Internet Legal Resources for the General Reference Librarian

James Huff, Guest Editor

Law-related inquiries are among some of the most difficult questions that reference librarians in public libraries have to answer. They naturally want to assist, but lack the subject matter expertise of professional law librarians. Further, many public libraries do not have very extensive collections of legal materials.¹ For patrons seeking guidance on personal legal matters, librarians must be careful to avoid behavior that could be construed as practicing law, such as advising on a course of action or commenting on the merits of a case. Such behavior is not only illegal, but unfair to the patron.²

On the other hand, changes in the way the legal profession views electronic sources are resulting in more and more legal information being available on the Internet.³ There is now a wealth of law-related information on the Web. Unfortunately, while law librarians are usually familiar with these resources, other types of reference librarians usually are not. In addition, many of these sites are aimed at people with formal legal training. The purpose of this article is to provide a list of Internet sources of legal information that are intelligible to people who are not legal professionals, and to assist general reference librarians when faced with legal reference questions.

Legal Web Sites

The following list is highly selective, not an exhaustive bibliography. Rather, it is intended as a practical, ready reference tool for the working librarian. To that end, sites that are considered the best in each of several categories are reviewed, making it easy for the librarian or the patron to pinpoint quickly the site most likely to help answer particular questions. The list may be easily translated into a print resource for use at the reference desk, or saved as a set of legal Web bookmarks.

Site Selection Criteria

Web sites were chosen based upon their overall quality and appropriateness. To make this selection, the following criteria were applied. These criteria are generally useful in developing a Web bibliography for practical reference work, or selecting links to include on a Web page.
Is the organization of the site clear and straightforward, so that one can easily understand and navigate through it?
Is the site sponsored by a group that would be expected to provide objective and reliable information?
Is the site maintained by an institution that is likely to continue, rather than by a single individual?
Is the site one that has existed for some time, yet shows evidence of recent updating?
Is the site one that provides information that is intelligible to laypersons, rather than one that would only be useful to legal laypersons?
Can the site be used free of charge by anyone with a Web browser?
Do the pages load quickly, even on equipment that is not staet-of-the-art?

Not every site was required to meet every criterion in order to be selected. To do so would have excluded some very useful material. However, all of the sites meet most of these criteria, and a number of the sites meet all of them.

Legal Resources

Federal Resources

Cornell Legal Information Institute U.S. Code On-line. One of the best online versions of the United States Code. It allows a user to search the code by title, by popular names of laws, by citation, or by entering words or phrases to be located. The system integrates the House of Representatives and the Library of Congress Thomas services to provide updates to sections that have changed.

Villanova Federal Court Locator. This service of the Center for Information Law and Policy at Villanova University provides access to Web sites relating to the units of the federal judicial system, including the United States Supreme Court, the federal court of appeals, and the federal district courts. A logical structure makes it easy to use, and also makes it a handy ready reference tool in its own right for seeing the structure of the federal court system. It is a gateway to sites providing information on the federal courts, and, for many of the courts, online versions of court opinions, including some that may not yet be available in print. However, the user must bear in mind that this is a gateway to sites maintained by others. Some of these sites contain more complete information than others regarding the courts with which they deal.

FindLaw Supreme Court Decisions. Full-text access to decisions of the United States Supreme Court from 1893 to the present. This site allows browsing by text, searching by citation and by the names of the parties involved in the case, and full-text searching. FindLaw has added hyperlinks for citations to other decisions, if the cited decision is also part of the database.

FLITE Supreme Court Decisions. Full-text access to decisions of the United States Supreme Court from 1937 to 1975. This site allows searching by case name, or full-text searching by keyword.

Cornell Legal Information Institute Supreme Court Collection. Full-text access to the most recent decisions of the United States Supreme Court (1990 to the present). The decisions are organized by topics and by the names of the parties involved. There is also a word or phrase search feature. In addition, the site contains a file of over six hundred of the most important cases from the whole period of the court’s existence.

Thomas. This site, provided by the Library of Congress, is the best place on the Web to find information about federal legislation for the last few years, including the text of the bills that are pending or that have become law, and the text of the Congressional Record. This site is clearly organized and easy to use.

State Resources

Washburn State Law. This site from Washburn University was one of the first to attempt to organize online information relating to state governments and legislation. It contains links to sites organizing online information from all the states and the District of Columbia, as well as links to many other types of sites containing legal information.

Villanova State Court Locator. Like the Federal Court Locator mentioned above, this gateway site is a service of the Center for Information Law and Policy at Villanova University. States are arranged alphabetically, with a list of links to Web sites relating to the state’s courts under each state’s name. The maintainers of the site have attempted to be as comprehensive as possible, as witnessed by the number of links, and the inclusion of sites that are still under construction (listed as such on the main page).

Piper Resources State and Local Government on the Net. This is another site that attempts to provide links to Web resources for all the states and the District of Columbia. This one also includes links for United States territories, tribal governments, and multistate commisions and organizations.

Local Resources

Seattle Public Library Municipal Codes Online. The first, and in my opinion still the best, attempt to organize sites containing municipal codes. Links are arranged alphabetically by state, then alphabetically by municipality within each state.

