legal research case law

Business development

• Billing management software
• Court management software
• Legal calendaring solutions

Practice management & growth

• Project & knowledge management
• Workflow automation software

Corporate & business organization

• Business practice & procedure

Legal forms

• Legal form-building software

Legal data & document management

• Data management
• Data-driven insights
• Document management
• Document storage & retrieval

Drafting software, service & guidance

• Contract services
• Drafting software
• Electronic evidence

Financial management

• Outside counsel spend

Law firm marketing

• Attracting & retaining clients
• Custom legal marketing services

Legal research & guidance

• Anywhere access to reference books
• Due diligence
• Legal research technology

Trial readiness, process & case guidance

• Case management software
• Matter management

Recommended Products

Conduct legal research efficiently and confidently using trusted content, proprietary editorial enhancements, and advanced technology.

Fast track case onboarding and practice with confidence. Tap into a team of experts who create and maintain timely, reliable, and accurate resources so you can jumpstart your work.

A business management tool for legal professionals that automates workflow. Simplify project management, increase profits, and improve client satisfaction.

• All products

Tax & Accounting

Audit & accounting.

• Accounting & financial management
• Audit workflow
• Engagement compilation & review
• Guidance & standards
• Internal audit & controls
• Quality control

Data & document management

• Certificate management
• Data management & mining
• Document storage & organization

Estate planning

• Estate planning & taxation
• Wealth management

Financial planning & analysis

• Financial reporting

Payroll, compensation, pension & benefits

• Payroll & workforce management services
• Healthcare plans
• Billing management
• Client management
• Cost management
• Practice management
• Workflow management

Professional development & education

• Product training & education
• Professional development

Tax planning & preparation

• Financial close
• Income tax compliance
• Tax automation
• Tax compliance
• Tax planning
• Tax preparation
• Sales & use tax
• Transfer pricing
• Fixed asset depreciation

Tax research & guidance

• Federal tax
• State & local tax
• International tax
• Tax laws & regulations
• Partnership taxation
• Research powered by AI
• Specialized industry taxation
• Credits & incentives
• Uncertain tax positions

A powerful tax and accounting research tool. Get more accurate and efficient results with the power of AI, cognitive computing, and machine learning.

Provides a full line of federal, state, and local programs. Save time with tax planning, preparation, and compliance.

Automate workpaper preparation and eliminate data entry

Trade & Supply

Customs & duties management.

• Customs law compliance & administration

Global trade compliance & management

• Global export compliance & management
• Global trade analysis
• Denied party screening

Product & service classification

• Harmonized Tariff System classification

Supply chain & procurement technology

• Foreign-trade zone (FTZ) management
• Supply chain compliance

Software that keeps supply chain data in one central location. Optimize operations, connect with external partners, create reports and keep inventory accurate.

Automate sales and use tax, GST, and VAT compliance. Consolidate multiple country-specific spreadsheets into a single, customizable solution and improve tax filing and return accuracy.

Risk & Fraud

Risk & compliance management.

• Regulatory compliance management

Fraud prevention, detection & investigations

• Fraud prevention technology

Risk management & investigations

• Investigation technology
• Document retrieval & due diligence services

Search volumes of data with intuitive navigation and simple filtering parameters. Prevent, detect, and investigate crime.

Identify patterns of potentially fraudulent behavior with actionable analytics and protect resources and program integrity.

Analyze data to detect, prevent, and mitigate fraud. Focus investigation resources on the highest risks and protect programs by reducing improper payments.

News & Media

Who we serve.

• Broadcasters
• Governments
• Marketers & Advertisers
• Professionals
• Sports Media
• Corporate Communications
• Health & Pharma
• Machine Learning & AI

Content Types

• All Content Types
• Human Interest
• Business & Finance
• Entertainment & Lifestyle
• Reuters Community
• Reuters Plus - Content Studio
• Advertising Solutions
• Sponsorship
• Verification Services
• Action Images
• Reuters Connect
• World News Express
• Reuters Pictures Platform
• API & Feeds
• Reuters.com Platform

Media Solutions

• User Generated Content
• Reuters Ready
• Ready-to-Publish
• Case studies
• Reuters Partners
• Standards & values
• Leadership team
• Reuters Best
• Webinars & online events

Around the globe, with unmatched speed and scale, Reuters Connect gives you the power to serve your audiences in a whole new way.

Reuters Plus, the commercial content studio at the heart of Reuters, builds campaign content that helps you to connect with your audiences in meaningful and hyper-targeted ways.

Reuters.com provides readers with a rich, immersive multimedia experience when accessing the latest fast-moving global news and in-depth reporting.

• Reuters Media Center
• Jurisdiction
• Practice area
• View all legal
• Organization
• View all tax

Featured Products

• Blacks Law Dictionary
• Thomson Reuters ProView
• Recently updated products
• New products

Shop our latest titles

ProView Quickfinder favorite libraries

• Visit legal store
• Visit tax store

APIs by industry

• Risk & Fraud APIs
• Tax & Accounting APIs
• Trade & Supply APIs

Use case library

• Legal API use cases
• Risk & Fraud API use cases
• Tax & Accounting API use cases
• Trade & Supply API use cases

Related sites

United states support.

• Account help & support
• Communities
• Product help & support
• Product training

International support

• Legal UK, Ireland & Europe support

New releases

• Westlaw Precision
• 1040 Quickfinder Handbook

Join a TR community

• ONESOURCE community login
• Checkpoint community login
• CS community login
• TR Community

Free trials & demos

• Westlaw Edge
• Practical Law
• Checkpoint Edge
• Onvio Firm Management
• Proview eReader

How to do legal research in 3 steps

Knowing where to start a difficult legal research project can be a challenge. But if you already understand the basics of legal research, the process can be significantly easier — not to mention quicker.

Solid research skills are crucial to crafting a winning argument. So, whether you are a law school student or a seasoned attorney with years of experience, knowing how to perform legal research is important — including where to start and the steps to follow.

What is legal research, and where do I start? 

Black's Law Dictionary defines legal research as “[t]he finding and assembling of authorities that bear on a question of law." But what does that actually mean? It means that legal research is the process you use to identify and find the laws — including statutes, regulations, and court opinions — that apply to the facts of your case.

In most instances, the purpose of legal research is to find support for a specific legal issue or decision. For example, attorneys must conduct legal research if they need court opinions — that is, case law — to back up a legal argument they are making in a motion or brief filed with the court.

Alternatively, lawyers may need legal research to provide clients with accurate legal guidance . In the case of law students, they often use legal research to complete memos and briefs for class. But these are just a few situations in which legal research is necessary.

Why is legal research hard?

Each step — from defining research questions to synthesizing findings — demands critical thinking and rigorous analysis.

1. Identifying the legal issue is not so straightforward. Legal research involves interpreting many legal precedents and theories to justify your questions. Finding the right issue takes time and patience.

2. There's too much to research. Attorneys now face a great deal of case law and statutory material. The sheer volume forces the researcher to be efficient by following a methodology based on a solid foundation of legal knowledge and principles.

3. The law is a fluid doctrine. It changes with time, and staying updated with the latest legal codes, precedents, and statutes means the most resourceful lawyer needs to assess the relevance and importance of new decisions.

Legal research can pose quite a challenge, but professionals can improve it at every stage of the process . 

Step 1: Key questions to ask yourself when starting legal research

Before you begin looking for laws and court opinions, you first need to define the scope of your legal research project. There are several key questions you can use to help do this.

What are the facts?

Always gather the essential facts so you know the “who, what, why, when, where, and how” of your case. Take the time to write everything down, especially since you will likely need to include a statement of facts in an eventual filing or brief anyway. Even if you don't think a fact may be relevant now, write it down because it may be relevant later. These facts will also be helpful when identifying your legal issue.

What is the actual legal issue?

You will never know what to research if you don't know what your legal issue is. Does your client need help collecting money from an insurance company following a car accident involving a negligent driver? How about a criminal case involving excluding evidence found during an alleged illegal stop?

No matter the legal research project, you must identify the relevant legal problem and the outcome or relief sought. This information will guide your research so you can stay focused and on topic.

What is the relevant jurisdiction?

Don't cast your net too wide regarding legal research; you should focus on the relevant jurisdiction. For example, does your case deal with federal or state law? If it is state law, which state? You may find a case in California state court that is precisely on point, but it won't be beneficial if your legal project involves New York law.

