Law Internet Resources

United States Law

• Legislation
• Court and Tribunal decisions, law reports etc
• Key National Bodies
• Links to Other United States Sites (State organisations, Pathfinders, Directories etc)

Legislation

Federal Legislation

• Bills
  • Library of Congress Thomas database
    Bills, Recent numbered Acts ("Public Laws"), Congressional Record (Hansard), Congressional Committees
  • Open Congress
    Text of bills (also showing amendments) and links to commentaries. Unofficial site
  • Bills
    Full text of Bills (1993+) from the Government Printing Office
  • Senate Bills page
    Text of bills and related information for bills currently before the Senate
  • IBM Many Bills: a Visual Bill Explorer
    Allows bills to be found by subject
  • Historical bills (1814-1873 incomplete)
  • Senate glossary - terminology used in considering Bills
• Acts / Statutes/ Public Laws
  • United States Code
    The US Code (cited as "USC") is the complete set of current US statutes in force arranged by subject (not by title of Act). This site allows browsing and searching of the Code as well as access by popular name of Act eg "Sherman Act". Note: the US Code is not updated frequently on the Internet. The Parliamentary Library has more current versions of the Code on the shelves at R 348.73 UNI and on LEXIS 
  • Library of Congress Thomas database
    Bills, Recent numbered Acts ("Public Laws"), Congressional Record (Hansard), Congressional Committees
  • Law Library of Congress portal to US legislation
  • Historical Acts (1789-1875, Statutes at Large)
  • Subject index to US acts, regulations, commentaries etc (Fedlaw)
• Regulations
  • United States Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) (Office of the Federal Register)
    Current regulations in force arranged by subject. This is a test site and updated daily. It is the most current version of the CFR.
  • United States Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) (Cornell University)
    Current regulations in force arranged by subject
  • Federal Register (volume 60, 1995+)
    The official daily publication for Rules, Proposed Rules, and Notices of Federal agencies and organizations, as well as Executive Orders and other Presidential Documents. Equivalent to the Commonwealth government gazette
  • Law Library of Congress portal to regulations, presidential documents and administrative agency material
• Presidential Document
  • Presidential Executive Orders
  • Federal Register (volume 60, 1995+)
    The official daily publication for Rules, Proposed Rules, and Notices of Federal agencies and organizations, as well as Executive Orders and other Presidential Documents. Equivalent to the Commonwealth government gazette
  • Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents (1993+)
     
• How our laws are made
  Detailed overview of the federal legislative process and how bills are introduced, considered and passed by Congress

State Legislation

• Full-text State statutes and legislation
• Policy Issues List (National Conference for State Legislatures)
  Summaries of state legislation for several areas

Court and Tribunal decisions, law reports etc

• Supreme Court decisions
  • 1792+ (from Justia)
  • 1893-2005 (from FINDLAW)
  • 1790+ (from lexisONE - free registration is required)
  • 1990+ (from Cornell University Legal Information Institute. Also includes over 600 of the Court's most important decisions from the founding of the court to the present, arranged by opinion author, party name, and topic.)
• Other Federal Court decisions – Court of Appeals, District Courts, Bankruptcy Courts etc
• State Court decisions
• Federal and State court decisions on Google Scholar.Use with care as this database is still new and gives irrelevant material

Key National Bodies

• American Bar Association
• American Bar Foundation
  A socio-legal research body
• American Law Institute
  A law reform body
• Congress: House of Representatives ; Senate
  • A Century of Lawmaking for a new nation: US Congressional documents and debates 1774-1875 (full text of early Congressional documents)
• Department of Justice
• Federal Bar Association
  For practitioners and judges of federal law
• Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
• Fedworld
  One stop shopping point for (US) federal government information on the World Wide Web
• JURIST: The Legal Education Network
• Law Journals
• Law Library Resource Xchange
  Research, management, electronic legislation and technology topics for legal professionals
• Legal citation
  Links to books on citing US legal material
• Library of Congress
  • Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service reports (Note - most are available in the Library through Factiva)
    • via US Department of State
    • via OpenCRS
    • CRS reports - how to access (S. Young)
  • Monitoring Congress: a revolution in access (P. Jenks)
    Lists websites for Congressional documents
• National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws
  Includes texts of uniform laws
• Office of Special Counsel
  Federal investigative and prosecutorial agency, dealing with offences in the public sector under the Civil Service Reform Act, the Whistleblower Protection Act, and the Hatch Act
• Supreme Court

Links to Other United States Sites (Pathfinders, Directories etc

• via Cornell Law School Legal Information Institute
• via Fedlaw (a portal to federal legal information)
• via FindLaw
• via Hieros Gamos
• via Justia Virtual Chase (articles, guides and directories on Internet legal research)
• via LegalEngine Legal Quicklinks
• via PublicLegal (Internet Legal Research Group)
• via University of Chicago
• via Washburn University
• via Yahoo United States Law Guide

Comments to: catherine.lorimer@aph.gov.au
Last reviewed 8 June, 2011 by the Parliamentary Library Web Manager
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