources. Casetext will not just find authorities on the same facts and legal issues—it will also find them in the same jurisdiction. Casetext’s citator functionality also makes it easier to check and flag any bad law.

Document your research with secure, cloud-based fact management software

Don’t let your research go to waste or let facts slip through the cracks because of a poor documentation system. By using secure, cloud-based fact-management software, you can record your research in an efficient, organized, and accessible way.

Software like Clio Manage and apps like FactBox , for example, keep you organized by connecting all the facts, notes, and ideas in your cases. Using this type of tool helps you prepare for depositions, hearings, client briefings, and trials faster—and with more confidence that you aren’t missing facts.

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Clio’s series f funding: how it benefits you, a lawyer’s guide to motion hearings, a lawyer's guide to post-trial motions, lawyer depression: recognizing the signs and dealing with it, final thoughts on how to conduct legal research.

Whether you’re a student in law school or an experienced attorney, learning how to do thorough legal research (or how to enhance your existing legal research process) is a skill that can give you a competitive advantage.

Learning great legal research techniques—from developing a more efficient research process to adopting cloud-based tools to conduct better, faster, and smarter legal research—helps you better support your cases, and clients.

Explore how you can conduct more efficient legal research with Clio Manage and the host of Clio software integrations .

How do you do legal research?

Lawyers conducting legal research often consult online legal databases, such as LexisNexis and Westlaw. They might also pore over print resources, case law reports, statutes and regulations, and secondary resources (such as legal encyclopedias, dictionaries, and treatises). That said, there’s no one-size-fits-all process.

How do I start a legal research paper?

Start by determining your topic—this should be specific and something you find interesting. Then, conduct the necessary research to form a well-supported thesis. Create an outline to structure your thoughts before writing an introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. Finally, edit and proofread.

How to do legal research as a paralegal

First, ensure you understand what you’re researching. Then, start with secondary sources (law reviews, practice guides, and treatises), consulting a citator to ensure it’s “good” law. Lastly, fill in any gaps with primary sources, including constitutions, treaties, regulations, and case law.

We published this blog post in October 2020. Last updated: November 15, 2023 .

Categorized in: Uncategorized

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How to Conduct Legal Research

September 21, 2021

Conducting legal research can challenge even the most skilled law practitioners.

As laws evolve across jurisdictions, it can be a difficult to keep pace with every legal development. Equally daunting is the ability to track and glean insights into stakeholder strategies and legal responses. Without quick and easy access to the right tools, the legal research upon which case strategy hinges may face cost, personnel, and litigation outcome challenges.

Bloomberg Law’s artificial intelligence-driven tools drastically reduce the time to perform legal research. Whether you seek quick answers to legal research definitions, or general guidance on the legal research process, Bloomberg Law’s Core Litigation Skills Toolkit has you covered.

What is legal research?

Legal research is the process of uncovering and understanding all of the legal precedents, laws, regulations, and other legal authorities that apply in a case and inform an attorney’s course of action.

Legal research often involves case law research, which is the practice of identifying and interpreting the most relevant cases concerning the topic at issue. Legal research can also involve a deep dive into a judge’s past rulings or opposing counsel’s record of success.

Research is not a process that has a finite start and end, but remains ongoing throughout every phase of a legal matter. It is a cornerstone of a litigator’s skills.

[Learn how our integrated, time-saving litigation research tools allow litigators to streamline their work and get answers quickly.]

Where do I begin my legal research?

Beginning your legal research will look different for each assignment. At the outset, ensure that you understand your goal by asking questions and taking careful notes. Ask about background case information, logistical issues such as filing deadlines, the client/matter number, and billing instructions.

It’s also important to consider how your legal research will be used. Is the research to be used for a pending motion? If you are helping with a motion for summary judgment, for example, your goal is to find cases that are in the same procedural posture as yours and come out favorably for your side (i.e., if your client is the one filing the motion, try to find cases where a motion for summary judgment was granted, not denied). Keep in mind the burden of proof for different kinds of motions.

Finally, but no less important, assess the key facts of the case. Who are the relevant parties? Where is the jurisdiction? Who is the judge? Note all case details that come to mind.

What if I’m new to the practice area or specific legal issue?

While conducting legal research, it is easy to go down rabbit holes. Resist the urge to start by reviewing individual cases, which may prove irrelevant. Start instead with secondary sources, which often provide a prevailing statement of the law for a specific topic. These sources will save time and orient you to the area of the law and key issues.

Litigation Practical Guidance provides the essentials including step-by-step guidance, expert legal analysis, and a preview of next steps. Source citations are included in all Practical Guidance, and you can filter Points of Law, Smart Code®, and court opinions searches to get the jurisdiction-specific cases or statutes you need.

Searching across Points of Law will help to get your bearings on an issue before diving into reading the cases in full. Points of Law uses machine learning to identify key legal principles expressed in court opinions, which are easily searchable by keyword and jurisdiction. This tool helps you quickly find other cases that have expressed the same Point of Law, and directs you to related Points of Law that might be relevant to your research. It is automatically updated with the most recent opinions, saving you time and helping you quickly drill down to the relevant cases.

How do I respond to the opposing side’s brief?

Whether a brief is yours or that of the opposing party, Bloomberg Law’s Brief Analyzer is an essential component in the legal research process. It reduces the time spent analyzing a brief, identifying relevant authorities, and preparing a solid response.

To start, navigate to Brief Analyzer available from the Bloomberg Law homepage, within the Litigation Intelligence Center , or from Docket Key search results for briefs.

Simply upload the opposing side’s brief into the tool, and Brief Analyzer will generate a report of the cited authorities and arguments contained in the brief.

You can easily view a comparison with the brief and analysis side by side. It will also point you directly to relevant cases, Points of Law, and Practical Guidance to jump start your research.

[ How to Write a Legal Brief – Learn how to shorten the legal research cycle and give your legal brief a competitive advantage.]

How to optimize your search.

Crafting searches is a critical skill when it comes to legal research. Although many legal research platforms, including Bloomberg Law, offer natural language searching, terms and connectors (also called Boolean) searching is still a vital legal research skill and should be used when searching across court opinions, dockets, Points of Law, and other primary and secondary sources.

When you conduct a natural language search, the search engine applies algorithms to rank your results. Why a certain case is ranked as it is may not be obvious. This makes it harder to interpret whether the search is giving you everything you need. It is also harder to efficiently and effectively manipulate your search terms to zero in on the results you want. Using Boolean searching gives you better control over your search and greater confidence in your results.

The good news? Bloomberg Law does not charge by the search for court opinion searches. If your initial search was much too broad or much too narrow, you do not have to worry about immediately running a new and improved search.

Follow these tips when beginning a search to ensure that you do not miss relevant materials:

• Make sure you do not have typos in your search string.
• Search the appropriate source or section of the research platform. It is possible to search only within a practice area, jurisdiction, secondary resource, or other grouping of materials.
• Make sure you know which terms and connectors are utilized by the platform you are working on and what they mean – there is no uniform standard set of terms of connectors utilized by all platforms.
• Include in your search all possible terms the court might use, or alternate ways the court may address an issue. It is best to group the alternatives together within a parenthetical, connected by OR between each term.
• Consider including single and multiple character wildcards when relevant. Using a single character wildcard (an asterisk) and/or a multiple character wildcard (an exclamation point) helps you capture all word variations – even those you might not have envisioned.
• Try using a tool that helps you find additional relevant case law. When you find relevant authority, use BCITE on Bloomberg Law to find all other cases and/or sources that cite back to that case. When in BCITE, click on the Citing Documents tab, and search by keyword to narrow the results. Alternatively, you can use the court’s language or ruling to search Points of Law and find other cases that addressed the same issue or reached the same ruling.

[Bloomberg Law subscribers can access a complete checklist of search term best practices . Not a subscriber? Request a Demo .]

How can legal research help with drafting or strategy?

Before drafting a motion or brief, search for examples of what firm lawyers filed with the court in similar cases. You can likely find recent examples in your firm’s internal document system or search Bloomberg Law’s dockets. If possible, look for things filed before the same judge so you can get a quick check on rules/procedures to be followed (and by the same partner when possible so you can get an idea of their style preferences).

Careful docket search provides a wealth of information about relevant cases, jurisdictions, judges, and opposing counsel. On Bloomberg Law, type “Dockets Search” in the Go bar or find the dockets search box in the Litigation Intelligence Center .

If you do not know the specific docket number and/or court, use the docket search functionality Docket Key . Select from any of 20 categories, including motions, briefs, and orders, across all 94 federal district courts, to pinpoint the exact filing of choice.

Dockets can also help you access lots of information to guide your case strategy. For example, if you are considering filing a particular type of motion, such as a sanctions motion, you can use dockets to help determine how frequently your judge grants sanctions motions. You can also use dockets to see how similar cases before your judge proceeded through discovery.