Where to start legal research: The library, online, or even AI?

In years past, future attorneys were trained in law school to perform research in the library. But now, you can find almost everything from the library — and more — online. While you can certainly still use the library if you want, you will probably be costing yourself valuable time if you do.

When it comes to online research, some people start with free legal research options , including search engines like Google or Bing. But to ensure your legal research is comprehensive, you will want to use an online research service designed specifically for the law, such as Westlaw . Not only do online solutions like Westlaw have all the legal sources you need, but they also include artificial intelligence research features that help make quick work of your research

Step 2: How to find relevant case law and other primary sources of law

Now that you have gathered the facts and know your legal issue, the next step is knowing what to look for. After all, you will need the law to support your legal argument, whether providing guidance to a client or writing an internal memo, brief, or some other legal document.

But what type of law do you need? The answer: primary sources of law. Some of the more important types of primary law include:

• Case law, which are court opinions or decisions issued by federal or state courts
• Statutes, including legislation passed by both the U.S. Congress and state lawmakers
• Regulations, including those issued by either federal or state agencies
• Constitutions, both federal and state

Searching for primary sources of law

So, if it's primary law you want, it makes sense to begin searching there first, right? Not so fast. While you will need primary sources of law to support your case, in many instances, it is much easier — and a more efficient use of your time — to begin your search with secondary sources such as practice guides, treatises, and legal articles.

Why? Because secondary sources provide a thorough overview of legal topics, meaning you don't have to start your research from scratch. After secondary sources, you can move on to primary sources of law.

For example, while no two legal research projects are the same, the order in which you will want to search different types of sources may look something like this:

• Secondary sources . If you are researching a new legal principle or an unfamiliar area of the law, the best place to start is secondary sources, including law journals, practice guides , legal encyclopedias, and treatises. They are a good jumping-off point for legal research since they've already done the work for you. As an added bonus, they can save you additional time since they often identify and cite important statutes and seminal cases.
• Case law . If you have already found some case law in secondary sources, great, you have something to work with. But if not, don't fret. You can still search for relevant case law in a variety of ways, including running a search in a case law research tool.

Once you find a helpful case, you can use it to find others. For example, in Westlaw, most cases contain headnotes that summarize each of the case's important legal issues. These headnotes are also assigned a Key Number based on the topic associated with that legal issue. So, once you find a good case, you can use the headnotes and Key Numbers within it to quickly find more relevant case law.

• Statutes and regulations . In many instances, secondary sources and case law list the statutes and regulations relevant to your legal issue. But if you haven't found anything yet, you can still search for statutes and regs online like you do with cases.

Once you know which statute or reg is pertinent to your case, pull up the annotated version on Westlaw. Why the annotated version? Because the annotations will include vital information, such as a list of important cases that cite your statute or reg. Sometimes, these cases are even organized by topic — just one more way to find the case law you need to support your legal argument.

Keep in mind, though, that legal research isn't always a linear process. You may start out going from source to source as outlined above and then find yourself needing to go back to secondary sources once you have a better grasp of the legal issue. In other instances, you may even find the answer you are looking for in a source not listed above, like a sample brief filed with the court by another attorney. Ultimately, you need to go where the information takes you.

Step 3: Make sure you are using ‘good’ law

One of the most important steps with every legal research project is to verify that you are using “good" law — meaning a court hasn't invalidated it or struck it down in some way. After all, it probably won't look good to a judge if you cite a case that has been overruled or use a statute deemed unconstitutional. It doesn't necessarily mean you can never cite these sources; you just need to take a closer look before you do.

The simplest way to find out if something is still good law is to use a legal tool known as a citator, which will show you subsequent cases that have cited your source as well as any negative history, including if it has been overruled, reversed, questioned, or merely differentiated.

For instance, if a case, statute, or regulation has any negative history — and therefore may no longer be good law — KeyCite, the citator on Westlaw, will warn you. Specifically, KeyCite will show a flag or icon at the top of the document, along with a little blurb about the negative history. This alert system allows you to quickly know if there may be anything you need to worry about.

Some examples of these flags and icons include:

• A red flag on a case warns you it is no longer good for at least one point of law, meaning it may have been overruled or reversed on appeal.
• A yellow flag on a case warns that it has some negative history but is not expressly overruled or reversed, meaning another court may have criticized it or pointed out the holding was limited to a specific fact pattern.
• A blue-striped flag on a case warns you that it has been appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court or the U.S. Court of Appeals.
• The KeyCite Overruling Risk icon on a case warns you that the case may be implicitly undermined because it relies on another case that has been overruled.

Another bonus of using a citator like KeyCite is that it also provides a list of other cases that merely cite your source — it can lead to additional sources you previously didn't know about.

Perseverance is vital when it comes to legal research

Given that legal research is a complex process, it will likely come as no surprise that this guide cannot provide everything you need to know.

There is a reason why there are entire law school courses and countless books focused solely on legal research methodology. In fact, many attorneys will spend their entire careers honing their research skills — and even then, they may not have perfected the process.

So, if you are just beginning, don't get discouraged if you find legal research difficult — almost everyone does at first. With enough time, patience, and dedication, you can master the art of legal research.

Thomson Reuters originally published this article on November 10, 2020.

Related insights

Westlaw tip of the week: Checking cases with KeyCite

Why legislative history matters when crafting a winning argument

Case law research tools: The most useful free and paid offerings

Request a trial and experience the fastest way to find what you need

• Platform Overview All-in-one legal research and workflow software
• Legal Research Unmetered access to primary and secondary sources
• Workflow Tools AI-powered tools for smarter workflows
• News & Analysis Paywall-free premium Bloomberg news and coverage
• Practical Guidance Ready-to-use guidance for any legal task
• Contract Solutions New: Streamlined contract workflow platform
• Introducing Contract Solutions Experience contract simplicity
• Watch product demo
• Law Firms Find everything you need to serve your clients
• In-House Counsel Expand expertise, reduce cost, and save time
• Government Get unlimited access to state and federal coverage
• Law Schools Succeed in school and prepare for practice
• Customer Cost Savings and Benefits See why GCs and CLOs choose Bloomberg Law
• Getting Started Experience one platform, one price, and continuous innovation
• Our Initiatives Empower the next generation of lawyers
• Careers Explore alternative law careers and join our team
• Press Releases See our latest news and product updates
• DEI Framework Raising the bar for law firms
• Request Pricing
• Legal Solutions

How to Conduct Legal Research

September 21, 2021

Conducting legal research can challenge even the most skilled law practitioners.

As laws evolve across jurisdictions, it can be a difficult to keep pace with every legal development. Equally daunting is the ability to track and glean insights into stakeholder strategies and legal responses. Without quick and easy access to the right tools, the legal research upon which case strategy hinges may face cost, personnel, and litigation outcome challenges.

Bloomberg Law’s artificial intelligence-driven tools drastically reduce the time to perform legal research. Whether you seek quick answers to legal research definitions, or general guidance on the legal research process, Bloomberg Law’s Core Litigation Skills Toolkit has you covered.

What is legal research?

Legal research is the process of uncovering and understanding all of the legal precedents, laws, regulations, and other legal authorities that apply in a case and inform an attorney’s course of action.

Legal research often involves case law research, which is the practice of identifying and interpreting the most relevant cases concerning the topic at issue. Legal research can also involve a deep dive into a judge’s past rulings or opposing counsel’s record of success.

Research is not a process that has a finite start and end, but remains ongoing throughout every phase of a legal matter. It is a cornerstone of a litigator’s skills.

[Learn how our integrated, time-saving litigation research tools allow litigators to streamline their work and get answers quickly.]

Where do I begin my legal research?

Beginning your legal research will look different for each assignment. At the outset, ensure that you understand your goal by asking questions and taking careful notes. Ask about background case information, logistical issues such as filing deadlines, the client/matter number, and billing instructions.

It’s also important to consider how your legal research will be used. Is the research to be used for a pending motion? If you are helping with a motion for summary judgment, for example, your goal is to find cases that are in the same procedural posture as yours and come out favorably for your side (i.e., if your client is the one filing the motion, try to find cases where a motion for summary judgment was granted, not denied). Keep in mind the burden of proof for different kinds of motions.

