Legal research can be costly for students and practitioners in two ways: time and money. A SHORT & HAPPY GUIDE TO ADVANCED LEGAL RESEARCH identifies available free and fee-based legal research options as good, cheap and/or fast. This book can streamline the process of legal research involving any subject matter and during any stage of civil litigation. An overview of the litigation analytics and artificial intelligence features available from Bloomberg Law, Lexis Advance, and Westlaw Edge is also included, in the likely event you graduated from law school before 2019. Ann Walsh Long is the Head of Research & Digital Collections/Assistant Professor of Law at the Lincoln Memorial University School of Law. Ann has also worked at the Environmental Protection Agency's Headquarters Library and in four "Big Law" firms. As a former law firm librarian, Ann taught hundreds of summer and new associates how to conduct cost-effective legal research, and advised firms on how best to recover those costs from clients.
Designed as a comprehensive resource, The Pocket Guide to Legal Research is a desk reference for use by paralegal students, practicing paralegals, legal assistants, and attorneys. The easy to understand format allows the user to quickly obtain the answer to many commonly encountered research questions regarding case, statutory, secondary authority, Internet research, and legal citation. Complete with a glossary of relevant legal research, and appendices covering court opinion, elements of statute, and a research source chart; The Pocket Guide to Legal Research is the most comprehensive guide available on legal research. Written in a non-technical manner, this book will ease the transition from student to professional, and will remain a valuable resource in a legal setting.
"The fourth edition of this text addresses the needs of changing curriculum and new courses and programs in Indigenous law by including a dedicated chapter on Indigenous legal research from members of the Indigenous Law Research Unit at the University of Victoria. This new content assists Canadian common law schools and the FLSC in fulfilling the Calls to Action from the Truth and Reconciliation Committee, specifically Calls to Action numbers 27and 28."--
Legal Research Demystified offers a real-world approach to legal research for first-year law students. The book guides students through eight steps to research common law issues and ten steps to research statutory issues. It breaks down the research steps and process into "bite-size" pieces for novice researchers, minimizing the frustration often associated with learning new skills. This text also gives students context, explaining why and when a source or finding tool should be used when researching the law. The process of legal research, of course, is not linear. This book constantly reminds students of the recursive nature of legal research, and it identifies specific situations when they may deviate from the research steps. Through the book's step-by-step approach, students will connect seemingly unrelated tools (e.g., citators and the Key Number System) and understand how to leverage them to answer legal questions. Every chapter includes charts, diagrams, and screen captures to illustrate the research steps and finding methods. Each chapter concludes with a "summary of key points" section that reinforces important concepts from the chapter. This book provides students and professors with multiple assessment tools. Each chapter ends with true-false and multiple-choice questions that test students' understanding of chapter content. These questions are replicated on the book's companion website, Core Knowledge. Students may answer these end-of-chapter questions, as well as more advanced questions, on Core Knowledge and receive immediate feedback, including an explanation of why the answer is correct or incorrect. Professors can generate reports to track students' performance. Based on students' performance, professors will know whether to review a topic in more detail or to move to the next topic. (New books contain an access code to Core Knowledge; students purchasing used books can buy an access code separately.) Core Knowledge offers yet another assessment tool: interactive research exercises. These online exercises walk students through the research steps on Westlaw and Lexis Advance, giving professors the option to "flip" the classroom. Through many screen captures and tips, students can navigate both research platforms outside of class, allowing students and professors to dig deeper into the material during class. Each research exercise simulates a real-world research experience and contains self-grading questions. For example, in one exercise, students research on Westlaw to determine whether the client could recover damages against a neighbor for the emotional distress for the death of the client's dog. To answer the client's question, students must complete the research steps, including finding and reviewing secondary sources on Westlaw, using the Key Number System and KeyCite, and performing keyword searches. Professor support materials include a Teacher's Manual, sample syllabi, and sample research exams.
For upper-level law students, law clerks, and attorneys, Field Guide to Legal Research is not another exhaustive treatise but a concise, working person's guide to solving complex legal research problems. Much like a field guide, this book classifies problem types and matches them with appropriate legal research resources. It emphasizes "working the problem," "problem typing," and then application of problem types to the appropriate resources. Problems and exercises illustrate the application of constructs and techniques to particular situations. Coverage is much broader than in first-year legal research classes. The book includes problems based on government agencies, statistics, and even patent law. There are numerous "screen shots" and images to facilitate the learning process.
The ability to use a law library is central to any lawyer's effectiveness, yet is often treated as peripheral. This book is designed for the law student and will provide a grounding in legal research which will be useful for lecturers and future employers. It not only describes the tools of the lawyers trade - the literature of law for England and Wales and the European Communities - but also the techniques for using these sources effectively. It adopts two novel approaches which make it easy to use. Firstly, information about each type of legal publication is presented under standard headings, and secondly, diagrams and charts are provided where possible to outline the content of publications. It also explains how to use electronic databases, both remote online such as Lexis and CD-ROM.
Texas Legal Research, Second Edition, is a practical, process-oriented guide to the skills and resources necessary to research Texas law. The book is designed for teaching first-year students, either as a stand-alone text or in conjunction with a research text focusing on federal law. The book is also suitable for use in advanced legal research courses. Others who will find the book useful include practitioners, paralegals, college students, laypersons, and anyone needing a concise handbook on how to find and use Texas legal materials. The book begins by explaining the nature and types of legal authority. The process of legal research and control of legal research projects are described in the first chapter, with an emphasis on the integral nature of legal research and legal analysis. These concepts are revisited and reinforced throughout the book. The second chapter explains basic principles underlying legal research, factors to consider in choosing whether to search online or in print, and techniques to add power and precision to legal research. Since students often use online research tools from the beginning of their studies, the second chapter also introduces online searching techniques and principles. Research using print and online resources is explained for each type of legal resource throughout the book. The order of coverage of types of legal authority has been substantially changed in the second edition, in order to track the author's recommended research process. Secondary materials are now addressed in chapter 3, followed by chapters devoted to the resources and techniques of constitutional research, statutory research, legislative history research, administrative agency law research, and case law research. The second edition adds an entirely new chapter on Texas local government law research. The historical and governmental roots of Texas legal resources are traced for each type of primary law. Updating techniques are explained in context for each type of legal material and a chapter is devoted to the use of online citators. An appendix explains the basics of legal citation, the use of the Greenbook and the Bluebook, special rules of Texas citation, and the ALWD Guide to Legal Citation. The second edition contains a new appendix discussing techniques for searching directly in the online case databases included in Westlaw, Lexis Advance, and Bloomberg Law. Most chapters contain tables with step-by-step guides to research in particular types of legal resources, as well as summaries of other critical information. Screenshots and images of research materials are included to illustrate the lessons of the text. For each type of resource, research in federal law is addressed following the discussion of research in Texas law. This book is part of the Legal Research Series, edited by Suzanne E. Rowe, Director of Legal Research and Writing, University of Oregon School of Law.
The research process -- Researching secondary authority -- Researching constitutions -- Researching statutes and court rules -- Researching legislative history -- Finding cases in reporters and online -- Researching cases in digests and online -- Researching administrative law -- Researching Arizona tribal law -- Updating research
