Legal Research on the Web

Commercial Portals and Meta-Sites

Findlaw: Findlaw has some great features such as the Lawcrawler search engine (powered by Google) and links to state codes, California Cases database back to 1934, and U.S. Supreme Court decisions back to 1893.
LexisOne: LexisOne's highlight is the free case law directory (state and federal) that is full text searchable. On the spot Shepardizing can be done for a small fee. Drawback is that registration is required.
Virtual Chase: Virtual Chase is a combination e-magazine and meta-site. The highlight of Virtual Chase is it's "Legal Research Guide" that links to and describes highlights of top web sites. This guide includes legal research and factual research web sites. Another useful tool on this site is the "How-To" section which contain a collection of how-to articles.
LLRX: LLRX contains the handy "Zimmerman's Research Guide" (aka "the law librarian's brain") which is a list of Reference questions and answers.

GPO Access: GPO Access is the one meta site that has all databases to track federal law. Includes Congressional Record, Congressional Bills, U.S. Code, Code of Federal Regulations, Federal Register, Public and Private Laws, and much more.
Thomas: At Thomas you will find Bills, Public Laws, Congressional Record, and House, Senate, and Committee Reports.
Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law: Cornell Law School's web site is great for looking up the U.S. Code and the Code of Federal Regulations. U.S. Code Entries are cross linked to entries in the C.F.R., if applicable. Another good feature of this site is the "Law About" section. It is a series of one page articles on the law about a specific topic.
U.S. Code at the House of Representatives Web Site: The U.S. Code can also be found at the House of Representatives web site. At this site, recent amendments are incorporated into the statute. It also includes a table that lists sections of the code recently affected by newly enacted laws (sorted in Public Law order or U.S. Code order).

Findlaw's Supreme Court Opinions: Findlaw has a searchable database of Supreme Court Opinions back to 1893.
U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit: U.S. Court of Appealsl for the 9th circuit contains opinions back to 1995. Slip opinions appear on the site by 12:00 PM the same day they are released.
Findlaw's circuit court database: Search all circuit courts at once with Findlaw's database (use the drop down menu and choose "all circuit courts"). Or search each individual circuit.
Federal Judiciary: The Federal Judiciary web site links to all us district courts. Click on "court links" at the top of the page.
California State Court: The California State Court page presents a comprehensive index of California courts, including: California Supreme, Appellate, or Trial Courts. Court forms can also be found here.
State Court Locator: Find individual state courts at the State Court Locator. This is a meta-site that links to all states' court sites.

Prairienet.org: Prairienet.org lists links to all State's codes.
Findlaw state law database: Findlaw also has as section of their site devoted to state law. Click on a state, then click on "Primary Materials".
Seattle Public Library: Seattle Public Library has a list (not comprehensive) of Municiple codes.
Municode.com: Municode.com is also a good place to go for municiple codes.

State of California: The state of California's Home Page has a link (located on the left side of the screen) to California legislature, constitution, code, regulations, agencies, and municipal law.
Legislative Council: California State Code is located at the Legislative Council site. Full text of House and Senate Bills are also found here.
California Senate and California State Assembly: The California Senate and California State Assembly' s Home Pages also have legislative information.
IGS at Berkeley: The University of California, Berkeley's IGS web site maintains a list of municpal codes for the state of California. This list is not comprehensive. Unfortunately, at this time it does not contain municipal code for Santa Clara County or City. But it does include municipal code for a number of neighboring cities and counties.

Findlaw's Attorney Directory: Search for an attorney or a law firm, or browse the directory.
Martindale's Attorney Directory: Another attorney search web site. Different interface from Findlaw, but many of the same features.

This page created by Monica Smith. Last updated 04/09/2002.