Guide to Legal Research on the Web
I. LAWS OF THE U.S.
A. Comprehensive Legal Research Sites
i. Legal Search Engines
- Findlaw's LawCrawler
- LIBClient
- Internet Legal Research Group
ii. Law Links for Federal Government Documents
iii. Compilations of Law Links
- ABA's LawLink has links to many federal government sites, state and federal cases, legal associations, law schools, etc.
- American Law Source On-Line also contains information on Mexican and Canadian Law
- Washlaw
- FindLaw: Internet Legal Resources
- Hieros Gamos
- Law Guru
iv. Links Relating to Federal and State Court Rules
v. Other
B. Federal Resources
i. Primary
1. The U.S.Constitution
2. U.S. Statutes
a. U.S. Code
b. Publications of the Congress
- CIS Universe Access Limited to Washington University School of Law
- From Thomas
- From GPO Access
- Legislative Source Book
- U.S. Congressional Bibliographies
- Historical: A Century of Lawmaking
- Includes records of the Constitutional Congress, the Constitutional Convention and ratification debates, and records covering through the 43rd Federal Congress, 1774-1875. Includes the Journals of the Continental Congress, the Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, and the Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution (1787-1788); the Journals of the House of Representatives (1789-1875) and the Senate (1789-1875); and other historical materials.
- The online collection houses the records of the U.S. Congress up until 1875.
3. Cases
a. Supreme Court
- Supreme Court Website
- Supreme Court Decisions (LII) 1990-
- Supreme Court Decisions (Findlaw) 1893-
- Supreme Court Decisions (FLITE) 1937 - 1975
b. U.S. Courts of Appeal
- 1st Circuit
- 2nd Circuit
- 3rd Circuit
- 4th Circuit
- 5th Circuit
- 6th Circuit
- 7th Circuit
- 8th Circuit
- 9th Circuit
- 10th Circuit opinions filed between August 1995 and October 1997
- 10th Circuit opinions filed on or after October 1, 1997
- 11th Circuit opinions filed from November 1994 to March 2003
- 11th Circuit more recent opinions
- DC Circuit
- Federal Circuit
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces
- U.S. Court of Federal Claims
- U.S. Court of International Trade
- U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims
c. U.S. District Courts (Findlaw)
4. Administrative Codes and Decisions
a. Codes
b. Decisions
ii. Secondary
1. Governmental Sources
a. From the Government
- CIS Universe (Access Limited to Washington University School of Law)
- Fed World Information Network
- GPO Access
- Library of Congress
- Thomas (Legislative Information on the Internet)
b. From Private Entities
- TRAC- Syracuse University-sponsored site providing independent, and nonpartisan information on federal law enforcement by major federal agencies (DEA, IRS, FBI)
C. State and Local Resources
i. Primary
- Missouri Constitution
- Missouri Revised Statutes
- Missouri Cases (Missouri Judiciary homepage -- contains links to Missouri Supreme Court and Missouri Court of Appeal opinions, as well as other court and judicial information. Also contains information on Circuit Courts.)
- Research For Primary Source Material of all Fifty States State Legislatures, State Laws and State Regulations (courtesy the Law Librarians' Society of Washington, D.C.)
ii. Secondary
Missouri
- Missouri Judiciary
- Missouri House of Representatives
- Missouri Senate
- Missouri State Government Home Page
- The Missouri Bar
- Bar Association of Metropolitan St. Louis
- St. Louis City Ordinances
This site, which is maintained by the St. Louis Public Library, contains: the Charter of the City of St. Louis, Revised Code of the City of St. Louis, City Ordinances and the Board of Aldermen Meeting Agendas.
Uniform Laws
D. Journals and Periodicals
i. Law Journals
- Indiana WWW Virtual Library: Law: Law Journals (Search Law Journals under "By Information Type.")
- Law Journals USC
- LegalTrac SearchBank index (Access Limited to Washington University School of Law)
- Index to Legal Periodicals index (Access Limited to Washington University School of Law)
- HeinOnline
ii. General Newspapers
- NewsDirectory.com
- Chicago Tribune
- International Herald Tribune
- New York Times
- STLTODAY - St. Louis Post-Dispatch
- Washington Post
iii. Legal Newspapers
II. FOREIGN AND INTERNATIONAL LAW
A. Comprehensive International Law Links
- Electronic Information System for International Law
- Washburn's Foreign and International Law Web
- Globalex
- World Legal Resource Center
- World Legal Information Institute
- Yale Law School (International Law Page)
- University of California-Berkeley-Guide to International Law
Click under International Research - International Law Index at FindLaw
- HIEROS GAMOS; Guide to International Law
- Law Guru's International Law Links (originally the U.S. House of Representative's Internet Law Library)
B. Foreign Law Links
- Internet Chinese Research Center
- Japanese Legal Research
- Korean Legal Research on the Internet
- German Legal Research
- United Kingdom Legal Research
- French Law
- Australian Law
- South African Law
C. Other Sources
- LLRX
- Law Library of Congress: Guide to Law Online: Nations of the World
- Europa Home page
Official Server of the European Union - Lex Mercatoria
- European Union Official Texts
- United Nations
- Global Legal Information Network
- World News Connection (Access Limited to Washington University School of Law)
- Internet Legal Research Group
III. GENERAL LEGAL INFORMATION
Missouri Bar Resources
- Public Information page
Forms
Consumer Law Resources
Other
IV. WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY SITES