Finally, but no less important, assess the key facts of the case. Who are the relevant parties? Where is the jurisdiction? Who is the judge? Note all case details that come to mind.

What if I’m new to the practice area or specific legal issue?

While conducting legal research, it is easy to go down rabbit holes. Resist the urge to start by reviewing individual cases, which may prove irrelevant. Start instead with secondary sources, which often provide a prevailing statement of the law for a specific topic. These sources will save time and orient you to the area of the law and key issues.

Litigation Practical Guidance provides the essentials including step-by-step guidance, expert legal analysis, and a preview of next steps. Source citations are included in all Practical Guidance, and you can filter Points of Law, Smart Code®, and court opinions searches to get the jurisdiction-specific cases or statutes you need.

Searching across Points of Law will help to get your bearings on an issue before diving into reading the cases in full. Points of Law uses machine learning to identify key legal principles expressed in court opinions, which are easily searchable by keyword and jurisdiction. This tool helps you quickly find other cases that have expressed the same Point of Law, and directs you to related Points of Law that might be relevant to your research. It is automatically updated with the most recent opinions, saving you time and helping you quickly drill down to the relevant cases.

How do I respond to the opposing side’s brief?

Whether a brief is yours or that of the opposing party, Bloomberg Law’s Brief Analyzer is an essential component in the legal research process. It reduces the time spent analyzing a brief, identifying relevant authorities, and preparing a solid response.

To start, navigate to Brief Analyzer available from the Bloomberg Law homepage, within the Litigation Intelligence Center , or from Docket Key search results for briefs.

Simply upload the opposing side’s brief into the tool, and Brief Analyzer will generate a report of the cited authorities and arguments contained in the brief.

You can easily view a comparison with the brief and analysis side by side. It will also point you directly to relevant cases, Points of Law, and Practical Guidance to jump start your research.

[ How to Write a Legal Brief – Learn how to shorten the legal research cycle and give your legal brief a competitive advantage.]

How to optimize your search.

Crafting searches is a critical skill when it comes to legal research. Although many legal research platforms, including Bloomberg Law, offer natural language searching, terms and connectors (also called Boolean) searching is still a vital legal research skill and should be used when searching across court opinions, dockets, Points of Law, and other primary and secondary sources.

When you conduct a natural language search, the search engine applies algorithms to rank your results. Why a certain case is ranked as it is may not be obvious. This makes it harder to interpret whether the search is giving you everything you need. It is also harder to efficiently and effectively manipulate your search terms to zero in on the results you want. Using Boolean searching gives you better control over your search and greater confidence in your results.

The good news? Bloomberg Law does not charge by the search for court opinion searches. If your initial search was much too broad or much too narrow, you do not have to worry about immediately running a new and improved search.

Follow these tips when beginning a search to ensure that you do not miss relevant materials:

• Make sure you do not have typos in your search string.
• Search the appropriate source or section of the research platform. It is possible to search only within a practice area, jurisdiction, secondary resource, or other grouping of materials.
• Make sure you know which terms and connectors are utilized by the platform you are working on and what they mean – there is no uniform standard set of terms of connectors utilized by all platforms.
• Include in your search all possible terms the court might use, or alternate ways the court may address an issue. It is best to group the alternatives together within a parenthetical, connected by OR between each term.
• Consider including single and multiple character wildcards when relevant. Using a single character wildcard (an asterisk) and/or a multiple character wildcard (an exclamation point) helps you capture all word variations – even those you might not have envisioned.
• Try using a tool that helps you find additional relevant case law. When you find relevant authority, use BCITE on Bloomberg Law to find all other cases and/or sources that cite back to that case. When in BCITE, click on the Citing Documents tab, and search by keyword to narrow the results. Alternatively, you can use the court’s language or ruling to search Points of Law and find other cases that addressed the same issue or reached the same ruling.

[Bloomberg Law subscribers can access a complete checklist of search term best practices . Not a subscriber? Request a Demo .]

How can legal research help with drafting or strategy?

Before drafting a motion or brief, search for examples of what firm lawyers filed with the court in similar cases. You can likely find recent examples in your firm’s internal document system or search Bloomberg Law’s dockets. If possible, look for things filed before the same judge so you can get a quick check on rules/procedures to be followed (and by the same partner when possible so you can get an idea of their style preferences).

Careful docket search provides a wealth of information about relevant cases, jurisdictions, judges, and opposing counsel. On Bloomberg Law, type “Dockets Search” in the Go bar or find the dockets search box in the Litigation Intelligence Center .

If you do not know the specific docket number and/or court, use the docket search functionality Docket Key . Select from any of 20 categories, including motions, briefs, and orders, across all 94 federal district courts, to pinpoint the exact filing of choice.

Dockets can also help you access lots of information to guide your case strategy. For example, if you are considering filing a particular type of motion, such as a sanctions motion, you can use dockets to help determine how frequently your judge grants sanctions motions. You can also use dockets to see how similar cases before your judge proceeded through discovery.

If you are researching expert witnesses, you can use dockets to help determine if the expert has been recently excluded from a case, or whether their opinion has been limited. If so, this will help you determine whether the expert is a good fit for your case.

Dockets are a powerful research tool that allow you to search across filings to support your argument. Stay apprised of docket updates with the “Create Alert” option on Bloomberg Law.

Dive deeper into competitive research.

For even more competitive research insights, dive into Bloomberg Law’s Litigation Analytics – this is available in the Litigation tab on the homepage. Data here helps attorneys develop litigation strategy, predict possible outcomes, and better advise clients.

To start, under Litigation Analytics , leverage the Attorney tab to view case history and preview legal strategies the opposition may practice against you. Also, within Litigation Analytics, use the Court tab to get aggregate motion and appeal outcome rates across all federal courts, with the option to run comparisons across jurisdictions, and filter by company, law firm, and attorney.

Use the Judge tab to glean insights from cited opinions, and past and current decisions by motion and appeal outcomes. Also view litigation analytics in the right rail of court opinions.

Docket search can also offer intel on your opponent. Has your opponent filed similar lawsuits or made similar arguments before? How did those cases pan out? You can learn a lot about an opponent from past appearances in court.

How do I validate case law citations?

Checking the status of case law is essential in legal research. Rely on Bloomberg Law’s proprietary citator, BCITE. This time-saving tool lets you know if a case is still good law.

Under each court opinion, simply look to the right rail. There, you will see a thumbnail icon for “BCITE Analysis.” Click on the icon, and you will be provided quick links to direct history (opinions that affect or are affected by the outcome of the case at issue); case analysis (citing cases, with filter and search options), table of authorities, and citing documents.

How should I use technology to improve my legal research?

A significant benefit of digital research platforms and analytics is increased efficiency. Modern legal research technology helps attorneys sift through thousands of cases quickly and comprehensively. These products can also help aggregate or summarize data in a way that is more useful and make associations instantaneously.

For example, before litigation analytics were common, a partner may have asked a junior associate to find all summary judgment motions ruled on by a specific judge to determine how often that judge grants or denies them. The attorney could have done so by manually searching over PACER and/or by searching through court opinions, but that would take a long time. Now, Litigation Analytics can aggregate that data and provide an answer in seconds. Understanding that such products exist can be a game changer. Automating parts of the research process frees up time and effort for other activities that benefit the client and makes legal research and writing more efficient.

[Read our article: Six ways legal technology aids your litigation workflow .]

Tools like  Points of Law ,  dockets  and  Brief Analyzer  can also increase efficiency, especially when narrowing your research to confirm that you found everything on point. In the past, attorneys had to spend many hours (and lots of money) running multiple court opinion searches to ensure they did not miss a case on point. Now, there are tools that can dramatically speed up that process. For example, running a search over Points of Law can immediately direct you to other cases that discuss that same legal principle.

However, it’s important to remember that digital research and analytical tools should be seen as enhancing the legal research experience, not displacing the review, analysis, and judgment of an attorney. An attorney uses his or her knowledge of their client, the facts, the precedent, expert opinions, and his or her own experiences to predict the likely result in a given matter. Digital research products enhance this process by providing more data on a wider array of variables so that an attorney can take even more information into consideration.

[Get all your questions answered, request a Bloomberg Law demo , and more.]

Recommended for you

See bloomberg law in action.

