Legal Reference Guide for Librarians. Handout for Legal Ease Workshop DO S & DON TS FOR LEGAL REFERENCE

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1 Legal Reference Guide for Librarians Handout for Legal Ease Workshop 2016 Annual Conference of the Pennsylvania Library Association Presented by Sue Lyons & Mary Stewart Erm Eastern Monroe Public Library DO S & DON TS FOR LEGAL REFERENCE DO provide bibliographic instruction in the use of legal materials within your library. DO advise a patron of Internet resources for finding cases, statutes, forms, court rules, and other legal information. DO provide information on bar association referral services and free or low cost legal services in your area. DO refer patrons to other libraries that are open to the public and have larger legal collections if the information the patrons are seeking cannot be found within your collection or on the Internet. Law libraries in the county courthouse are generally open to the public, but may not be staffed. DO provide handouts and pathfinders in the stacks where legal materials are located for those patrons who avoid the reference desk. DON T give legal advice. Don t interpret the meaning of a law, court decision or legal papers. Don t offer an opinion on the merits of a patron s case. Don t assist a patron in drafting legal papers, but DO direct patrons to form books or official forms online that can help them to draft documents. Don t argue with a crazy patron. Just give them what they ask for if it is in your collection. 1

2 HOW TO READ A LEGAL CITATION On a good day, a patron comes to the reference desk and not only asks to find a court decision but also has a citation to the case. Legal citations appear as cryptic letter abbreviations surrounded by numbers. For court decisions, the first number indicates the volume. The letters are an abbreviation for a set of books or case reporters that publishes cases from a particular court. The second number after the letters indicates the page number where the case begins. For example: Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98, 121 S. Ct. 523, 148 L.Ed.2d 388. Yikes! One case with three sets of numbers and letters. This is a case decided by the United States Supreme Court and there are three sets of reporters that print decisions of the Supreme Court. The official reporter for the Supreme Court is U.S. Reports, and the first citation is usually to the official reporter. The full text of the court decision is reprinted in all three reporters, but the unofficial reporters add additional material that may be useful to legal researchers. The citations to the unofficial reporters are sometimes called parallel citations. A breakdown of the first citation: The case is in volume number 531 U.S. - of U.S. Reports 98 - and the case starts on page 98 Statutes and administrative citations work in much the same way, except statutes and administrative regulations are usually divided into titles and sections. The first number refers to the title and the second number refers to the section number. For example, the citation for the federal Freedom of Information Act is: 5 U.S.C Title 5 U.S.C. - of the U.S. Code Section 552 2

3 CRIB SHEET FOR LEGAL ABBREVIATIONS Case Reporters Abbreviation Reporter Decisions of: U.S. U.S. Reports U.S. Supreme Court S.Ct. Supreme Court Reporter U.S. Supreme Court L.Ed.2d Lawyers Edition, second series U.S. Supreme Court F.3d Federal Reporter, third series U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals F.Supp. Federal Supplement U.S. District Courts A.3d Atlantic Reporter, Third series Regional reporter Pa. cases Pa. Pennsylvania Reports Pennsylvania Supreme Court Pa. Super Pennsylvania Superior Ct Reports Pennsylvania Superior Court Pa. D.&C. Pennsylvania Courts of Common Pleas County Courts Statutes and Administrative Rules Abbreviation U.S.C. U.S.C.A. U.S.C.S. Stat. F.R or Fed. Reg. C.F.R. Pa.C.S. Pa.C.S.A. Pa. Code Pa. B. United States Code United States Code Annotated United States Code Service U.S. Statutes-at-Large Federal Register (issued 5 days a week) Code of Federal Regulations (codified version of federal rules) Pennsylvania Consolidated Statutes (Official version) Pennsylvania Consolidated Statutes Annotated (Purdon s by West) Pennsylvania Administrative Code (Codified Rules) Pennsylvania Bulletin (Like the Federal Register but for Pa. Rules) Three reference works useful for decoding legal citations are: The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation, 19 th ed. Cambridge, MA: The Harvard Law Review Association, (aka: the Harvard Bluebook) Bieber s Dictionary of Legal Abbreviations, Buffalo, NY: William S. Hein & Co Introduction to Basic Legal Citation, Cornell Legal Information Institute, online at: 3