If you are researching expert witnesses, you can use dockets to help determine if the expert has been recently excluded from a case, or whether their opinion has been limited. If so, this will help you determine whether the expert is a good fit for your case.

Dockets are a powerful research tool that allow you to search across filings to support your argument. Stay apprised of docket updates with the “Create Alert” option on Bloomberg Law.

Dive deeper into competitive research.

For even more competitive research insights, dive into Bloomberg Law’s Litigation Analytics – this is available in the Litigation tab on the homepage. Data here helps attorneys develop litigation strategy, predict possible outcomes, and better advise clients.

To start, under Litigation Analytics , leverage the Attorney tab to view case history and preview legal strategies the opposition may practice against you. Also, within Litigation Analytics, use the Court tab to get aggregate motion and appeal outcome rates across all federal courts, with the option to run comparisons across jurisdictions, and filter by company, law firm, and attorney.

Use the Judge tab to glean insights from cited opinions, and past and current decisions by motion and appeal outcomes. Also view litigation analytics in the right rail of court opinions.

Docket search can also offer intel on your opponent. Has your opponent filed similar lawsuits or made similar arguments before? How did those cases pan out? You can learn a lot about an opponent from past appearances in court.

How do I validate case law citations?

Checking the status of case law is essential in legal research. Rely on Bloomberg Law’s proprietary citator, BCITE. This time-saving tool lets you know if a case is still good law.

Under each court opinion, simply look to the right rail. There, you will see a thumbnail icon for “BCITE Analysis.” Click on the icon, and you will be provided quick links to direct history (opinions that affect or are affected by the outcome of the case at issue); case analysis (citing cases, with filter and search options), table of authorities, and citing documents.

How should I use technology to improve my legal research?

A significant benefit of digital research platforms and analytics is increased efficiency. Modern legal research technology helps attorneys sift through thousands of cases quickly and comprehensively. These products can also help aggregate or summarize data in a way that is more useful and make associations instantaneously.

For example, before litigation analytics were common, a partner may have asked a junior associate to find all summary judgment motions ruled on by a specific judge to determine how often that judge grants or denies them. The attorney could have done so by manually searching over PACER and/or by searching through court opinions, but that would take a long time. Now, Litigation Analytics can aggregate that data and provide an answer in seconds. Understanding that such products exist can be a game changer. Automating parts of the research process frees up time and effort for other activities that benefit the client and makes legal research and writing more efficient.

[Read our article: Six ways legal technology aids your litigation workflow .]

Tools like  Points of Law ,  dockets  and  Brief Analyzer  can also increase efficiency, especially when narrowing your research to confirm that you found everything on point. In the past, attorneys had to spend many hours (and lots of money) running multiple court opinion searches to ensure they did not miss a case on point. Now, there are tools that can dramatically speed up that process. For example, running a search over Points of Law can immediately direct you to other cases that discuss that same legal principle.

However, it’s important to remember that digital research and analytical tools should be seen as enhancing the legal research experience, not displacing the review, analysis, and judgment of an attorney. An attorney uses his or her knowledge of their client, the facts, the precedent, expert opinions, and his or her own experiences to predict the likely result in a given matter. Digital research products enhance this process by providing more data on a wider array of variables so that an attorney can take even more information into consideration.

[Get all your questions answered, request a Bloomberg Law demo , and more.]

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Law School Home

Getting Started With Legal Research: Strategy and Considerations

• Strategy and Considerations
• Types of Resources
• Finding Legal Resources

Beginning legal research can be daunting task. Below are some strategic guidelines for starting your research and considerations to keep in mind.

For deeper insight into legal research, you will find the books highlighted below in the MLaw collection.

Step One: Plan Your Research

• Frame the legal issues and consider the facts
• Determine the applicable jurisdiction 
• Generate initial keywords for search terms

Step Two: Consult Secondary Sources

• For an overview of your topic, search Google or Wikipedia or consult a legal dictionary
• Refine search terms using new knowledge
• Use more specific secondary authority as you narrow your search
• Discover what primary authority is cited by the secondary sources

Step Three: Search for Primary Authorities

• Consult statutes, regulations, and case law
• Search for primary authorities mentioned by secondary sources and other primary sources

Step Four: Expand and Update Case Research

• Evaluate how cases relate to earlier relevant cases
• Find references to relevant cases with key numbers
• Make sure cases are still good law by using a citator

Step Five: Analyze and Organize Results

• Determine what primary authorities are actually relevant to your facts
• Determine what primary authorities are binding on your issue

See  Mark K. Osbeck,  Impeccable Research: A Concise Guide to Mastering Legal Research Skills, 2nd  (2016).

Guides on Legal Research and the Legal System

• Locating the Law: A Handbook for Non-Law Librarians (6th) Ed. Elizabeth Caulfield 2018 publication of Southern California Association of Law Libraries Also available on their website https://scallnet.org/publications/ .

Keep these factors in mind when conducting research online.

Primary Sources Primary materials are more likely to be available online than secondary materials. The U.S. federal government has especially made a point of trying to make official documents available online. It is also less expensive to publish electronically, so many governments are moving toward online-only government publication policy.

Secondary Sources Secondary sources are less likely to be online (for copyright, use, and cost issues). However, many law journals are now published in both print and electronic formats. 

Coverage Dates With the exception of archival projects, most legal information on the internet is available beginning in the mid-1990s.

Citators There are no free citators for ensuring that a law is still good. Patrons on the U-M campus can access Shepard's Citator on Nexis Uni .

Depth of Research Free internet resources are likely the fastest (or only) option when looking for a single document or statistic. These resources are not as useful for in-depth legal research, such as looking for the ten best cases on your subject or making sure your case is still good law. 

Research Guides Research guides will often list useful print and Internet resources for legal research on a given subject. They can been a good starting point for legal research on an unfamiliar subject. Online research guides are generally free and most major law school libraries have collections of research guides on their websites. Remember that local and regional law libraries may have research guides on state-specific legal research. Search online for "[subject] libguide" or "[subject] research guide" to find useful sources. 

Library Catalogs Many law libraries now add links to Internet materials in their online catalogs. Searching a library's catalog is more exact than searching the Internet because libraries use standardized subject headings and uniform names that do not vary within a particular catalog or between catalogs. Library catalogs are also helpful because the librarians have already looked at resources and then made the decision to select that resource for their collection. Accordingly, the Internet resources linked in library catalogs will often be official or useful or both.

• Next: Types of Resources >>
• Last Updated: Jul 2, 2024 10:27 AM
• URL: https://libguides.law.umich.edu/getting-started

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• How to Research a Legal Problem | Law Library | University of Wyoming

University of Wyoming 1000 E. University Ave. Laramie, WY 82071 Phone: (307)-766-1121

How to Research a Legal Problem: A Guide for Non-Lawyers

This guide is intended to help a person with a legal problem find legal rules that can resolve or prevent conflict. It is most useful to work through the steps and sources in the order given.

GETTING STARTED

Determine exactly what the question is that you need to answer.

Identify the jurisdiction. This is affected by where the event occurred or by the subject or your question. It requires determining which court or government agency can resolve the conflict. You need this information before beginning research.

Understand citations and abbreviations. Most law books are cited in order of volume number, book, and page. For example, 410 U.S. 113 would signify volume 410 of United States Reports, page 113. Statutes are cited by statute title and section number, such as 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for title 42 United States Code, section 1983. Any law library can assist you in reading a cite or determining the abbreviated title.

PLACES TO FIND HELP

Public libraries will have at least some of the codes, texts, and self-help materials mentioned here, as well as facilities for internet access.

Most county, court, or law school libraries are open to the public and contain some of the resources talked about here. Internet access for the public will vary across libraries of this type.

Depository libraries of federal materials are located at most law libraries, larger public libraries, and universities and are required by law to be available to the public. Increasingly, the federal government has made many of its depository and other publications available on the internet at https://www.govinfo.gov/ . Guides are available at our web site,  https://www.uwyo.edu/lawlib/researchguides/index.html , or from other law libraries on the web.

The Internet is not a comprehensive source for legal material, but good starting points for legal information are available at: The Legal Information Institute, http://www.law.cornell.edu ; FindLaw, http://www.findlaw.com ; WashLaw: Legal Research on the Web, http://www.washlaw.edu; The American Bar Association's Public Resources page, https://www.americanbar.org/about_the_aba/aba_public_resources/ ; HierosGamos, http://www.hg.org ; Public Library of Law, http://www.plol.org ; and LexisOne, http://www.lexisone.com .

