Resources for Legal Research
1) Types:
 Primary
3) Internet
 Secondary
 NY Courts
Website
 Helpers
 Tanbook
2) Library
 Books
 Citation
Services
4) Computer
1
A. Primary
B. Secondary
C. Helpers
Types of
Sources
PRIMARY
 This is the actual law
 Constitutions
 Statutes
 Rules and Regulations
 Cases
PRIMARY
Constitutions
 Constitutions
 Federal
 New York
 Constitutional Law
 Case Law
 Courts’ interpretation of
the constitution)
PRIMARY
Statutes
 Federal
 United States Code
 United States Code Annotated
 United States Code Service
PRIMARY
Statutes
 New York
 McKinney’s Consolidated Laws
of NY, Annotated
 Consolidated Law Service
PRIMARY
Rules and Regulations
 Federal
 Code of Federal Regulations
 New York
 New York Code, Rules and
Regulations
PRIMARY
Federal Cases
 Supreme Court
 Court of Appeals
 District Court
PRIMARY
Federal Cases
 Supreme Court
 United States Reports
 Supreme Court Reporter
 Lawyers’ Edition
 1st Series
 2d Series
PRIMARY
Federal Cases
 Court of Appeals
 Federal Reporter
 1st series
 2d series
 3d series
PRIMARY
Federal Cases
 District Court
 Federal Supplement
 1st series
 2d series
PRIMARY
New York Cases
 Court of Appeals
 Appellate Division
 Appellate Term
 Trial Courts
PRIMARY
New York Cases
 Court of Appeals
 New York Reports
 1st series
 2d series
 3d Series
PRIMARY
New York Cases
 Appellate Division
 Appellate Division Reports
 1st series
 2d series
 3d Series
PRIMARY
New York Cases
 Appellate Term & Trial Courts
 Miscellaneous Reports
 1st series
 2d series
 3d Series
Secondary Sources of Law
 These are not the law
 (The law is found in primary)
 They explain the law
 They come from
 Legal Writers/Commentators
 Lawyers
 Professors
RY
Secondary Sources of Law
A. Encyclopedias
B. Restatements
C. Hornbooks
Secondary Sources of Law
RY
A. Encyclopedias
 American Jurisprudence
 New York Jurisprudence
 Corpus Juris Secundum
Secondary Sources of Law
RY
B. Restatements
 Contracts
 Torts
 Other areas
RY
Secondary Sources of Law
C. Hornbooks
 Siegel’s New York Practice
Helpers
 Law Dictionary
 New York Digests
New York Digests
HELPER
S
 New York Cases are published in
New York Reports (NY, NY2d,
NY3d)
 This is the official reporter
 New York Cases are also published
in New York Supplement (NYS)
 Published by West
 This is unofficial
 But it contains more than just
New York Digests
HELPER
S
 The West editors take a case and
adds headnotes
 Headnotes are a summary of a
legal point made in the case
 There can be one to many
headnotes per case
 it depends on how many
legal points there are in a
particular case
New York Digests
HELPER
S
 What do they do with all those
headnotes?
 Each headnote gets a
keynumber based on similar
rules
 They organize them into topics
and publish them in Digests
 Use them to find similar cases
2
Books in Our
Library
 General
 Federal
 New York
Books in Our Library
 General
 Corpus Jurisprudence Secundum
 Law Dictionary
 Law Thesaurus
 Text Books
Books in Our Library
 Federal
 US Reports & Lawyers Edition
 US Supreme Court Digests
 Code of Federal Regulations
 US Code & US Code Service
Books in Our Library
 New York
 McKinney’s Consolidated Laws of
New York Annotated
 New York Supplement
 New York Digests
The Internet
3
The Internet
 NY Courts Website
 Search Engines
The Internet
 NY Courts Website
 New York Style Manual (Tanbook)
 Citation Services
The Internet
 Search Engines
 Google
 Bing
COMPUTERASSISTED
LEGAL RESEARCH
4
 LexisNexis
 Westlaw
On line Legal
Research
Services