4 Statutes, Case law and Regulations The federal and state governments are both divided into three branches: the executive, judicial and legislative branches. Each branch of government makes law. The legislative branch passes statutes. Courts within the judicial branch write decisions that form the body of case law. The executive branch, through its executive agencies, issues legally binding rules and regulations. To find the answer to a legal question, a patron may need to examine the law in one, two or all three branches of the law. Most state and federal laws are now available on the Internet. Google Scholar has (published) federal case law going back to 1923 and state cases back to U.S. Supreme Court cases go back to State and federal statutes and regulations can also be found through Google and often on the website of the state library. Statute A law passed by a legislative body (Congress or the State Legislature) and signed by the head of the executive branch (the President or the Governor), or passed over the veto of the executive. Statutes are first issued as slip laws (individual laws). The laws passed during one year or one session of the legislature are bound together as session laws. Finally the law is added to a statutory code, a compilation of all of the laws currently in force, e.g., the U.S. Code or Pennsylvania Statutes. U.S. Code Pa. Statutes Case law Court decisions that are written by judges and serve as precedents in future court cases. Case law is also referred to as common law. Google Scholar: Regulations Legally binding rules and regulations issued by executive branch agencies. This area of law is also referred to as administrative law. Federal regulations are found in the Code of Federal Regulations. Pennsylvania regulations are found in the Pennsylvania Code. Code of Federal Regulations: ecfr: Federal Register: Pa. Code: 4

5 Landmark Supreme Court Cases Citations Case Name Citation Subject Amistad case 40 U.S. 518 Slavery Bolling v. Sharpe 347 U.S. 497 Desegregation Brown v. Board of Education 347 U.S. 483 Desegregation Bush v. Gore 531 U.S. 98 Presidential election California v. Bakke 438 U.S. 265 Affirmative action Citizens United v. FEC 558 U.S. 310 Campaign Finance Clinton v. Jones 520 U.S. 681 Executive immunity Furman v. Georgia 408 U.S. 238 Death penalty Gideon v. Wainwright 372 U.S. 335 Right to counsel Griswold v. Connecticut 381 U.S. 479 Privacy Grutter v. Bollinger 539 U.S. 306 Affirmative action Heart of Atlanta Motel v. U.S. 379 U.S. 241 Civil Rights Korematsu v. United States 323 U.S. 214 Japanese internment Loving v. Virginia 388 U.S. 1 Interracial marriage Marbury v. Madison 5 U.S. 137 Federalism McCulloch v. Maryland 17 U.S. 316 Federalism Miranda v. Arizona 384 U.S th Amendment rights New York Times v. United States 403 U.S. 713 Pentagon Papers case Norris v. Alabama 294 U.S. 587 Scottsboro Boys I Plessy v. Ferguson 163 U.S. 537 Segregation Powell v. Alabama 287 U.S. 45 Scottsboro Boys II Roe v. Wade 410 U.S. 113 Abortion Scott v. Sandford 60 U.S. 393 Slavery, Dred Scott case 5

6 Legal Reference Bibliography Web guides Public Library Toolkit American Association of Law Libraries. Pennsylvania Legal Research Guide Jenkins Law Library Pennsylvania Legal Research Guide Duquesne Law Library Articles on Legal Reference in Libraries Arant, Wendi and Brian Carpenter. Where is the Line? (Law Libraries and Unauthorized Practice of Law) 38 Reference & User Services Quarterly 235 (March 22, 1999). Brown, Yvette. From the Reference Desk to the Jail House: Unauthorized Practice of Law and Librarians. 13 Legal Reference Services Quarterly 31 (1994). Condon, Charles J. How to Avoid the Unauthorized Practice of Law at the Reference Desk. 19 Legal Reference Services Quarterly 165 (2001). Healy, Paul D. Pro Se Users, Reference Liability and the Unauthorized Practice of Law: Twenty Five Selected Readings. 94 Law Library Journal 133 (2002). Healy, Paul D. Chicken Little at the Reference Desk: The Myth of Librarian Liability. 87 Law Library Journal 515 (1995). Books Cohen, Morris L. and Kent C. Olson, Legal Research in a Nutshell, 12th Ed. West Group, Elias, Stephen, Legal Research, How to Find and Understand the Law, 17 th Ed. Nolo Press, Healy, Paul D., Legal Reference for Librarians, ALA, Collection Development Recommendations Black's law dictionary, 9th ed. St. Paul, MN: West Group, Nolo Press Publications. Civil Procedure (Vols. 1-3, West's Pennsylvania Forms) Pennsylvania Family Law Practice and Procedure With Forms (Vol. 17, West s Pennsylvania Practice) Drafting Wills and Trusts in Pennsylvania, PBI Press, Elder Law in Pennsylvania, PBI Press,