SOME GOOD SOURCES OF INFORMATION

Self-help books or kits containing instructions and forms are available in many bookstores and public libraries and even from some court clerks and legal aid offices to help non-lawyers with routine matters. The books or kits may cover divorce, bankruptcy, traffic tickets, wills, contracts and leases, landlord-tenant agreements, small business matters, and many other legal subjects. Usually written by lawyers, such books may save the patron hours of research. At the Wyoming Supreme Court web site, http://www.courts.state.wy.us , for example, there are links to divorce kits to guide you through the process, among other forms. Try searching the name of the state along with "self help" to find similar resources from other states. Some self-help information is also available at Nolo Press, http://www.nolo.com , specifically geared towards the non-lawyer.

Practice aids and form books are intended for lawyers, but they can be useful for anyone. Some examples of practice aids are Causes of Action , American Jurisprudence Trials , and American Jurisprudence Proof of Facts, which give guidance in what evidence a court must be given and how to proceed. Form books aid in drafting legal documents or documents that need to be filed in court. State form books are available for many states, but Wyoming is not among them. It may be necessary to check into general form books like American Jurisprudence Legal Forms , American Jurisprudence Pleading and Practice Forms, West's Legal Forms, and West's Federal Forms or the Wyoming Court Rules (see Appendices for litigation forms in the Rules of Civil Procedure, Rules of Criminal Procedure, and Rules of Appellate Procedure). . While some forms are available free on the internet, such as those at  http://www.lexisone.com , many sites will ultimately charge a fee. Try your local court and nearest law library first. The law library and affiliates of the University have access to Wyoming Legal Forms through the law library’s Database page.

Legal encyclopedias are a good starting point to get an overview of a topic. There are two general legal encyclopedias: Corpus Juris Secundum (C.J.S.) and American Jurisprudence 2d (Am. Jur. 2d). Many states also have encyclopedias of state law, though, again, Wyoming does not. Begin with the index and look for different synonyms of your term. The text will contain many footnotes leading to further sources.

Texts and treatises can also yield useful general information. They contain the law on a specific subject, sometimes a specific jurisdiction. The briefest are those in West Publishing Company's Nutshell Series. West's Hornbooks or comparable publications provide more depth. Multivolume encyclopedic treatises present comprehensive information for many subjects and may include forms.

Articles printed in journals or law reviews published commercially by law schools or bar associations may also be useful. Look up your search terms in printed or computer databases such as Hein Online. Some articles may be found online for free at sites such as Google Scholar . Authors also post their articles on bePress, http://www.bepress.com/journals and SSRN (Social Science Research Network), http://ssrn.com . These can be accessed for free.

Codes are laws that are passed by a law-making assembly or agency. They contain legal rules known as statutes, regulations or ordinances. Topics within sets of codes are accessed through their index that refers you to a numbered section. Print versions are updated by supplements or pocket parts or are in binder or "looseleaf" form.

Most public libraries and all law libraries will include a copy of the local state code, which holds the laws passed by a state's legislature. They may also have city or county ordinance codes and codes of state administrative agency regulations. Most state and some local law can be found on the internet by going to a state's official site and looking for links to law and local government (or cities and counties). Sites such as http://www.washlaw.edu will also lead to states' government sites.

One of the following federal code versions will be used if the jurisdiction is federal: The United States Code (U.S.C.), United States Code Annotated (U.S.C.A.) or United States Code Service (U.S.C.S.). The U.S.C. is available at http://uscode.house.gov , although other sites containing the U.S.C., e.g. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode , may provide easier ways to locate a particular statute. For pending and new federal laws, you'll probably need to check a government web site for legislative information, such as https://www.congress.gov/ . Regulations of federal agencies are contained in the Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R.), though they are more current and easily searchable at http://www.ecfr.gov/ .

Court rules state the procedure by which a dispute must make its way to court and how the resolution of the dispute is to be conducted. Court rules address such topics as time limitations and formal requirements for pleadings and other court documents or processes. Although procedural law can also be found in statutory and administrative codes, court rules are generally more detailed and can vary from court to court. Wyoming court rules are available at http://www.courts.state.wy.us/Supreme/CourtRules .

Reports or reporters contain opinions (sometimes called decisions or cases) written by courts to explain how and why certain legal rules were used to resolve the dispute in a particular lawsuit. These rules constitute the "common law" and are followed by courts deciding later cases with similar facts and issues so that consistency may be maintained. Decisions of a higher court are mandatory, or binding. This means those decisions must be followed if coming from a higher court in the same jurisdiction or from the U. S. Supreme Court. If a decision is not binding, a court may still find it persuasive and follow it.

With few exceptions, these cases are from courts of appeals rather than trial courts. (The most common exception is decisions from federal district courts reported in the Federal Supplement, abbreviated F. Supp.) Opinions are not written for every case. Further, not every decision is selected by the court for publication. These "unpublished" decisions, such as those found in the Federal Appendix (F. Appx.), can help one to understand the law. However, it is important to consult a court's rules on citation of unpublished opinions before using them to support an argument in a legal proceeding.

Cases decided in the U.S. Supreme Court are reported in the United States Reports (U.S.) and reprinted in the Supreme Court Reporter (S.Ct.) and United States Supreme Court Reports, Lawyers' Edition, first and second series (L.Ed., L.Ed.2d). Newer U.S. Supreme Court cases are available at http://lp.findlaw.com . Cases from the intermediate U.S. Courts of Appeals, also called U.S. Circuit Courts, are printed in the Federal Reporter, first, second, or third series (F., F.2d and F.3d). The Federal Supplement, first and second series (F.Supp., F. Supp.2d) contain cases from the U.S. District Courts. Circuit court and district court cases can also be found at Google Scholar , though availability of cases will vary from court to court. 

State supreme court opinions are printed in state reports in many states. They are also reprinted in West's regional reporters, which each contain several states, including the Atlantic (A. and A.2d), North Eastern (N.E. and N.E.2d), North Western (N.W. and N.W.2d), Pacific (P., P.2d and P.3d), South Eastern (S.E. and S.E.2d), South Western (S.W., S.W.2d and S.W.3d), and Southern (So. and So.2d) Reporters. Because California and New York generate a large amount of case law, these states have their own West reporters: the California Reporter (Cal. Rptr., Cal. Rptr.2d and Cal. Rptr.3d) and the New York Supplement (N.Y.S. and N.Y.S.2d).

Many states, like Wyoming, no longer print their own reports, so their newer decisions are found only in West's reporters. Wyoming decisions are found in the Pacific Reporter. They are also available at Google Scholar . Sometimes a decision is printed in more than one publication. Then you may find more than one citation to it. These are called parallel citations. State court opinions are also available through Google Scholar.

Finding opinions may be done in various ways. Reports are not arranged by subject, and the sets are not indexed. Often you can find a reference from text or footnotes of texts, encyclopedias, or other cases. Annotated codes will list cases which have cited a statute following the text of the statute.

Electronic databases of legal materials, including case law, are available at the Law Library. Both Westlaw and Lexis can be searched on site without a password. 

Digests for federal jurisdictions, most states and several of the regions that correspond to the regional reporters. For example, there is a Federal Practice Digest (Fed. Prac. Dig.), a California Digest (Cal. Dig.) and a Pacific Digest (Pac. Dig.). The Decennial Digest (Dec. Dig.) covers all jurisdictions in five or ten year increments (and most recently, in five-year increments). These publications make up West's American Digest System, which divides the law into more than 400 topics. Each topic is subdivided into principles or points of law which are each assigned a "key" number. Pigeonholed under each key number are brief paragraphs abstracted from cases, which summarize the points of each case, and citations to where each case can be found. It is possible to go directly to the topic in the digest and scan through the key numbers, but it is usually less confusing to start in the Descriptive Word Index to the digest. This index uses common words to lead to the right topic and key number. The digest also contains a case table, which can be used to look up a citation if only the name of a case is known .

American Law Reports (A.L.R.) functions both as a digest of leading cases on a particular topic and as an index to "annotations," which review a legal topic in depth and analyze court cases from all jurisdictions on the subject.

Reports and digests for certain courts or topics are also beneficial. These cover legal areas such as bankruptcy, military justice, education, labor, and tax. Administrative agencies, which often act as tribunals in their areas of jurisdiction, also publish reports of their opinions, often with digests.

Looseleaf services are useful tools that pull together text, statutes, regulations, and opinions of courts and administrative agencies on specific important topics that need constant updating. Examples include Standard Federal Tax Reporter, Federal Tax Coordinator, Employment, Bankruptcy Law Reporter, Consumer Credit Guide, Family Law Reporter, and Criminal Law Reporter. Such titles are available in CCH and BNA databases on the library’s Databases page , but access is limited to researchers on site at the law school.

BEFORE YOU STOP

Check supplements. These sometimes appear as "pocket parts" inserted into the back covers of volumes to provide updates and new material .