From live events to in-depth reports, discover singular thought leadership from Bloomberg Law. Our network of expert analysts is always on the case – so you can make yours. Request a demo to see it for yourself.

Legal Research Fundamentals

• Research Strategy Tips
• Secondary Sources

The Different Types of Case Law Research

Popular case law databases, using secondary sources, any good case, from an annotated statute, ai and smart searching.

• Statutory Research
• Legislative History
• Administrative
• People, Firms, Witnesses, and other Analytics
• Transactional
• Non-Legal Resources
• Business Resources
• Foreign and International Law Resources This link opens in a new window

Generally, there are two types of case law research:

• Determining the case law that is binding or persuasive regarding a particular issue. Gathering and analyzing the relevant case law. 
• Searching for a specific case that applies the law to a set of facts in a particular way. 

These are two slightly different tasks. However, you can use many of the same case law search techniques for both of these types of questions. 

This guide outlines several different ways to locate case law. It is up to you to determine which methods are most suitable for your problem. 

When selecting a case law database, don't forget to choose the jurisdiction, time period, and level of court that is most appropriate for your purposes.

Note: Listed above are the databases that law students are most likely to use. It's possible that, once you leave law school, you will not have access to the same databases. Resources such as Fastcase  or Casetext may be your go-to. For any database, take the time to familiarize yourself with the basic and advanced search functions. 

Check out the Secondary Sources tab for information about how to locate a useful secondary source. 

Remember: secondary sources take the primary source law and analyze it so that you don't have to. Take advantage of the work the author has already done!

What do we mean by 'any good case'? 

A case that addresses the issue you care about. We can use the citing relationships and annotations found in case law databases to connect cases together based on their subject matter. You may find such a case from a secondary source, case law database search, or from a colleague.

How can we use one good case? 

1. Court opinions typically cited to  other cases to support their legal conclusions. Often these cited cases include important and authoritative decisions on the issue, because such decisions are precedential. 

2. Commercial legal research databases, including Lexis, Westlaw, and Bloomberg, supplement cases with  headnotes . Headnotes allow you to quickly locate subsequent cases that cite the case you are looking at with respect to the specific language/discussion you care about. 

3. Links to topics or Key Numbers. Clicking through to these allows you to locate other cases with headnotes that fall under that topic. Once you select a suitable Key Number, you can also narrow down with keywords. A case may include multiple headnotes that address the same general issue.

4.  Subsequent citing cases.  By reading cases that have cited to the case you've started with, you can confirm that it remains "good law" and that its legal conclusions remain sound. You can also filter the citing references by jurisdiction, treatment, depth of treatment, date, and keyword, allowing you to focus your attention on the most relevant sub-set of cases.

5. Secondary sources! Useful secondary sources are listed in the Citing References. This can be a quick way to locate a good secondary source. 

NOTE: Good cases may come in many forms. For example, a recent lower court decision might lead you to the key case law in that jurisdiction, while a higher court decision from a few years back might be more widely-cited and lead you to a wider range of subsequent interpretive authority (and any key secondary sources). 

What is an annotated statute?

An annotated statute is simply a statute enhanced with editorial content. In Lexis and Westlaw, this editorial content provides the following: 

Historical Notes about amendments to the statute. These are provided below the statutory text (Lexis) or under the History tab (Westlaw). 

Case Notes  provided either at the bottom of the page (Lexis) or under the Notes of Decisions tab (Westlaw). These are cases identified by the publisher as especially important or useful for illustrating the case law interpreting the statute. They are organized by issue and include short summaries pertaining to the holding and relevance are provided for each case.  

Other Citing References  allow you to locate all other material within Lexis and Westlaw that cite to the statute. This includes secondary sources (always useful) and all case law that cites to that specific section. You can narrow down by keywords, jurisdiction, publication status, etc. In Lexis, click the Shepard's link. In Westlaw, click the Citing References tab.

Lexis, Westlaw, and Bloomberg are all actively developing tools to lead you to cases more quickly. These include: 

Westlaw's recommendations and WestSearch Plus. These will show up in the "Suggestions" option that appears when you start typing into the search bar. 

Lexis Ravel View. When you search the case database in Lexis and click on the Ravel icon, you will see an interactive visualization of the citing relationships between the first 75 cases that appear in your results list, ranked by relevance.

Bloomberg's "Points of Law" feature in the Litigation Intelligence Center also allows users to visualize the citing relationships among cases meeting their search criteria.

• << Previous: Secondary Sources
• Next: Statutory Research >>
• Last Updated: Apr 5, 2024 2:06 PM
• URL: https://law.upenn.libguides.com/researchfundamentals

Legal Research

• Statutory Law
• Regulations
• Secondary sources
• Citing Legal Resources

Case Law Resources

• Caselaw Access Project The Caselaw Access Project (CAP), maintained by the Harvard Law School Library Innovation Lab, includes "all official, book-published United States case law — every volume designated as an official report of decisions by a court within the United States...[including] all state courts, federal courts, and territorial courts for American Samoa, Dakota Territory, Guam, Native American Courts, Navajo Nation, and the Northern Mariana Islands." As of the publication of this guide, CAP "currently included all volumes published through 2020 with new data releases on a rolling basis at the beginning of each year."
• CourtListener Court Listener is a free and publicly accessible online platform that provides a collection of legal resources and court documents, including court opinions and case law from various jurisdictions in the United States. It includes PACER data (the RECAP Archive), opinions, or oral argument recordings.
• FindLaw Caselaw Summaries Archive FindLaw provides a database of case law from the U.S. Supreme Court and U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeal, as well as several state supreme courts. It includes U.S. Supreme Court Opinions, U.S. Federal Appellate Court Opinions and U.S. State Supreme, Appellate and Trial Court Opinions. Search for case summaries or by jurisdiction.
• FindLaw Jurisdiction Search FindLaw provides a database of case law from the U.S. Supreme Court and U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeal, as well as several state supreme courts. It includes U.S. Supreme Court Opinions, U.S. Federal Appellate Court Opinions and U.S. State Supreme, Appellate and Trial Court Opinions. Search for case summaries or by jurisdiction.
• Google Scholar for Case Law Google Scholar offers an extensive database of state and federal cases, including U.S. Supreme Court Opinions, U.S. Federal District, Appellate, Tax, and Bankruptcy Court Opinions, U.S. State Appellate and Supreme Court Opinions, Scholarly articles, papers, and reports. To get started, select the “case law” radio button, and choose your search terms.
• Justia Justia offers cases from the U.S. Supreme Court, U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeal, and U.S. District Courts. Additionally, you may find links to many state supreme court and intermediate courts of appeal cases. Content includes U.S. Supreme Court Opinions, U.S. Federal Appellate & District Court Opinions, Selected U.S. Federal Appellate & District Court dockets and orders and U.S. State Supreme & Appellate Court Opinions.

An interdisciplinary, international, full-text database of over 18,000 sources including newspapers, journals, wire services, newsletters, company reports and SEC filings, case law, government documents, transcripts of broadcasts, and selected reference works.

• PACER (Public Access to Court Electronic Records) PACER is a nationwide database for accessing federal court documents, including case dockets. It covers U.S. District Courts, Bankruptcy Courts, and the U.S. Court of Appeals. Users can search for and access federal case dockets and documents for a fee.
• Ravel Law Public Case Access "This new Public Case Access site was created as a result of a collaboration between the Harvard Law School Library and Ravel Law. The company supported the library in its work to digitize 40,000 printed volumes of cases, comprised of over forty million pages of court decisions, including original materials from cases that predate the U.S. Constitution."
• The RECAP Archive Part of CourtListener, RECAP provides access to millions of PACER documents and dockets.

State Courts

• State Court Websites This page provides a list of various state court system websites by state.
• Pennsylvania Judiciary Web Portal The Pennsylvania Judiciary Web Portal provides the public with access to various aspects of court information, including appellate courts, common pleas courts and magisterial district court docket sheets; common pleas courts and magisterial district court calendars; and PAePay.
• Supreme Court of Pennsylvania Opinions

US Supreme Court

• US Reports he opinions of the Supreme Court of the United States are published officially in the United States Reports.
• US Reports through HeinOnline
• << Previous: Start
• Next: Statutory Law >>
• Last Updated: Apr 5, 2024 3:44 PM
• URL: https://guides.library.cmu.edu/legal_research

Library electronic resources outage May 29th and 30th

Between 9:00 PM EST on Saturday, May 29th and 9:00 PM EST on Sunday, May 30th users will not be able to access resources through the Law Library’s Catalog, the Law Library’s Database List, the Law Library’s Frequently Used Databases List, or the Law Library’s Research Guides. Users can still access databases that require an individual user account (ex. Westlaw, LexisNexis, and Bloomberg Law), or databases listed on the Main Library’s A-Z Database List.

