Web resources for Free Legal Research

Prepared by Joan Goodbody, Government Documents Coordinator, J. Robert Van Pelt Library, MTU.

 

General Web resources:

 

http://www.law.cornell.edu/ - Legal information through a law school website. Designed especially for law students.

http://barratry.law.cornell.edu/notify/buzz.html - BigEar listens to a variety of law-related mailing lists and newsgroups. From each, it selects messages which contain references to Net documents, and constructs a convenient cumulative listing which shows the title of the document, a link to it, and a link to the message "announcing" it on the mailing list. At the end of a week's time, the old listing is scrapped and a new one started. It thus offers a (slightly distorted) view of what's new on the Net for lawyers, and of what people are talking about.

http://www.law.cornell.edu:9999/USCA-ALL/search.html - Link from Cornell site to search US court of appeals.

 

http://www.oyez.org/oyez/frontpage - The OYEZ Project provides access to more than 2000 hours of Supreme Court audio. All audio in the Court recorded since 1995 is included in the project. Before 1995, the audio collection is selective. It remains the aim or Northwestern University is to create a complete and authoritative archive of Supreme Court audio covering the entire span from October 1955 through the most recent release.

 

http://www.findlaw.com/ - Numerous links to diverse sites for the law professional or other professionals, this is the main page.

http://biz.findlaw.com/ - Law resources for small businesses

http://consumer.pub.findlaw.com/ - Legal resources for the consumer

http://stu.findlaw.com/ - Legal resources for students

http://news.findlaw.com/ - Legal news and commentary

http://lp.findlaw.com/ - Legal resources for legal professionals

http://directory.findlaw.com/ - Find a Lawyer directory link from Findlaw.

 

http://www.hg.org/ - Hieros Gamos, legal information including news, resources, etc., in over 50 languages.

http://www.hg.org/employment.html - Hieros Gamos career center.

 

http://www.lawguru.com/ - homepage for law guru.

http://www.lawguru.com/ilawlib/index.html - The Internet Law Library (formerly the U.S. House of Representatives Internet Law Library) was originally provided to the public courtesy of the Office of the Law Revision Counsel of the U.S. House of Representatives. This was part of the Counsel's mission to make the law available to the public. Still has numerous links.

http://www.lawguru.com/search/research.html - Welcome to the Legal Research page. From here you can search on more than 535 legal search engines and tools. Please bookmark this page for future reference. Use the drop-down menu form above to select the name of the engine you want to search. Then click the "Go there!" button and the search form for that engine will appear. Simple. The list is sorted alphabetically. This site has tried to include searchable resources for every state, including cases, court opinions, codes, statutes, bills and more, whenever possible. Federal resources can generally be found alphabetically. There is a lot more.

 

http://www.lawyerexpress.com/ -Designed by a busy lawyer for busy lawyers. Basic legal information.

http://www.lexisone.com/ - Lexis One is a site for small law firms. Some information is free, but much requires payment. The following are also part of the Lexis One group of links.

http://www.lexisone.com/legalresearch/caselaw_gate.html

http://www.lexisone.com/specialoffer/getOffer?action=mainIndex

http://www.lexisone.com/store/catalog?action=main:

http://www.lexisone.com/legalresearch/legalguide/legal_guide_index.html

 

http://www.martindale.com/xp/Martindale/home.xml - Use this Locator to find a lawyer by name. Or click the tabs to search by location/area of practice, by firm, or for lawyers in corporations, agencies of the US government, or law school faculty. A&M has this database with more information.

 

http://www.washlaw.edu/ - Guide to legal research on the Internet.

http://www.washlaw.edu/directry/directry.html - Washlaw general directory.

http://www.washlaw.edu/doclaw/doclawnew.html - Washlaw Document.

http://www.washlaw.edu/washburn.txt.html - Washburn law school link in the Washlaw.

http://www.washlaw.edu/forint/admin/search.htm - search page for foreign and international law for Washlaw.