Check Citators. Shepard's is the most common. These must be used to ascertain whether the validity of a case or statute has been affected in some way, such as being reversed, overruled or ruled unconstitutional (for statutes). They are also used to determine if one case has been cited by another. KeyCite in Westlaw and Shepard's in Lexis are the tools for this. We have both available on our computers in the reference area of the library.

WHEN TO STOP

You'll keep reading the same legal rule. You may notice that once you have thoroughly covered all the sources listed above, the same legal rule, whether set out in statute, regulation, or court opinion, will appear in several places. You can usually take this as confirmation that your research has been complete enough to give a reliable answer to your legal question.

MORE INFORMATION

An attorney may still be required to help find and understand legal information. Word of mouth, the Yellow Pages, or state and local bar associations can help you find one. Attorney directories are available online at http://www.lawhelp.org , http://www.martindale.com  and http://lawyers.findlaw.com .

A law librarian can help but cannot give legal advice. Call your local public library for a listing of area law libraries.

Other suggested resources:

Finding the Law (2005)

Fundamentals of Legal Research (2009)

Legal Research: How to Find & Understand the Law (2015)

Legal Research in a Nutshell (2007)

Nolo Press, https://nolo.com

This guide was adapted from a guide prepared by Lee Warthen and Angus Nesbit for Legal Information Services to the Public (LISP), a Special Interest Section of the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL). 

Library Catalog

Introduction to Legal Research: How to Start

• Home: Introduction to Legal Research
• How to Start
• Secondary Sources
• Regulations
• Updating Case Law
• Getting Help

Research Strategies

• Use secondary sources to learn about the law and get references to primary law.
• Use a known case to find citations to other cases and statutes.
• Use a known statute to find citations to cases.

Key Questions

• Be sure you have the basic facts . Ask the "who, what, when, where, why and how" questions.  You have to be sure you understand the facts surrounding your legal issue before you start.
• Articulate the legal issue . What jurisdiction is involved? Federal or state? Is this a civil or criminal matter? Who are the parties and what relief is sought?
• Consider which of three groups may have established the law on this issue : the legislature, the courts, or the executive branch. It is quite possible that two and possibly all three groups have touched on the topic. Then look for to the statute, case, or regulation that applies.

Search Terms

To begin to research, you need a list of search terms . Here are three ways to come up with search terms:

• Brainstorm by jotting down as many synonyms and related words as you can because different resources use different terminology to refer to the same topic. For example, "children" could be listed under "infants," "minors," or "parent and child."
• Use a dictionary, especially a legal dictionary (see Secondary Sources ).
• Ask a librarian or other person familiar with the topic for suggestions.
• << Previous: Home: Introduction to Legal Research
• Next: Secondary Sources >>
• Last Updated: Jan 12, 2024 12:19 PM
• URL: https://guides.library.cornell.edu/legalresearchintro

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Legal Research Basics

Introduction, step 1: preliminary analysis, step 2: create a research plan, step 3: consult secondary sources, step 4: search for primary authority – statutes, regulations, and cases, step 5: evaluate your search strategy and results as you go, step 6: update & final check.

• Secondary Sources
• Primary Law - Mandatory v. Persuasive Authority
• Court Structure
• Regulations
• Legislative History
• Legal Citations
• Boolean Operators
• Free Sources of Legal Information

Whenever you conduct legal research, it is essential that you follow a process. Many researchers simply throw words into Westlaw or Lexis+ and try their best to sift through the thousands of results, without first coming up with a research plan. They end up lost, confused, and frustrated. Taking the time to develop a research plan (and having the discipline to follow it) will make your research more efficient and productive. The major steps of the research process are detailed below.

• Relevant and material facts (Who? What? Where? When?)
• Parties (who is the Plaintiff and who is the Defendant?)
• Jurisdiction(s) – Is the issue resolved under federal, state (which state?), or both?
• Area(s) of law
• Primary legal issues: what are you trying to resolve?
• Legal concepts, terms of art, possible legal theories, and defenses
• What entities have authority?
• What types of law do you expect to find (e.g., statutes, regulations, case law)?
• How familiar are you with the area of law? What do you know about the issues?
• Create a list of general and specific search terms (unique or distinctive facts) and legal concepts (include synonyms and related terms).
• Decide where to begin (usually secondary sources).
• Identify primary authority sources to search (federal, state, or both; statutes, regulations, and cases).
• Locate the sources you wish to search, choose the format, understand the scope and coverage of the resource and how to navigate / search (table of contents, index, full-text search conventions).
• Identify one or more secondary sources relevant to your issue.
• Find the relevant sections using the index, table of contents, or search features.
• Read all the relevant sections. Take notes as you go.
• Note any citations to primary law. Repeat this until you have a good understanding of the issue.

If you don't know what secondary source to use, consult our list of Recommended Treatises . You can also contact your Research Librarians if you need assistance getting started. 

• Search for statutes first (enacted laws control before case law).
• Search for administrative regulations related to relevant statutes.
• Search for case law interpreting the statute(s).
• If there are no applicable statutes or regulations, look for mandatory case law (See Mandatory v. Persuasive Authority for more detail).
• Search for persuasive authority if there is no mandatory authority, or to find contrary authority (it can be good to know what authority the other side is going to use to make their case).
• Identify new search terms and legal concepts.
• Refine research strategy to incorporate findings.
• Try utilizing a research log to track what terms you've already used, in what combination, and where you searched them.
• Add more terms, use more specific terms, set filters, adjust proximity connectors (e.g., AND instead of OR, /s instead of /p).
• Use fewer terms, use synonyms for original terms, use broader terms, remove filters, adjust proximity connectors (e.g., OR instead of AND, /p instead of /s).
• Periodically consult your notes/facts to ensure you are staying on track.
• Consider other relevant sources (e.g., surrounding sections of statutes, definitions, related authority).
• Make sure you have addressed all issues completely.
• Update all primary authority you are relying on or citing to make sure it is still good law (using KeyCite and/or Shepard’s).
• Proofread your work.
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• Next: Secondary Sources >>
• Last Updated: Jun 11, 2024 3:12 PM
• URL: https://libguides.law.chapman.edu/legalresearchbasics

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Future of Law

The ultimate guide to conducting legal research

We run through three basic steps that will help lawyers conduct effective legal research, showing them how to create research plans, gather effective information, and review that information.

Legal research is defined as the process of identifying and retrieving information to support legal decision-making. It is essential to lawyers at all stages of their legal careers. It helps students to study for exams, graduates to prepare for careers, and seasoned lawyers to find effective case law to back up their motions, support the over-arching narrative of their case, or refute an opposing argument.

Every lawyer, regardless of their position, should practice legal research. The benefits are obvious. Legal research gives you access to the best facts and knowledge, helps you to form coherent arguments and find effective solutions using the latest information, supports the decision-making process, allows you to curate up-to-date and relevant teaching material for students, and much more.

In short, legal research is essential. But the value you gain depends on the way you conduct the research. In this article, we are going to explore the steps lawyers and legal counsel can take to boost productivity and maximise value with legal research, starting with the creation of a research plan.

Creating a research plan

The first step is finding out what you need to find out. If you are trying to identify and understand the facts of a case, for example, start by recording what you know in a case management tool, such as Visualfiles . That will help you develop a course of action, narrowing down the research.

You’ll then need to build on the initial facts. First, identify where you’re planning to search. Lawyers and legal counsel too often rely on free services like Google to find information. Indeed, the LexisNexis  2022 Bellwether report found that a concerning 74% of lawyers use Google for research.

The problem is that Google often provides information that is unreliable and outdated . And that can prove problematic and time-consuming, as lawyers and legal counsel will need to cross-check and fact-check the information they find, ensuring that it is accurate – or finding that it is inaccurate.

A better option is to find a trusted platform. Take the legal tech tool, Lexis+® UK , for example. Lexis+® UK offers quick and accurate answers using practical guidance and provides leading legal content. It allows you to start with a natural language search or question and offers loads of incredible optimisation features that help lawyers quickly sift through primary and secondary sources.

Once you’ve figured out where to search, you will need to work out what to search. You might want to start by asking yourself questions, such as: What are the main issues that arose when gathering initial facts? What’s the most helpful case law or practical guidance on those issues? Are there any significant gaps in my knowledge? And so on. The answers will define the start of your legal research.

Gather the best information

The next step in the process is to gather all the best information to help you meet your objective. For lawyers working on cases, that usually means gathering relevant sources of law. You should start with secondary law materials , which will help ensure you are up to date on what the experts have to say about a particular topic before you start the (slightly more laborious) task of reading primary sources.

Secondary sources are vital – and one of the massive benefits of legal research tools . Secondary sources include, among other things, practice guides, legal treatises, legal guidance, review articles, journals, legal news, legal dictionaries and encyclopaedias, and some more obscure resources.

Secondary legal sources are, simply put, educational materials that describe or interpret the law. Students can read them to understand how lawyers might analyse a particular case. Lawyers can use secondary sources to build a case. Teachers can use them to show students about the merits of a case.