• Georgetown Law Library
• Research Process

Case Law Research Guide

Introduction.

• Print Case Reporters
• Online Resources for Cases
• Finding Cases: Digests, Headnotes, and Key Numbers
• Finding Cases: Terms & Connectors Searching

Key to Icons

• Georgetown only
• On Bloomberg
• More Info (hover)
• Preeminent Treatise

Every law student and practicing attorney must be able to find, read, analyze, and interpret case law. Under the common law principles of stare decisis, a court must follow the decisions in previous cases on the same legal topic. Therefore, finding cases is essential to finding out what the law is on a particular issue.

This guide will show you how to read a case citation and will set out the sources, both print and online, for finding cases. This guide also covers how to use digests, headnotes, and key numbers to find case law, as well as how to find cases through terms and connectors searching.

To find cases using secondary sources, such as legal encyclopedias or legal treatises, see our Secondary Sources Research Guide . For additional strategies to find cases, like using statutory annotations or citators, see our  Case Law Research Tutorial . Our tutorial also covers how to update cases using citators (Lexis’ Shepard’s tool and Westlaw’s KeyCite).

Basic Case Citation

A case citation is a reference to where a case (also called a  decision  or an  opinion  ) is printed in a book. The citation can also be used to retrieve cases from  Westlaw  and  Lexis . A case citation consists of a volume number, an abbreviation of the title of the book or other item, and a page number.  

The precise format of a case citation depends on a number of factors, including the jurisdiction, court, and type of case. You should review the rest of this section on citing cases (and the relevant rules in  The Bluebook ) before trying to format a case citation for the first time. See our Bluebook Guide for more information.

The basic format of a case citation is as follows:

Parallel Citations

When the same case is printed in different books, citations to more than one book may be given. These additional citations are known as  parallel citations .

Example: 265 U.S. 274, 68 L. Ed. 1016, 44 S. Ct. 565.

This means that the case you would find at page 565 of volume 44 of the  Supreme Court Reporter  (published by West) will be the same case you find on page 1016 of volume 68 of  Lawyers' Edition  (published by Lexis), and both will be the same as the opinion you find in the official government version,  United States Reports . Although the text of the opinion will be identical, the added editorial material will differ with each publisher.

Williams Library Reference

Reference Desk : Atrium, 2nd (Main) Floor (202) 662-9140 Request a Research Consultation  

Case law research tutorial.

Update History

Revised 4/22 (CMC) Updated 10/22 (MK) Links 07/2023 (VL)

• Next: Print Case Reporters >>
• © Georgetown University Law Library. These guides may be used for educational purposes, as long as proper credit is given. These guides may not be sold. Any comments, suggestions, or requests to republish or adapt a guide should be submitted using the Research Guides Comments form . Proper credit includes the statement: Written by, or adapted from, Georgetown Law Library (current as of .....).
• Last Updated: Feb 29, 2024 1:03 PM
• URL: https://guides.ll.georgetown.edu/cases

• Law Library

Free Online Legal Research

• Getting Started

Reliable Free Primary Law Sources

Starting with secondary sources.

• United States Constitution
• Federal Legislative Branch Resources
• Federal Cases
• Other Court/Judicial Information
• Federal Administrative Law
• California Law
• Local Government Law
• Law Reviews & Journals
• Free Legal Forms
• Legal Research Guides
• Dictionaries & Abbreviations/Acronyms
• Legal News & Blogs

Important Note About Access to Databases

Be sure to read the access to databases guide carefully before beginning your research..

The internet contains no shortage of free law-related materials. The challenge is to locate accurate and authoritative sources of legal information. This guide attempts to aid you in that challenge. 

This guide covers both federal and California law sources as well as sources for locating the laws of local jurisdictions. As you consult some of the sources listed in this guide, keep in mind the following limitations with respect to free online legal research sources: 

• You will often not find everything you need for free online. For example, you will not find most legal treatises and practice guides available for free on the internet.
• It is often more cost-effective to use a subscription database for your legal research. For example, while you can find the federal and California statutory code compilations for free on the internet, the free versions do not include case annotations, which can provide an efficient way of locating cases that interpret the statutes. 
• It may be easier to start your research using print sources. Many print sources include subject indexes, which can often assist with identifying relevant search terms. It is also often easier to browse legal sources in print since you can more readily go back and forth between pages and sections. 

Links to other UCLA Law Library research guides containing information about print and/or subscription databases are included in other parts of this guide. There are a variety of subscription databases and plans available for researching the law. While the major legal databases, Lexis, Westlaw, and Bloomberg Law can be quite expensive given the extensive amount of content and varied searching options they provide, individuals and small firms may be able to subscribe to more limited versions of these databases at a lower cost. Further, limited use of these and other subscription databases may be available for free at a local public law library, and many colleges and universities also offer access to limited versions of Lexis and Westlaw (Nexis Uni and Westlaw Campus Research) and other subscription databases.  

Finally, in recent years, several lower cost databases have become available, including FastCase, CaseText, and CEB. For more information about these databases, consult the UCLA Law Library's Workshop series guide "Beyond the Big Two: Alternative Legal Research Tools."  

The federal government and most of the states post copies of their statutes, regulations, and cases online. Additionally, some third-parties (such as the Cornell Legal Information Institute or CLII) gather freely available information and make it easier to browse and search. The chart below lists reliable sources of primary law for the U.S. federal government and California. Note that California's online regulations and online case law are made available through "free" portals provided by Westlaw and Lexis, respectively. This is a common practice for states, but these portals are missing many of the features of paid Westlaw and Lexis databases. 

For a list of online primary resources from other states, please see the excellent State Online Legal Information  website, provided by the Digital Access to Legal Information committee of the American Association of Law Libraries. There, you can browse government sources of opinions, session laws, statutory codes, administrative registers, and administrative codes for each state.

When conducting legal research on a topic you are not very familiar with, it is often helpful to begin your research with a secondary source, such as a treatise, legal encyclopedia, or article, which can provide useful background information and analysis and point you in the right direction.  While treatises, legal encyclopedias and certain other types of specialized legal secondary sources are typically only available through subscription databases or in print form, articles on law topics are widely available for free on the internet (see the Law Reviews & Journals and Legal News & Blogs pages of this guide for more information). 

Reports from the Congressional Research Service (CRS)  can also be helpful in providing a good overview of the law, particularly with respect to issues affected by federal legislation. The CRS website has fairly comprehensive coverage of CRS reports from 2018 to the present and selective coverage of reports prior to 2018. For additional older CRS reports, consult one of the archival CRS reports websites listed on the Federal Legislative Branch Resources page of this guide.  

For additional background information and/or commentary on a particular legal topic, consult one or more of the following websites:

• HG.org  (browse the "Learn about the Law" and "Legal Articles" menus)
• Cornell Law School's Legal Information Institute's Wex Legal Dictionary and Encyclopedia  (browse or search for legal topics)  
• Findlaw  (browse the "Learn About the Law" menu)
• Justia  (browse the topics under the "Legal Guides" heading)
• Lawyer.com (browse the "Legal Articles" menu)

Finally, if you wish to locate print versions of secondary sources, check out our Secondary & Practice Guides library guide, which lists secondary sources available in print at the UCLA Law Library (in addition to those available through subscription databases). 

If you're not able to visit the UCLA Law Library, find another law library in your state using the below links.

• LA Law Library The LA Law Library is located in downtown Los Angeles and has a wide-ranging collection of print and electronic resources.
• Find Your Local California Law Library Every county in California has a public law library. This link will provide contact information and the website (if applicable) for your county (courtesy of the Law Library of San Bernardino County).
• Map of Law Libraries Across the Country This Google Map contains contact information and locations for various public law libraries across the United States and its territories. Any person who uses this map should contact the law library of interest to determine hours, collection, and access policies.
• Next: Federal Law >>
• Last Updated: Apr 27, 2024 2:23 PM
• URL: https://libguides.law.ucla.edu/freeonlinelegalresearch

© The Regents of the University of California. UCLA School of Law. All Rights Reserved.