Piper Resources State and Local Government on the Net. This is the same site discussed above under state resources. I thought that it was worth including separately here because legal information relating to countries and municiplaities is notoriously hard to find on the Web. Under each state, the Piper site not only lists links for Web sites relevant to that state, but also links for sites relating to local governmental units within that state. Of course, the coverage is uneven because many counties and cities do not have Web sites. Of those that do, some are comprehensive, while others may provide only a general home page for a city, or a link to a department of tourism. Still, this is an impressive effort. For those trying to find online legal information relating to local government, this is the place to start.

Legal Research

Nolo’s Legal Encyclopedia. A legal encyclopedia written in plain English, it contains articles on everything from student loans to tax problems to child care to dog ownership.

Free Advice. Short, introductory essays on a wide variety of legal topics, including aspects of family law, real estate, and employment law. The essays are generally well written and understandable to individuals without formal legal training. Note that this is a commercial site that contains advertisements that can be annoying and can sometimes slow the loading of pages. The site also offers help in finding a lawyer. Be wary of this aspect of the service. The best way to find an attorney you can trust and who is right for you is still a recommendation from someone you know.

Self-Help

Nolo. The leading publisher of print legal self-help materials is also the leading provider of online self-help documents. I referred above to Nolo’s information on legal research, but this is only one part of a comprehensive self-help law site. Ofcourse, Nolo is a commercial venture, so many of the references are to books and software that Nolo offers for sale. Still, a good deal of legal information is free. Patrons could identify Nolo books that might be useful, then check the local library’s catalog for those books or request them through interlibrary loan.

Legal Forms

All About Forms. A collection of generic legal forms, on a wide variety of topics, available for free. Of course, to make use of this site, a terminal that supports printing is required.

FindLaw Forms. Forms, forms, and more forms, plus links to other collections of still more forms. This is a much more complex site than All About Forms, and much of it is aimed at legal professionals rather than laypersons. However, it may be useful to individuals who cannot find what they want at the more basic All About Forms site. Some of the forms are specific to individual states. Again, access to a printer is necessary. Some of these forms require Adobe Acrobat Reader, but many do not.

The Legal System

Anatomy of a Murder: A Trip Through Our Nation’s Legal Justice System. A rather unusual site, created by a group of students, that uses a fictional murder trial to explain the workings of the criminal justice system. Although the writing style is amateurish,the information is well researched. Obviously the students put a great deal of work and enthusiasm into this site. It is probably most appropriate for students in the junior high through lower division undergraduates who are researching the justice system. More advanced patrons or individuals seeking answers to specific legal questions would be better served by other sites.

Taxes

Internal Revenue Service. The IRS Web site remains the premier place on the Internet for federal tax information and forms. It is well designed and easy to navigate. Be aware that this site becomes busier and busier, and therefore slower and slower, as April 15 approaches.

Northwestern University Federal and State Tax Information. This site links to the IRS pages mentioned above. More importantly, though, it contains links to the Web sites of the revenue departments of all the states and the District of Columbia. Most of these sites provide both tax information and state tax forms. Even Alaska and Wyoming are included—although these states do not have state income tax, their sites provide information and forms for other types of state taxes.

Louisiana State University Federal and State Tax Forms. An alternate site for links to pages providing federal and state tax forms.

General

FindLaw. The sites selected for review have been organized by topic to make it easier for a librarian or patron to find the exact information sought. FindLaw is a good legal meta-site for individuals who have not been able to find what they need in other Web pages. As mentioned earlier, it provides legal forms, but it contains much, much more, including links to a large number of law-related sites on a wide variety of topics, such as foreign and international resources, legal news, government information, and the Law Crawler Web search engine.

Web Sites and Resources

All About Forms, www.allaboutforms.com

Anatomy of a Murder: A Trip Through Our Nation’s Legal Justice System, http://tqd.advanced.org/2760

Cornell Legal Information Institute Supreme Court Collection, http://www.supct.law.cornell.edu/supct

Cornell Legal Information Institute U.S. Code On-line, www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode

FindLaw, www.findlaw.com

FindLaw Forms, www.findlaw.com/16forms/index.html

FindLaw Supreme Court Decisions, www.findlaw.com/casecode/supreme.html

FLITE Supreme Court Decisions, www.fedworld.gov/supct/index.htm

Free Advice, www.freeadvice.com

Internal Revenue Service, www.irs.ustreas.gov

Louisiana State University Federal and State Tax Forms, www.lib.lsu.edu/govdocs/taxes.html

Nolo, www.nolo.com

Nolo’s Legal Encyclopedia, www.nolo.com/briefs.html

Northwestern University Federal and State Tax Information, www.library.nwu.edu/govpub/topics/tax.html

Piper Resources State and Local Government on the Net, www.piperinfo.com/state/states.html

Seattle Public Library Municipal Codes Online, www.splorg/govpubs/municode.html

Thomas, http://thomas.loc.gov

Villanova Federal Court Locator, www.cilp.org/fed-ct/fedcourt.html

Villanova State Court Locator, www.cilp.org/State-Ct/index.html

Washburn State Law, www.washlaw.edu

References

Janet L. Crowther, “Legal Information for the Public: A Public Library Perspective,” Law Library Journal 84 (summer 1992): 559–65; Patricia Dewdney et al., “A Comparison of Legal and Health Information Services in Public Libraries,” RQ 31 (winter 1991): 185–96.
“Guidelines for Medical, Legal, and Business Responses at General Reference Desks,” RQ 31 (summer 1992): 554–55.
James H. Wyman, “Freeing the Law: Case Reporter Copyright and the Universal Citation System,” Florida State University Law Review 24 (fall 1996): 217–81.