Then you will need to look at primary legal sources. These are formal documents officially issues by the body that establishes law. They are, in short, the law. Primary sources include , among other things, case law provided by the courts, legislation passed by parliament, tribunals and statutes, court records and court decisions, government documents, and other elements issued by official bodies.

Studying primary sources is the most authoritative act of research, but often time consuming, as the documents can be challenging to read, particularly for students and graduates early in their careers. But you can use secondary sources to make more sense of the primary sources, cross-referencing and cross-checking, exploring interpretations and analysis to simplify the act of research.

Once you’ve checked out the secondary and primary sources, you should have built a strong portfolio of information. At that stage, the legal research process is nearly complete. You’ll just need to review.

Review your information

The final step is the quickest one. It is mainly about practicing caution and ensuring you adopt a thorough approach. You just need to ensure that the legal sector broadly considers the information you have gathered reliable. You may want to double-check, for example, that case law has not been overturned or questioned. Or you may want to check the information you have gathered is up to date.

The above is an easy task, especially if you are using legal research software . Legal software often offers a quick and easy option to view how cases have been treated in court, for example, or view analysis of legal developments, allowing you to double-check information with the click of a button.

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LISP-SIS published a reference guide called How To Research A Legal Problem: A Guide for Non-Lawyers.  This guide is intended to help a person with a legal problem find legal rules that can resolve or prevent conflict. It is most useful to work through the steps and sources in the order given.

• How to Prepare for Law School
• Head start on legal research
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How to do Legal Research in Law School

What are we going to cover?

Introduce you to an important skill for law students and lawyers.

How are we going to cover it?

Walk through the standard legal research process.

Why is it important to me as an incoming 1L?

You’ll have a class dedicated to legal research during the year, and learning legal research is part of the process of becoming a lawyer.

• The Process
• Starting Your Search
• 3 S’s of Legal Research

Question: What is “Legal Research?”

Answer: Legal research is the process of identifying and retrieving information necessary to support legal decision-making.

Question: So why do it?

Answer: Support legal decision-making:

• COMPLEX legal issues
• Applied to SPECIFIC facts
• Requiring COMPLETE answers
• For clients that PAY for your expertise

The Legal Research Process is based upon The Legal Research Pyramid

Starting on the Open Web such as Google and/or bing. This is a good place to start but:

• Not specific enough
• Rarely authoritative (can’t cite to Google in court)
• Credibility of sources is always a question
• Collapse All

Step #1:Legal Research Process  

• Secondary Sources: Sources of information that describe or interpret the law, such as legal treatises, law review articles, and other scholarly legal writings, cited by lawyers to persuade a court to reach a particular decision in a case, but which the court is not obligated to follow.
• Don’t reinvent the wheel
• Learn from Legal Experts
• Get most important authority
• Read important background information
• Practice Guides
• Annotations & Digests
• Law Reviews & Journals   

Step #2:Legal Research Process  

• Primary Sources : A document that establishes the law on a particular issue, such as a case decision or legislative act.
• Authoritative
• Precedential
• Controlling
• Regulations

Step #3: Legal Research Process  

• Shepardizing®: The process of consulting Shepard's® to see if a case has been overturned, reaffirmed, questioned, or cited by later cases.
• Your research needs to be “Good Law”
• You can’t use reversed or overruled authority
• See “Precedential Value”
• Shows if authority is overruled
• Ensures research is “Good Law”

Step #4: Rinse & Repeat?  

• Law is Always Changing
• Legal research is never done
• Need to update your research as the law evolves
• Don’t find out your research is obsolete from opposing counsel
• Start with Secondary Sources
• Support with Primary Sources
• Shepardize ™

More Helpful Links

• The American Legal System
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• How to Read a Casebook 101
• Top 20 Things You Need to Know About Law School
• Learn to Spot Issues Like a Lawyer
• Why an Internet Search is Not Legal Research
• Why go to Law School?
• What’s the Most Challenging Part of Law School?
• What advice would you give yourself about law school?

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Can't Find Anything?

• Make sure you understand the problem.  Did you note all the factual information you need and do you understand the assignment correctly?
• Rethink your search terms.  Have you expanded the breadth and depth of your search terms?  Think of other ways to approach the problem and the applicable legal theories.
• Go back to secondary sources.  The material on the topic might be scattered through many digest topics or statutory sections so that it is difficult to locate without secondary sources that compile the relevant information.   Are you looking for the wrong type of authority?  Is it a case of first impression?

What To Do If You Find an Overwhelming Amount of Material

• Make sure you understand the problem.
• Rethink search terms to narrow your approach. If you did word search, try subject search to focus on relevant authority.
• Consult secondary sources.  They will identify key authorities and limit the scope of the information.
• If you've located only secondary authority or primary persuasive authority, you might want to refocus on primary mandatory authority from the controlling jurisdiction. 
• Narrow the legal theories you are considering.

Creating a Research Plan

Creating a research plan requires three steps:

Obtaining preliminary information about the problem

• How much time do I have for the assignment?
• What final work product should I produce?  A memorandum, pleading, brief, or informal report?
• Are there any limits on the research materials I am permitted to use?  Use only authorized research tools.
• Which jurisdiction's law applies?  Federal or state?
• Should I research persuasive authority?  Understanding the scope of the assignment will help you focus your efforts.
• Do you know any of the sources that are good for researching in this area of law?  Include looseleaf or other subject-matter services.
• What background on the law or terms should I know as I begin my research?
• Should I consult any written materials or individuals before beginning my research?  Reviewing briefs or memoranda on the same or similar issue or consulting the "resident expert" can help your research efforts.

Writing out a plan

• Develop an initial issue statement and generate search terms -- a preliminary assessment of the problem that helps define the scope of your research. 
• Identifying research sources -- Determine which research sources are likely to have relevant information.  Decide which of the three categories of authority (mandatory primary authority, persuasive primary authority, and secondary authority), and then within each category which specific authorities, you should consult.  Begin with what you know, identify what you do not know, and determine the best way to fill in the blanks.  At a minimum, map out your search for primary mandatory authority.
• Print vs Electronic sources -- Some sources can be accessed more easily in one format or the other. 

Working effectively

• Keeping track: effective notetaking -- know where you have looked and where you need to look; needed for proper citations; demonstrate that you undertook comprehensive researchto try to resolve the issues.  Keep a list of the source or database, the citation (topic and key numbers), the method of locating the source, a summary of relevant information, and any updating information.
• Deciding when to stop -- you will know you have come full circle in your research when, after following a comprehensive research path through a variety of sources, the authorities you locate start to refer back to each other and the new sources you consult fail to reveal significant new information.

When to use Print Sources

• When you are searching material not available online -- such as treatises and hornbooks, or legal periodicals.
• When you need general information on a topic about which you are unfamiliar.
• When your search terms are general or the subject of your research involves broad concepts.
• When you are conducting statutory or regulatory research.
• When you need to read authorities located through other means.

When to use Electronic Sources

• When the material you need is not available in print.
• When you have unique search terms or are searching for proper names.
• When you need to update your research.
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Home » Blogs, News, Advice » Legal Education » Legal Research Techniques for Finding Relevant Case Law

Legal Research Techniques for Finding Relevant Case Law

• Aug 8, 2023
• No Comments

Legal research is a systematic finding or ascertainment of law on an identified topic or in a given area. Additionally, it is a legal inquiry into the existing scholarship to advance the science of law.

Case law research and analysis is a prerequisite in the process of legal research. The method of acquiring this skill starts as soon as one embarks upon the journey of learning, studying, exploring and most importantly applying the law in a practical scenario.

Reading a case law, comprehending the rationale behind the decision and relating it to the present case to build a compelling and coherent argument is a skill every lawyer not only aspires to acquire. In order to become proficient and accomplished in their chosen profession, every lawyer must be skilled in finding relevant case laws through different means. One can learn several legal research techniques to find relevant case laws in legal databases.

Read on to find out several tools and techniques of Legal Research.

What are the different types of Legal Research?

Different types of research are crucial in case law research as they provide varied perspectives and information. Legal research helps identify relevant statutes, regulations, and precedents.

By utilizing these different research methods, researchers can obtain a comprehensive understanding of the legal landscape and make well-informed arguments or decisions in case law research. There are several legal research methodologies available for researchers to pursue their research.

1. Descriptive & Analytical Research

Descriptive research methodology focuses more on the “what” of the subject than the “why” of the research question. It is a description-based methodology that studies the characteristics of the population or phenomenon. The analytical research, however, uses the facts and information available to make a critical evaluation.

2. Qualitative & Quantitative Research

Qualitative legal research is a subjective method that relies on the researcher’s analysis of the controlled observations. In Quantitative Legal Research, one collects data from existing and potential data using sampling techniques like online surveys, polls, & questionnaires. The researcher can represent the outcomes of the quantitative study numerically.