Pritzker Legal Research Center

Researching case law, what do you need, where to find free case law online.

• Finding Cases
• Determining if Case Law is Still Good

Research Tip

Keep records of your work throughout the process.  Make notes of where you searched and your results from each step.  

This will keep you from having to repeat steps and will help you recall what search terms you used.  If you cannot find a definitive answer, you will be also able to report on what you did find and where you looked.

• Most authoritative statement of rule(s) from high court.
• Most recent reaffirmation of rule(s) from the binding lower courts.
• Which case most approximates your case facts? Do any highly analogous cases exist in other jurisdictions (especially if their overall legal principles are similar)? Typically, real world assignments do not precisely match precedents. The best lawyers are those who see connections between cases with superficial dissimilarities. 
• Which cases state the principles in the most advantageous way? In which cases does the position you represent win (e.g., the defendant, the movant, etc.)? 
• What trouble lurks in the cases that your opponent will exploit in attacking your arguments? 
• What trends can be identified in the cases (e.g., “no court has ever . . .”)? 
• What overarching principles can you synthesize into a framework to demonstrate to a court, even if the framework is not specifically articulated by courts? Are there related principles that may help support arguments you want to make? 

This guide discusses researching case law using Lexis, Westlaw and Bloomberg Law, the commercial databases most frequently used in law firms.  However, there are many free options for conducting case law research online. 

See the Library of Congress's Guide for more information:

• How To Find Free Case Law Online - Library of Congress A research guide to help you locate free case law on the internet using Google Scholar, CourtListener, FindLaw, Justia, and Public Library of Law (PLoL).

This research guide was last revised and updated on 8/22/2019. 

• Next: Finding Cases >>
• Last Updated: Aug 22, 2019 1:57 PM
• URL: https://library.law.northwestern.edu/cases

Free Legal Research Resources - United States

Federal law & gov't docs, secondary sources, data sources, getting help, how to use this guide.

This guide contains selected, free, online United States federal and state legal research materials.

Many lawyers have access to paid databases. Yet, combining paid and free resources, can help them to avoid potentially expensive searches. According to a 2020 Legal Technology Survey Report, nearly 60% of lawyers “say they regularly use free online resources to conduct legal research.”

• Legal Technology - ABA Legal Profile

For researchers without access to paid databases, the following resources may be essential. Legal research is often more effective when using a local law library. To learn more about law libraries throughout the United States, visit:

• Local Law Libraries by AJ Blechner Last Updated Apr 12, 2024 617 views this year

Range of Materials

The Constitution

Statutes and Legislative Materials

Statutes and legislative materials are becoming available freely online, with increasing frequency. Free resources can be a great starting place for statutory research. However, always make sure you confirm your findings in an authoritative version of the law.

Supreme Court

Case Law and Court Documents

Federal case law and court documents are often available freely online, particularly recently decided cases. Check the website of the deciding court for digital copies of their cases. In addition, the following resources provide free case law.

Case Validation

Case involves ensuring that cases have not been overruled or negatively impacted by later caselaw. Case searching and retrieval through free databases is increasingly achievable. However, paid services are still most often used to validate cases. Tools that facilitate this case validation process are called citators. The best way to access free citators is through state and local public law libraries. To find a state or local law library visit:

Executive Documents

State Statutes and Regulations

Many states and localities publish some or all of their legislative materials on their website. Consider starting with the website of the state or locality in question. Remember, materials on official government websites, may not be the “official copy.” The National Conference of State Legislators provides a list of State Legislative Websites.

The sources below provide alternatives for hard-to-find state materials.

State Case Law and Court Documents

Courts are increasingly making their materials freely available online, frequently via the court website. This is particularly true for state Supreme Courts. When looking for state case law, consider starting with the website of the deciding court. The National Center for State Courts provides a list of state court websites.

U.S. Treaties

Several government-sponsored websites provide the full-text of U.S. treaties on the web. Refer to the list below for date ranges for each sources.

Foreign & International Law

For free resources on foreign and international law, see our foreign and international law guide:

• Free Legal Research Resources - Foreign & International by AJ Blechner Last Updated Sep 12, 2023 555 views this year

Journal Search & Legal Opinions - Google Scholar

Google Scholar offers access to many legal documents including patents, legal opinions and journals. Use the search box below and select the appropriate options from the dropdown menu at the top left of your screen.

While many journals are only available through paid databases, high-quality, open access journals are increasingly common. The following sources collect freely available journal articles.

Books, Dictionaries, Encyclopedias, Treatises, Dissertations, Etc.

Secondary sources are also increasingly available online for free. 

Federal Data Sources

Many government data sources are made available to the public for free online. Check the websites of relevant agencies or organizations to look for additional data.

• Additional sources are available on the Harvard Law School Library's website.

Contact Us!

  Ask Us!  Submit a question or search our knowledge base.

Chat with us!  Chat   with a librarian (HLS only)

Email: [email protected]

 Contact Historical & Special Collections at [email protected]

  Meet with Us   Schedule an online consult with a Librarian

Hours  Library Hours

Classes  View  Training Calendar  or  Request an Insta-Class

 Text  Ask a Librarian, 617-702-2728

 Call  Reference & Research Services, 617-495-4516

This guide is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License .

You may reproduce any part of it for noncommercial purposes as long as credit is included and it is shared in the same manner. 

• Last Updated: Apr 12, 2024 4:50 PM
• URL: https://guides.library.harvard.edu/law/free

Harvard University Digital Accessibility Policy

• Find a Lawyer
• Ask a Lawyer
• Research the Law
• Law Schools
• Laws & Regs
• Newsletters
• Justia Connect
• Pro Membership
• Basic Membership
• Justia Lawyer Directory
• Platinum Placements
• Gold Placements
• Justia Elevate
• Justia Amplify
• PPC Management
• Google Business Profile
• Social Media
• Justia Onward Blog

US Case Law

The United States Supreme Court is the highest court in the United States. Lower courts on the federal level include the US Courts of Appeals, US District Courts, the US Court of Claims, and the US Court of International Trade and US Bankruptcy Courts. Federal courts hear cases involving matters related to the United States Constitution, other federal laws and regulations, and certain matters that involve parties from different states or countries and large sums of money in dispute.

Each state has its own judicial system that includes trial and appellate courts. The highest court in each state is often referred to as the “supreme” court, although there are some exceptions to this rule, for example, the New York Court of Appeals or the Maryland Court of Appeals. State courts generally hear cases involving state constitutional matters, state law and regulations, although state courts may also generally hear cases involving federal laws. States also usually have courts that handle only a specific subset of legal matters, such as family law and probate.

Case law, also known as precedent or common law, is the body of prior judicial decisions that guide judges deciding issues before them. Depending on the relationship between the deciding court and the precedent, case law may be binding or merely persuasive. For example, a decision by the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit is binding on all federal district courts within the Fifth Circuit, but a court sitting in California (whether a federal or state court) is not strictly bound to follow the Fifth Circuit’s prior decision. Similarly, a decision by one district court in New York is not binding on another district court, but the original court’s reasoning might help guide the second court in reaching its decision.

Decisions by the US Supreme Court are binding on all federal and state courts.

US Federal Courts

Reported opinions from the us federal courts of appeals.

• Federal Reporter, 2nd Series (F.2d) (1924-1993)
• Federal Reporter, 3rd Series (F.3d) (1993-present)

Opinions From the US Federal Courts of Appeals

• US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
• US Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces
• US Court of International Trade
• US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review
• Bankruptcy Reporter (B.R.) (1980-present)
• Federal Reporter, 2nd Series (F.2d) (1924-1932)
• Federal Supplement (F. Supp.) (1933-1998)
• Federal Supplement, 2nd Series (F. Supp. 2d) (1998-present)
• Connecticut
• District of Columbia
• Massachusetts
• Mississippi
• New Hampshire
• North Carolina
• North Dakota
• Pennsylvania
• Rhode Island
• South Carolina
• South Dakota
• West Virginia
• US District Court for the District of Guam
• US District Court for the District of Puerto Rico
• US District Court for the District of the Northern Mariana Islands
• US District Court for the District of the US Virgin Islands
• Emergency Court of Appeals (1942-1974)
• US Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims
• US Court of Claims (1855-1982)
• US Court of Customs and Patent Appeals (1909-1982)
• US Court of Federal Claims
• US Tax Court

State Courts

Foreign and international courts.

