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FREE LEGAL RESEARCH

FREE LEGAL RESEARCH. Wake Forest PCL Brownbag Series Jason R. Sowards. TWEN. The slides for this brown bag presentation (and all other brown bags) are available in our TWEN course: PCL Brown Bag Research Series > Course Materials > Free Legal Research. Cost-Effective Research.

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FREE LEGAL RESEARCH

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  1. FREE LEGAL RESEARCH Wake Forest PCL Brownbag Series Jason R. Sowards NOVEMBER 3, 2010

  2. TWEN • The slides for this brown bag presentation (and all other brown bags) are available in our TWEN course: • PCL Brown Bag Research Series > Course Materials > Free Legal Research

  3. Cost-Effective Research • Legal Information can be EXPENSIVE!!! • More and more legal information is being made available for free on the Internet from reliable places (such as libraries, nonprofits, and the government). • This brownbag will introduce you to some of these reliable and FREE resources that you can add to your research arsenal.

  4. Sites We’ll Cover • 1. Cornell’s Legal Information Institute • Great for:Wexand USC • 2. Thomas • Great for: Current legislation and legislative history information • 3. GPO Access & FDSys • Great for: CFR, Federal Register, Presidential documents, other legislative documents • 4. Google Scholar • Great for: Case law, patents, and articles

  5. LEGAL INFORMATION INSTITUTE (LII)

  6. Cornell’s Legal Information Institute (LII) • Free site maintained by Cornell Law School (donations accepted to keep it running) • Provides access to: • Wex (and Nolo Free Legal Dictionary) • United States Code • Code of Federal Regulations • Foreign & International Law Resources • RSS Feeds to updates

  7. THOMAS

  8. Thomas • Thomas is a web site maintained by the Library of Congress to provide free access to FEDERAL LEGISLATIVE INFORMATION • What kind of federal information? • Bills • Legislative history information (from bill  hearing  committee report  debate (Congressional Record)) • Treaties and Presidential nominations (b/c of Senate approval) • Coverage of most information goes back to mid-to-late 90s

  9. GPO ACCESS/FDSys

  10. GPO Access v. FDSys • For years, GPO Access was one-stop shopping for government information for the 3 branches of government, particularly legislative and regulatory information. • However, GPO Access, as a research tool, was never very user-friendly. Over the past several years, GPO has been developing a new research system/digital repository of authenticated (official) government information. That new system is called FDSys.

  11. Google Scholar

  12. Google Scholar • All the things you love about Google, and then some… • Great place to locate: • Case law • Law review articles • Patents (for you IP people) • Advanced searching is the way to go!

  13. Other Sites of Note • Public Library of Law (powered by Fastcase) • Cases from the U.S. Supreme Court and Courts of Appeals • Cases from all 50 states back to 1997 • Federal statutory law and codes from all 50 states • Regulations, court rules, constitutions, and more! • State Legislature Pages • Great place to find session laws and state statutes!

  14. Other Sites of Note • 3. GovTrack.us • Great for: federal legislative research by subject and member of Congress • 4. Regulations.gov • Great for: reading comments submitted for proposed rules • 5. Free Law Reviews from the ABA • Great for:full-text of over 350 online law reviews, as well as repositories hosting academic papers and publications such as CRS reports

  15. Other Sites of Note • 6. Zimmerman’s Research Guides • Great for: quick overviews of legal and business topics; links to law online from credible places; databases available on Westlaw and Lexis to help you research that topic.

  16. Parting Thoughts • Things you may not have thought about… • When you leave Wake Forest Law, you can come back and use our resources. • Live far from Wake? Other law school libraries in your area may offer access to practicing attorneys (their books and maybe their electronic resources). • Public libraries offer interlibrary loan services (for books and articles; nominal fees may apply).

  17. Questions? Reference Desk – 758-4520 sowardjr@wfu.edu

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