3. Doctrinal & Empirical Research

In doctrinal legal research, the researcher analyses the existing statutory data to find the relevant answer to “What is the Law?” However, in empirical research, the researcher creates new data using several data collection methods and uses statistical tools to analyze it.

What is the Case Law Technique in Legal Research?

Case laws are the primary sources, i.e., the most original source, used in all legal research methodologies.

The case law technique in legal research methodology studies judicial opinions or decisions, and it is the technique of finding relevant legal precedents and principles. This is more challenging than it sounds because finding applicable case laws from legal databases is confusing and time-consuming, if the researcher is not well-versed with the tools.

Like legislation, case law can also be challenged and consequently change over time, as per the changing needs of the society. An earlier decision does not guarantee that it will always remain the law of the land.

Therefore, a lawyer must be skilled at finding, reading, and ascertaining the relevance, applicability and legal standing of any case law at a given point of time. . Thus, the importance of case law technique in legal research is quite significant as there can be no legal research without delving deep into judicial decisions.

How to Do Legal Research for Case Laws?

Before the time of the web, legal databases were in the form of multi-volume bulky books and digests. Researchers had to locate the cases manually with the help of case citations which was extremely time consuming. Though these periodicals are still available, online legal databases have overpowered them owing to their easy accessibility and time-saving tendency.

The Offline Tools for Legal Research

The researcher can locate case laws using the citations in printed law reporters. For example, the citation of a case is AIR 2017 SC 57, here the name of the Law Reporter in which the case law is published is AIR (All India Reporter), the year of the judgment is 2017, SC (Supreme Court) is the name of the Court, and the page number of the printed reporter on which the judgment can be found is 57.

The format of citation differs for every law reporter. Thus, the first step for locating the proper case law using citation is to decode the name of the law reporter.

The law reporters also categorize all the case laws. Thus, if the researcher does not know the case citation, they can find the case law as per its category.

The Online Tools for Legal Research

Using online tools for finding case laws is relatively easy. Even if the researcher does not know the name, citation, or year of the judgment, they can still find the same or similar judgments, thanks to these online tools’ intelligent features.

The only drawback is the majority of these tools require a heavy subscription fee which is not ideal for everyone.

What are the Methods of Locating Relevant Case Laws?

A researcher can locate relevant case laws if they know either of the following:

The identity of the case in law reporters, usually denoted in a combination of words & numbers.

For example: (1973) 4 SCC 225; AIR 1973 SC 1461

Case number

The official number the Court gives to a particular case.

For example: W.P.(C) 135 OF 1970

Name of the Parties

Either party’s name can be used for finding the case law.

For example: Petitioner’s name- Kesavananda Bharati Sripadagalvaru

Respondent’s name- State of Kerala

Jurisdiction

A researcher can filter their finding by deciding which Court’s judgment they want to look for.

A researcher can refer to various statute-based legal databases while finding a case law pertaining to a particular statute.

For example: The Labour Law Reporter publishes judgments specifically related to the Labour Laws of India.

How to Find Relevant Case Laws in India?

The offline tools.

The Supreme Court Reports (SCR) are the only authorized Indian law report series, and Supreme Court decisions should be cited from here whenever possible. However, Supreme Court Reporters are about four years behind in publishing the cases. Because of the long delay in the publication of the SCR. Therefore, it is entirely acceptable to cite a few unauthorized reports in academic and judicial work.

All India Reporter (AIR) is often cited in preference to the SCR, and in the Indian courts it has the status of an authorized series. The Law Library has the AIRs in print.

Online Tools

• Supreme Court of India at main.sci.gov.in . All the latest judgments by the Supreme Court of India are available here.
• Judgment Search Portal at judgments.ecourts.gov.in/pdfsearch/index.php : You can find the old Supreme Court Judgments here by entering any related keyword. It can be the citation of the case, name of the parties, case number, nature of the case, etc.
• SCC Online at www.scconline.com : India’s premier legal database with access to complete coverage of the Supreme Court, all High Courts, Tribunals and Commissions, Statutory Material and many foreign jurisdictions’ and International material. Individual registration is required to use this online legal database .
• AIROnline at www.aironline.in : Again, a subscription-based legal database which covers the judgments of all Supreme Courts, all High Courts, Tribunals and Commissions. The subscribers can find the case laws through citations, individual words, or exact phrases.
• Manupatra at www.manupatrafast.com : Indian case law coverage includes full-text decisions from the Supreme Court, all High Courts, the Federal Court, Privy Council and many tribunals. It covers judgments from the inception of each Court. The legislations covered include bare acts, amending acts, repealed legislation, subordinate legislation and bills from all jurisdictions. The primary material is grouped by topic; the secondary material comprises annotated legislation and commentary.
• Indian Kanoon at indiankanoon.org contains unreported decisions and is more up-to-date by a few days than the unreported cases on Manupatra or SCC Online. It goes back further (for example, Supreme Court cases started in 1947 in Kanoon and 1950 in Manupatra).

If you are looking for very recent decisions or if it is optional to access a reported version of the case, use Kanoon. Citation, party names, keywords, Court, date range etc., can search it. Researchers can also browse Indian Kanoon by Court and year. Indian Kanoon is also free!

However, Indian Kanoon tends to provide fewer parallel citations than Manupatra. It relies on user-generated content, lacks official verification, may contain outdated or inaccurate information, and sometimes does not provide comprehensive access to all relevant legal materials and judgments.

The approach to case law research has changed globally and in India due to technological advancement. According to statistics, roughly 33.9% of lawyers begin their research by using Google. Because Google is a generic search engine, the search results may sometimes be vague. Hence, case law databases or search engines that are tailor-made for lawyers emerge.

Lawctopus Law School’s Legal Research & Writing Course helps law students and legal professionals in understanding a crisp way to conduct Legal Research of different techniques and the right way to use legal databases.

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Legal Research Skills Guide: I - The Facts and the Legal Issues

• Getting Started
• Legal Research Strategy (IRAC)
• I - The Facts and the Legal Issues
• R - Gather background information
• R - Locate key case law or legislation
• A & C - Apply & Conclude...
• Search tips
• Using Primo Search
• Effective internet searching
• Evaluating information
• Keep a record
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• What is case law?
• Reading a case citation
• How to find a case
• Unreported Judgments
• Law reports - Authorised vs Unauthorised
• Case Citators
• Anatomy of a case
• Judicial consideration
• Legislative process
• Terminology
• Finding NSW legislation
• Finding Commonwealth legislation
• Extrinsic materials
• Commencement
• History of an Act
• An introduction to legal referencing
• AGLC Referencing guides
• Repeat citations
• Bibliographies

Identifying the Facts

• Who – Who was responsible? To whom did it happen? 
• What – What happened? What is the desired outcome?
• Where – Where did it happen? Jurisdiction?
• When – When did it happen?
• Why – Why did it happen?
• How – How did it happen?

Not all of these will be relevant in every scenario, but it is good to identify these elements before developing the legal issues you need to address.

Remember to 

• list each fact separately,
• order them logically or chronologically, and
• acknowledge any missing facts, do not assume facts!

Identifying the Issues

A legal problem will usually comprise of more than one issue. When you start your research issues don’t need to be overly specific. You may need to narrow your research focus as you work

If the issue is in its nature reasonably certain, then little research may be required. More research may be required in the grey or difficult areas of law relative to your facts. This might be because 

• Problems that accompany the facts as provided 
• The law is uncertain or arguable

The more difficult the issues = The more research focus required

A legal issue should be stated as a question, and you then work on providing the answer to that question. The law is often concerned with rights and liabilities of the parties, so a good approach is to frame the issues in the terms of possible rights and liabilities. Identifying issues from facts is a skill that will take time to develop, and you will refine this the more you do it.

Activity #2 - Identifying legal facts and issues

Jane speaks to her Uncle Bill at a family barbeque in March. He is happy to help out and lends Jane the money on the understanding that Jane can pay off the loan when she starts her after school job at the supermarket.

Jane contacts the caterers, decides on the menu, and pays a deposit. She spends the rest of the money on decorations and on hiring a DJ. She also spends $200 to buy herself a new dress and shoes.

At a Christmas gathering Uncle Bill asks Jane when she is planning to repay the money. Jane tells him she can't repay it because she decided not to take the supermarket job but instead to study hard, finish school and go to University.

• << Previous: Legal Research Strategy (IRAC)
• Next: R - Gather background information >>
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Formulating a research question.

Last update: April 21, 2022

The start of any research project lies with whatever it is you are interested in. It could be a specific topic, an event, a piece of legislation or any collection of facts and phenomena that puzzles you and triggers questions. The key is then to determine the research question that will guide your research. As with many parts of the research process, the research question can change and develop as you engage with the relevant literature and data. You don’t have to form a fixed research question at the very beginning of the research process. Nonetheless, it is essential to never lose sight of your research question. Your research question has implications for which methods will be used during the analysis and which central goals the study is set up to accomplish.