• Australia Courts
• Canada Courts
• Israel Courts
• United Kingdom Courts
• International Courts
• Bankruptcy Lawyers
• Business Lawyers
• Criminal Lawyers
• Employment Lawyers
• Estate Planning Lawyers
• Family Lawyers
• Personal Injury Lawyers
• Estate Planning
• Personal Injury
• Business Formation
• Business Operations
• Intellectual Property
• International Trade
• Real Estate
• Financial Aid
• Course Outlines
• Law Journals
• US Constitution
• Regulations
• Supreme Court
• Circuit Courts
• District Courts
• Dockets & Filings
• State Constitutions
• State Codes
• State Case Law
• Legal Blogs
• Business Forms
• Product Recalls
• Justia Connect Membership
• Justia Premium Placements
• Justia Elevate (SEO, Websites)
• Justia Amplify (PPC, GBP)
• Testimonials

Introduction to Legal Research

Introduction

• Legislative Branch (statutory law)

The Judicial Process

Federal court system, finding a case, finding a case: annotated codes, finding a case: digests, find a case: legal encyclopedias, additional places to access federal case law, case reporters, reading a case citation, additional guides.

• Executive Branch (administrative law)
• Secondary Sources
• Georgia Law

Case Law and Its Authority

Case law is the collection of reported cases that form the body of law withing a given jurisdiction.  It is based upon judicial opinions by various courts, which may set future precedent.

Courts in the United States adhere to stare decisis , which generally means that courts respect and adhere to the precedent of previous decisions.  However, a court does not have to stand by a decision that is not binding precedent.  Generally courts will follow the decisions of higher courts in their jurisdiction.  Therefore the effect of a court's decision on other courts will depend both on the level of the court and its jurisdiction.  A decision by the United States Supreme Court is binding precedent in all courts. 

A decision by the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit would not be binding on the United States Supreme Court or courts from another circuit.  However, it would be binding in all lower courts of the 11th Circuit.

Publication of Case Law

Not all case law is published.  Generally, appellate court decisions that will be used as future precedent are published (reported) in sources (case reporters) specific to that court.  Attorneys use published case law as a means to interpret the law.  For these reasons, few trial court decisions are published in case reporters.

A case starts at the trial court level, which could either be a trial by judge or trial by jury.  Generally, evidence and witnesses are presented at the trial court level.

An appellate court will hear appeals from parties seeking to change the result of the case heard at the trial court.  An appellate court will not answer questions of fact, meaning they will not review the evidence in a case.  Instead, the appellate court rules on questions of law, which means it considers legal issues.  

Because of the parallel system between state courts and federal courts, researching case law can be difficult and complex.  A researcher will often need to determine if their issue is one that is inherently federal or state.  Even then, some issues can overlap each other and require a state and federal analysis. 

The federal court system is made up of the following courts, excluding the specialized courts: 

The following link provides a map and additional information on the 11 circuits, the federal circuit, and the Supreme Court.

A researcher will not always have a case citation when they begin their research.  Often times a researcher will have an issue or topic that are looking for case law on.  Without a case citation, a researcher would have a daunting challenge trying to go straight to a case reporter and locate a case on their topic.  However, there are several avenues that a researcher can go down if they do not have a citation for a case.

Here are a few suggestions when looking for case law without a citation:

• Annotated Codes (statutes): annotated codes such as the United States Code Annotated (West) or the United States Code Service (LexisNexis) provide researchers with citations to case law. 
• Digests: provide an indexing function for cases in the National Reporter system.  
• Legal Encylopedias: cover a wide range of topics that are arranged alphabetically.  Many of the topics include footnotes with citations to relevant case law.     
• LexisNexis Academic: research system that allows users to search for cases by party name, case citation, or by keyword searches. 

Each of these methods are described in more detail in the boxes that follow.

Annotated codes produced by West and LexisNexis are a great way to find cases on a particular topic.  As mentioned on the Legislative tab , not every law is statutory law, therefore this would not be a good place to find cases where the underlying law is not rooted in statutory law.  However, for issues that do invoke statutory law, the annotated codes are an efficient way to find cases that have cited that particular statute.

Both the United States Code Annotated and the United States Code Service provide case citations after the text of the statute.  The cases will be grouped together by topic and they will often include a short summary.  This provides the researcher with an easier method of locating case law that deals with their particular issue.

For more information on finding a statute in an annotated code, please refer back to the  Legislative tab .  

West's Digests provide an indexing function for the cases in the National Reporter System.  The digests allow researchers to locate cases by subject from any jurisdiction.  In addition, the digests provide an abstracting function, giving researchers short summaries of the points of law discussed in the indexed opinions.  This enables researchers to determine if a case would be worth further exploring without having to read the entire case.   

The Digest System sub-divides the law into over 450 Topics , which are broad legal issues, and then further sub-divided into Key Numbers , which are assigned to specific legal issues within the broader issue.  Topics and Key Numbers are consistent throughout West's System - the same subject arrangement is applied to all cases from every jurisdiction, so that if you find a case from one jurisdiction that discusses a legal issue you are researching, you can use the topic and key number for that isssue to find other cases from other jurisdictions that discuss the same issue.  Remember that you need to know both the topic AND the key number to search the digests.

Currently, the GSU College of Law Library has West's Federal Practice Digest in its collection.  There are two ways that one can search the federal practice digest:

• Table of Cases:   The table of cases lists all of the cases indexed in the digest in alphabetical order.  In addition to the case name and citation, the table of cases also provides the Topics and Key Numbers that apply to that particular case.  This is a great way for a researcher to find the citation for their case if they have the name of the case.  Additionally, this is also a great way to see all of the Topics and Key Numbers that apply to a particular case.  This may lead to futher investigation of those Topics and Key Numbers, which could produce additional cases on the issue for the researcher.
• Desciptive Word Index: The descriptive word index allows researchers to search by topics and subtopics.  A researcher may start with a broad topic and then narrow down the topic to a subtopic.  A subtopic will either provide the appropriate Topic and Key Number where one can find that topic, or it will refer the researcher to another topic.  The index also includes a table at the beginning which lists the topics in order and their abbreviations used in the index.

Here is the typical process of using the descriptive word index to find a case along with an example: 

• A user who is doing research on "abduction" would first go to the Descriptive Word Index. The index is usually several volumes of the digest, generally located near the end of the set of books. Looking under "abduction," one would find several subtopics. If one was only concerned with the criminal liability involved in abduction, they they would look at "CRIMINAL liability" under the term "ABDUCTION." Criminal liability provides the user with the Topic and Key Number Crim Law 45.10 .
• The front of each index provides the researcher with a list of digest topics and what the abbreviations mean.  In the case of our example, Crim Law would mean topic Criminal Law.  Topics are in order alphabetically in the digest.  Therefore, to locate Criminal Law, one would need to just look on the spine of the book until the come to the appropriate volume.  
• Once at the appropriate volume and topic, the researcher can flip to Key Number 45.10.  Key numbers will be in chronological order in each topic.  Once at the correct key number, the researcher will see lists of cases with ciatations and short summaries of those cases.  If the case appears to be on point with what the researcher is looking for, then they can take down the case citation and retrieve that case from the appropriate reporter.

Legal encyclopedias are another great way to find case citations on topics.  Generally, a legal encyclopedia is arranged alphabetically by topic, which are further divded into more detailed subtopics.  Legal encyclopedias provide broad coverage of American state and federal law, including excerpts from judicial decisions and statutes.

For researching federal law, the two most popluar legal encyclopedias are American Jurisprudence (AmJur) and Corpus Juris Secundum (CJS).  Both of these publications provide researchers with a summary of the state of the law along with references to West's Topic and Key Numbers. 

Methods for Searching

Researchers can search for their issue in AmJur and CJS using the General Index.  Similiar to other indexes, the General Index is organized alphabetically by topic, with each topic divided into subtopics.  Citations are provided in Topic and Section format.  An abbreviations table is provided at the front of each volume of the general index to aid researchers in identifying topic names in the index.  Similiar to digets, once a researcher has the topic name and section number for their specific subtopic, they can browse the spine of the books and look for the topic name.  Once at the correct topic name, they can then look for the appropriate section number.  Sections are listed in chronological order. 