 

http://www.llrx.com/ - This site is done by Westlaw and has some free access.

http://www.llrx.com/guide/ - This is the link for the guide page in LLRX.

http://www.virtualchase.com/resources/index.shtml - A legal research guide: an annotated finding aid for legal professionals.

http://www.benefitslink.com/index.shtml - Since 1995, BenefitsLink has provided free compliance information and tools for employee benefit plan sponsors, service-providers and participants. We're independently published

 

http://www.ceoexpress.com/default.asp - Connecting executives to information that matters.

 

Statues and Regulations on the Internet

 

Federal:

Federal Judicial Center

http://www.fjc.gov - A education and research agency of the Federal judiciary. It serves its statutory mission by providing research on various aspects of the operation of the Federal judiciary. This site is valuable for more scholarly patrons researching statistical information about Federal litigation.

 

 

 

Library of Congress

http://www.loc.gov/law/guide/usjudic.html - Good for simple searches and to find federal legal information

 

The General Services Administration

http://www.legal.gsa.gov/legal29.htm - Has links to many Fderal judiciary sites

 

US Courts

http://www.uscourts.gov - This site has links to all the courts. It is a portal to all Federal case law.

Thomas

http://Thomas.loc.gov - US Congress on the Internet

 

Firstgov

http://www.firstgov.gov - Your first Click to the US Government

access to over 47 million sites

 

Fedworld

http://www.fedworld.gov - An alternate way to locate Government information

 

US Supreme Court

http://www.supremecourtus.gov - Homepage of US Supreme Court. Dockets, rulings, history, etc

 

US Code:

http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/ - Cornell

http://uscode.house.gov - Office of the Law Revision Counsel

Also available from Lawguru, Findlaw, Firstgov and GPO access.

 

Federal Regulations CFR

 

GPO Access

http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/index.html

http://www.acccess.gpo.gov/su_docs/aces/aces140.html

Also links available from most sites listed above such as Cornell, Findlaw.

State:

Multistate:

http://www.yahoo.com

http://www.google.com

http://www.prairienet.org/~scruffy/f.htm

http://www.law.cornell.edu/topics/state_statues.html - Cornell State Statues on the Internet

 

Lawlinks state and federal codes

http://resource.lawlinks.com/content/legal_research/state_codes/state_codes.htm

 

 

Piper Resources State and Local Government on the Net

http://www.piperinfo.com/state/index.cfm

 

Rominger Legal

http://www.romingerlegal.com

 

State links also found in Lawguru, Findlaw, Hieros Gamos, and Lexis One.

 

Michigan Specific:

Michigan Bar Association

http://www.michbar.org/ Lists information on the Michigan bar, access to the journal and other information on the law in Michigan and a link for public resources, opinions, and links of interest.

Michigan.gov

http://www.michigan.gov This site is the general site established by the state so that the residents will have a convenient site to go for information. By using the search function, Topics links or Quick links the user can find most information needed.

Michigan Legislature Online: http://www.michiganlegislature.org/

Michigan Courts: http://www.courts.michigan.gov/

 

Michigan Administrative Code

http://www.michigan.gov/orr/1,1607,7-142--15520--,00.html This site is how to use the Michigan administrative code.

 

Michigan Register

http://www.michigan.gov/orr/1,1607,7-142-5696-13996--,00.html This site introduces The Michigan Register which is a comprehensive source of regulatory information that complements and supplements the Michigan Administrative Code. It contains copies of all proposed administrative rules, notices of public hearings on proposed administrative rules, and administrative rules filed with the secretary of state as submitted by Michigan departments and agencies.

The Institute of Continuing Education

http://www.icle.org ICLE's mission is to provide Michigan lawyers with accessible, high-quality, continuing legal education and resource materials that enable them to practice law more effectively.

Municipal Codes

Municipal Code Corporation. Online codes

http://www.municode.com: A private sector corporation that fortunately makes free downloads available.

 

Seattle Public Library

http://www.spl.org/selectedsites/municode.html : Seattle Public Library page with

links to municipal codes.