There are three main reasons why the formulation of the research question is essential for the research process and has to be done with great care:

• Condensing the topic, you are interested in into a single question forces you to really get to what exactly it is you want to know and which key variables are involved.
• Every research question requires a justification as to why it is being posed. Has this question not yet been answered definitively? Why is this question significant for the field?
• The research question has to fit what you are actually doing in your work. A question that is too broad will make it impossible for you to sufficiently answer it. If your question is too specific, the answer might be uninteresting.

Research questions are often sorted into different categories. As with most categorizations, these types of questions differ depending on the field of study. The biggest fault lines when it comes to the different types of research questions lie (1) between normative and descriptive research, (2) within the latter between theoretical and empirical research, and (3) within empirical research between descriptive and explanatory questions. Toshkov (2016) differentiates descriptive, predictive, and explanatory research while Chui (2017) categorizes them as descriptive, exploratory, and explanatory. No matter which exact typology of research question you are working with, it is always helpful to reflect on these key fault lines. Is the goal of your research to determine what ought to be or study the world as it is ? Will you be doing theoretical or empirical work? If you are working with empirics, are you focusing on the collection of facts surrounding a phenomenon (What is happening? What has happened?) or are you trying to determine causal mechanisms and structures (Why is this happening? How has this happened?)?

If your research topic constitutes a lack of information on a phenomenon, a type of legal proceeding or a specific event for example, a descriptive research question underlines the objective of your research of collecting facts that would be necessary to set-up further analyses or theory building. Descriptive research can utilize a number of methodologies ranging from archival work, ethnographic participant observation to conducting large-N surveys examining one or multiple cases.

If you want to determine the how or why of a phenomenon or event, then you are aiming to uncover causal mechanisms or structures and hence require an explanatory research question. For a more detailed outline of the set-up of explanatory legal research, please refer to Jaroslaw Kantorowicz’s entry on “ Causality in Research Design ”.

Finally, a few guiding questions to keep in mind when (re)formulating your research question:

• Is the question concise and grammatically as well as structurally formulated in a way that is easily understood?
• Is the question open-ended?
• Does the question reflect your research goal?
• Is the question making use of normative language (and should it)?
• Is the question researchable and can be feasibly answered within the scope of the study?
• Does your research address everything mentioned in your research question?

Chui, W. H., & McConville, Michael. (2017). Research methods for law (2nd ed.). Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univ. P.

Dunleavy, P. (2015). Authoring a PhD: how to plan, draft, write and finish a doctoral thesis or dissertation. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan education.

Halperin, S., & Heath, O. (2020). Political research: methods and practical skills (Third edition.).

Toshkov, D. (2016). Research design in political science.

Wellington, J., Bathmaker, A.-M., Hunt, C., McCulloch, G., & Sikes, P. (2005). Succeeding with Your Doctorate. In Succeeding with Your Doctorate. London: SAGE Publications.

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AI art is facing a copyright problem. Here’s what it means for creators

By: Verbit Editorial

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This summer, X (formerly Twitter) introduced its subscribers to Flux, a cutting-edge artificial intelligence image generator developed by Black Forest Labs. Soon after, the platform became saturated with images of celebrities and fictional characters created by AI.

Some entertainment and gaming industry titans were not happy. Disney and Nintendo, two companies with a track record for aggressively defending their intellectual property, place strict limits on using their characters and images. That left X users wondering how the companies would respond to the hundreds of millions of high-quality images of their favorite princesses and Italian plumbers firing guns or hobnobbing with controversial political figures.

Still, it’s not just major corporations that must contend with the nonconsensual use of their material. The recent explosion of AI has raised a whole host of copyright concerns for creators of all types, from influential global animation studios to individual artists with modest followings. The questions of who determines the ownership of AI-generated images and whether creators — whose work is used to train AI models — should share the profits of an image or text generated using their creative output loom large.

While media outlets, publishers, network studios and other companies worldwide that own valuable intellectual property are gearing up to fight the tech companies in court, individual creators — illustrators, musicians, authors — who lack the corporate muscle to defend their interests may face a different battle.

Verbit examined news articles and legal research to see what the rise of AI means for creators.

Legal challenges loom for content created with AI

As AI pushes the boundaries of what’s considered fair use, critical questions are being hashed out in court. One of the central tensions in several recent lawsuits is determining what constitutes fair use . When evaluating whether copyrighted material has been used without authorization, US courts consider several factors, such as whether the new work is commercial or nonprofit, whether it is creative or factual, how transformative it is and what economic impact it has on the copyright owner.

For example, sharing clips from news articles or movies for purposes of commentary or critique is considered fair use, as is publishing parodies of copyrighted works. In contrast, sharing an entire article or movie without authorization or any added commentary would not be fair use.

The New York Times , for example, is one of several news publishers suing OpenAI for copyright infringement. The company trained its chatbots on millions of articles from the Times , which now arguably compete with the newspaper. OpenAI, however, defends its models as transformative, and thus protected under fair use laws.

While the lawsuit is still pending, a similar argument succeeded in the 2015 Authors Guild lawsuit against Google Books. In that instance, the court ruled that Google Books, an online service providing searchable excerpts from millions of books, was transformative enough to fall under fair use, despite publisher objections that the service unfairly used their content.

Another prominent case involves a group of artists who sued several tech companies known for their text-to-image models for copyright infringement. The plaintiffs allege that the generative AI companies used their copyrighted work unauthorized to train their AI models, thereby enabling them to generate work in the styles of particular artists when prompted. The lawsuit also contends that Midjourney, another AI image generation company, once shared a list of 4,700 artist names, including some of the artists’ work, whose work their programs could imitate.

The yet-to-be-determined outcome of the case could have major implications for artists. If companies and consumers can use image generation tools to create an image almost instantly for fractions of a penny without the fear of legal action, they might ultimately decide that hiring humans to draw for them is simply too costly. This is doubly true if people can generate art that perfectly matches the styles of their chosen artists.

Looking to past fair use cases as precedent for the future

One possible path forward for companies and major content producers wanting to protect their intellectual property rights would be for AI tools to sign licensing arrangements with them. OpenAI has already agreed to sizable deals with numerous publishers, including Condé Nast , Time , News Corp ., Axel Springer , the Financial Times , the Associated Press and others, agreeing to pay publishers millions of dollars for the rights to use their work over the next few years. Another pathway is being tested by Perplexity, an AI-driven search engine, which recently launched a revenue-sharing program.

This is not without precedent. In 2006, when YouTube was still in its infancy, record labels threatened legal action when music sharing boomed on the platform. Eventually, YouTube signed a licensing deal with producers, offering them a share of ad dollars in exchange for music sharing.

But while major news publishers and record producers might have the legal resources to sign deals with tech companies — and profit from their own work — individual artists, musicians, publishers and other creators are often not as fortunate, making them easy targets for copyright issues.

Smaller YouTube creators often say they are falsely accused of copyright violations for sampling snippets of lyrics or song covers in educational videos. When a big music label issues a copyright claim, individual creators often have little recourse due to the narrow scope of fair use laws. They can either take down their video or pay the label a portion of their ad revenue — a crucial stream of revenue that keeps creators afloat.

Exactly how thorny copyright and fair use issues will play out as AI evolves is still unknown. However, as more people use generative AI to produce text, images and videos, ambiguous cases will likely arise. It will be up to courts and legislators to define fair use, but that alone may not be enough to protect smaller creators who lack the resources to defend their work or secure deals with tech companies.

By Wade Zhou

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Understanding the legal sector’s role in climate and nature action

Over the past 10 months, we’ve conducted exploratory research that shares a deeper understanding and mapping of the legal sector’s role in climate and nature action.

We hoped to better understand its role, potential and power in decarbonising the global economy and achieving nature-positive outcomes, so you can too. The research has also allowed us to identify gaps across the field that may be interesting for further research and opportunities to strengthen existing interventions, and even develop new ones.

In this three-part blog series, we share our research into the role of the business of law in driving climate and nature action, and what we learned about vocational education, development training and professional regulation along the way. We also share our latest plans and thinking around developing educational resources for our users, so they feel more confident using climate clauses in their everyday work.

This research project, initiated in late 2023, was brought to fruition in 2024 through the collaborative efforts of Humzah Khan and Guillermo Miranda Garcia . Guillermo joined our team at the beginning of the year, bringing his experience in legal entrepreneurship and corporate governance to the project. Their collaborative efforts have been instrumental in conducting interviews, synthesising our findings, and drawing meaningful conclusions from the data collected.

Introduction

The role of the legal sector in driving meaningful action has never been more crucial. We know what climate laws do, and what they don’t do. We also know about the use of strategic litigation, and what this response to the climate crisis lacks too. We know less about what’s happening across the business of law. In other words, the advisory and transactional work that drives global economic activity.

We recently led an exploratory research project to better understand the activities happening in this space and to identify interventions needed to ensure more coordinated and effective action. This short article outlines what we learned about what role the business of law plays in driving climate and nature action, and the key problems limiting the legal sector from realising its transformative potential to deliver systemic change.

The questions we hoped to find answers to

A good discovery project means asking the right research questions. We aimed to find out:

• What are the systemic problems with the legal sector that prevent or restrict change across the profession?
• Who is already addressing the change needed within the sector?

The framing of the two questions above helped us identify a series of problem statements, and provided the ability to map existing activities and actors against those problems. We believed this would, in theory, give us a high-level indication of where action is taking place, and where it isn’t.

This approach would also help us identify potential leverage points where targeted interventions could have the most significant impact on aligning the legal sector with climate and nature action goals.

The questions we asked research participants 

Through a mix of semi-structured interviews, roundtable discussions, and a survey, led by leading barrister Margherita Cornaglia, we asked research participants:

• What is the work you are doing to transform and align the law with positive action on climate and nature?
• What are the biggest problems you are facing in the work you described above?
• What, if any, solutions to these problems exist?
• Who else do you work with to transform law?
• Who do you think should be working to transform law, who isn’t currently doing so?

We spoke to a range of people working in the law and climate and nature ecosystem. This included 30 research participants in total, from lawyers to academics to non-profits. The diversity of perspectives we gathered provided a robust foundation for understanding the current landscape and identifying key areas for improvement.

The problems we identified

We created a series of problem statements. We identified more than 70 in total before narrowing down to 36, mostly because they were similar to each other.

Examples include

“Private practice lawyers lack understanding and dedicated training on climate-related issues. This affects their confidence when advising clients on them.”

“Law firms have limited understanding of biodiversity risk because it’s new and not yet integrated into mainstream law.”

“There is a lack of engagement by company boards on climate. This slows how quickly a company decarbonises its business.”

“Raising funding for climate and legal-related initiatives is time-consuming and difficult.”

We identified a range of actors across a spectrum, from law firm collaborations, to organisations working directly with c-suite executives, to those focussed on accountability and activism.

We categorised our problem statements into all of the following themes:

• Education and training
• Professional regulation
• Legal and corporate culture
• Legislation

Limitations in each of education and training, professional regulation and legal and corporate culture featured the most often. While we know the majority of problems related to these dominant themes, another limiting factor in the research is it tells us less about why the problems exist, and how they manifest in different users’ experience of the business of law.

Where our research left us

Our findings allowed us to build hypotheses that education, training, regulation and legal and corporate culture, both individually and as interconnected systems, were significant problem areas restricting the legal sector from driving meaningful change. These findings suggest that addressing these interconnected issues could create a ripple effect, potentially transforming how the legal sector engages with and influences climate and nature action.

To understand these areas more deeply, we took our research to the next stage. This involved visualising our understanding of them on a map, identifying problems, opportunities and solutions that already exist.

As we move forward, we invite legal professionals, policymakers, and other stakeholders to engage with our findings and contribute to the ongoing dialogue on how the legal sector can more effectively drive climate and nature action.

“Our research uncovered a significant opportunity for the legal sector to drive systemic change in climate action. By bridging gaps in education and professional training, we can equip legal professionals with the tools to become powerful advocates for a sustainable future.” Guillermo Miranda Garcia

We will share what we learned about vocational education, professional training and regulation in the next blog, including a downloadable version of our systems map.

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Kia ora - welcome to our new website. We've tried to ensure old links will redirect to the correct pages, but some links may no longer work. Find out more .

About us Mō mātou

About the Ministry of Health and the New Zealand health system. 

Quick links

• Consultations

New Zealand’s health system

• Government Policy Statement
• Health system roles and organisations
• Overview and statutory framework
• Vote Health

Organisation and leadership

• Chief clinical officers
• Executive Governance Team
• Ministry directorates
• Public Health Agency
• Statutory roles

Corporate publications

• Annual reports
• Briefings to incoming Ministers
• Health and Independence reports
• Mental health annual reports
• Strategic intentions
• Current vacancies
• Employee benefits
• Information for job applicants

Regulation & legislation Ngā here me ngā ture

Health providers and products we regulate, and laws we administer.

Legislation we administer

• Rest home audit reports

Assisted dying

Certification of health care services, drug checking, health practitioners competence assurance act, medicinal cannabis, medicines control, mental health and addiction, notifiable diseases, pharmacy licensing, psychoactive substances, smoked tobacco, vaping, herbal smoking and smokeless tobacco, strategies & initiatives he rautaki, he tūmahi hou.

How we’re working to improve health outcomes for all New Zealanders.

Health strategies

• New Zealand Health Strategy
• Health of Disabled People Strategy
• Pae Tū: Hauora Māori Strategy
• Rural Health Strategy
• Te Mana Ola: The Pacific Health Strategy
• Women’s Health Strategy

Programmes and initiatives

• Gambling harm
• Health workforce
• Mental health, addiction and suicide prevention
• Pacific health
• Smokefree 2025

Māori health Hauora Māori

Increasing access to health services, achieving equity and improving outcomes for Māori.

• Subscribe for Māori health updates

Ao Mai te Rā anti-racism initiative

Māori health models, te tiriti o waitangi framework, wai 2575 health services and outcomes inquiry, whakamaua: māori health action plan, statistics & research he tatauranga, he rangahau.

Data and insights from our health surveys, research and monitoring.

• New Zealand Health Survey
• Health targets

System monitoring

• Mental health and addiction targets
• Planning and performance data
• New Zealand Gambling Survey
• Past surveys

Statistics and data sets

• Māori health data and statistics
• Mental health data and statistics
• Obesity data and statistics
• Suicide data and statistics
• Tobacco data and statistics
• COVID-19 and immunisation research projects
• Gambling harm research and evaluation
• Our role in health research

Regulation and legislation Ngā here me ngā ture

Health providers and products the Ministry of Health regulates, and laws we administer.

•  Controlled drugs

In this section Kei tēnei wāhanga

Laws the Ministry of Health administers, and legislation that defines our statutory roles and obligations.

Information about abortion legislation and what the legislation means for health practitioners.

About assisted dying legislation in New Zealand, the Ministry of Health’s role regulating assisted dying services, and how to give feedback or make a complaint.

Burial and cremation

About the Ministry of Health's review of the Burial and Cremation Act 1964 and related legislation.

Certifying health care services ensures service providers, auditing agencies, and health districts provide safe and reasonable service levels.

About the Ministry of Health's statutory and regulatory role in relation to disability.

Information about drug checking services and service providers.

Environmental health officers

About the Environmental Health Officers Qualifications Regulations 1993, and being appointed as an Environmental Health Officer.

About the Health Practitioners Competence Assurance Act 20023, professions regulated under it, restricted activities, quality assurance, and how to register a new profession.

High-power laser pointers

Information about controls managing the health and safety risks from high-power laser pointers.

Human Tissue Act

The Human Tissue Act regulates how human tissue is collected and used. This section provides guidance on the consent process, the Standard for non-therapeutic use, and use for research purposes.

Ionising radiation safety

The Ministry of Health administers the Radiation Safety Act 2016 and the Radiation Safety Regulations 2016. 

Industrial hemp

Information about regulations applying to the use of industrial hemp for industry and as a food.

Medical examination of children

Guidelines for the medical examination of children under section 125 of the Health Act 1956, and information for health care workers.

The Medicinal Cannabis Agency administers the Medicinal Cannabis Scheme and ensures medicinal cannabis products meet the minimum quality standard.

Medicines Act

The Medicines Act 1981 regulates medicines, related products and medical devices in New Zealand. The Act ensures that the medicines and products used in New Zealand are safe and effective.

Medicines Control (within Medsafe) oversees local medicine distribution, administration of pharmacy licensing and drug abuse containment activities.

About the Mental Health Act and other legislation relating to mental health and addictions.

A list of the diseases that are notifiable to the Medical Officer of Health.

Psychoactive substances are regulated in New Zealand by the Psychoactive Substances Act 2013.

Regulating medicines, medical devices and natural health products

Information about proposals in development for the modern, risk-proportionate regulation of medicines, medical devices, and natural health products.

About the Smokefree Environments and Regulated Products Act 1990 and regulation of smoked tobacco products in New Zealand.

Sterilisation services

Information about current sterilisation legislation reporting requirements and support for sterilisation providers in New Zealand.

The Ministry of Health regulates vaping, herbal smoking and smokeless tobacco products, ensuring retailers, importers, manufacturers and distributors comply.

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