In addition to the General Index, AmJur also includes a volume entitled "Table of Laws and Rules."  This volume has several tables which provide cross references from United States Code Annotated sections and Code of Federal Regulations sections to topics and sections in AmJur.  This enables researchers to find articles citing those particular laws and regulations, which could lead to further case citations. 

Printed Reporters and LexisNexis Academic are not the only places researchers can access case law.  Many websites are devoted to providing free access to case law.  Although not comprehensive, many of these websites do offer a good amount of case law if someone knows what they are looking for.  

• Justia Justia provides legal information on numerous legal topics and jurisdictions, including federal and state case law.
• Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law The "Federal Law" section provides users with links to all of the Federal Courts' pages which provide court decisions. Although not comprehensive, many of these pages do provide case law from at least the mid-1990's. This is a good source of free case law.
• Oyez The Oyez Project is a multimedia archive devoted to the Supreme Court of the United States and its work. It aims to be a complete and authoritative source for all audio recorded in the Court since the installation of a recording system in October 1955. The Project also provides authoritative information on all justices and offers a virtual reality 'tour' of portions of the Supreme Court building, including the chambers of some of the justices.
• FindLaw Contains links for both state and federal cases. Opinions are categorized by jurisdiction.

Cases are published in chronological order in books called reporters .  Below is a list of the reporters for the three levels of federal courts:

Some reporters only include cases from a specific court.  For example, the United States Reports only publishes opinions from the Supreme Court of the United States.  On the other hand, some reporters includes cases from courts within a specific geographical region, also known as regional reporters.  For example, the South Eastern Reporter publishes reported cases from the southeastern United States, such as Georgia and North Carolina.  Moreover, some reporters only publish cases on a specific topic, such as bankruptcy or tax. 

In addition to these designations, reporters are also classified as official or unofficial reporters.  An official reporter simply means that it is the publication designated by statute or court order as official.  Generally it will contain only the text of the opinion.  A case published in an unofficial reporter will include the same text of the same case from the official reporter, but it will also include headnotes, topics, key numbers, and other aids to assist researchers.

Parallel Citations

As mentioned above, a case can be published in an official reporter and an unofficial reporter.  For that reason, a single case may have 2 or more citations.  When a case has more than one citation, the subsequent citations are known as parallell citations.  A classic example of this is Bush v. Gore , 531 U.S. 98, 121 S. Ct. 525, 148 L. Ed. 2d 388 (2000).

As one can see, not only is Bush v. Gore cited in the official reporter ( United States Reports ), but also in two unofficial reporters ( Supreme Court Reporter and Lawyer's Edition . 

Case citations allow a researcher to find a case quickly and easily.  Similiar to statutory citations, all case citations follow the same structured format.  This enables researchers to clearly identify the parts of a citation and where to locate the case.

Here is a breakdown of the citation for Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973).

From this, a researcher can determine that the case Roe v. Wade is located in United States Reports , Volume 410, Page 113.

The process is the same with parallel citations.  So if we use the previous example of Bush v. Gore , 531 U.S. 98, 121 S. Ct. 525, 148 L. Ed. 2d 388 (2000), the breakdown would look something like this:

Thus, a researcher would be able to either of these 3 reporters and find the same case using that reporter's volume and page numbers.  

Pinpoint Cite

A researcher may also come across a citation that includes an additional number after the page number.  This additional number, numbers or range of numbers are called pinpoint cites.  Cases and articles will often use these to refer researchers to exactly where the thought arose from.  Here is an example using  Bush v. Gore , 531 U.S. 98 (2000).

Federal Reporter Citation

Cases cited to Federal Reporter will have an extra element in the citation to identify the court.  Unlike the United States Reports, Supreme Court Reporter, and Lawyer's Edition, which only publishes cases from the Supreme Court of the United States, the Federal Reporter publishes cases from several different courts.  Therefore, cases published in these reporters include an element in the parentheses to identify the court that rendered the decision. 

Here is an example using United States v. MacDonald , 531 F.2d 196 (4th Cir. 1976).

In this case, the deciding court is 4th Cir. which means United States Court of Appeals, 4th Circuit.

Each circuit court will have its own abbreviation which will help the researcher identify the court that rendered the decision.  This is important for researchers because they might only want to find cases from their jurisdiction.  

Here is a table circuits and their abbreviations used in case citations for the United States Court of Appeals:

Federal Supplement Citation

Similar to the Federal Reporter , cases cited to the Federal Supplemen t will also include an extra element in the citation.  Cases cited to the Federal Supplement are United States District Court decisions.  Therefore, an extra element will be included in these citations so that a researcher can determine which court rendered the decision.  

Here is an example using Jenkins v. Byrd , 103 F. Supp. 2d 1350 (S.D. Ga. 2000).

In this case, the deciding court was the S.D. Ga, which means the United States District Court,Southern District of Georgia.

Because there could be several United States District Courts inside one state, a researcher unfamiliar with a state may need to look up the court abbreviation to determine which court is referenced in the citation.  

Here is a brief list of some abbreviations for United States District Courts that might be most useful for researchers in Georgia: 

For additional district court abbreviations, please refer to George Butterfield's libguide titled Legal Abbreviations.  

Here are some research guides created by other law schools that might be helpful in explaining how to conduct case law legal research.

• Boston University School of Law Federal Case Law Research
• Georgetown University Law Center Case Law Research Guide
• Georgetown University Law Center Case Law Research Tutorial
• University of Washington School of Law Case Law Research Checklist
• University of Washington School of Law Case Law Research
• << Previous: Legislative Branch (statutory law)
• Next: Executive Branch (administrative law) >>
• Last Updated: Feb 29, 2024 11:02 AM
• URL: https://libguides.law.gsu.edu/intro

Skip to Main Content - Keyboard Accessible

Welcome to lii.

We believe that everyone should be able to read and understand the laws that govern them, without cost. We carry out this vision by:

• Publishing law online, for free.
• Creating materials that help people understand law.
• Exploring new technologies that make it easier for people to find the law.

We hope you'll learn more about us, and help support our work.

What's New?

State regulations.

LII now publishes state regulations for all 50 U.S. states . Updates are released quarterly.

We're hiring!

Keep an eye on this space for new position postings as they become available.

LII Original Content

• The Wex Legal Dictionary and Encyclopedia has new entries on statutory interpretation , corruption , and summaries of recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions.
• Trump v. Anderson
• The Women & Justice collection now features a new set of resources on legislation in Ukraine .

From the Government

• Modern Doctrine on Appropriate Scrutiny (college admissions)
• States and Elections Clause (redistricting)
• True Threats (social media)
• The U.S. Supreme Court collection : most recent opinions and Code of Conduct for Justices
• The U.S. Code is up to date through the most recent version published by the Office of the Law Revision Counsel; the CFR is up to date through the end of last week.

Legal Resources

Primary sources.

• Constitution
• Supreme Court
• Executive Orders
• Federal Rules
• State law and State regulations
• Locators for Uniform law , State statutes by topic , World law

Original content

• Wex legal encyclopedia
• Congressional Research Service's U.S. Constitution Annotated
• LII Supreme Court Bulletin
• Introduction to Basic Legal Citation
• Parallel Table of Authorities
• RiO Citation Resolver
• Table of Popular Names
• The Women & Justice Collection

Learn about

• Administrative Law
• Constitutional law
• Consumer Protection
• Corporations
• Courts and procedure
• Intellectual Property
• Legislation
• Real Estate Law

Legal topics

• Business law
• Criminal law
• Estate Planning
• Employment law
• Immigration Law
• Landlord/Tenant
• Money and Finances
• Personal Injury

New York Law School

We are New York's Law School

Legal Research: Employment and Labor Law

This course presents an in-depth review of practical research skills, reinforcing the importance of finding and interpreting statutes, administrative regulations, cases, and secondary sources, including practice materials (e.g., forms, pleadings, and court rules). This course helps students refine research skills, learn shortcuts, and develop cost-effective research strategies for employment and labor law-related projects. Class sessions integrate print resources with online services through which students learn more sophisticated and responsible search practices.

This class builds on fundamental research skills and developing effective research strategies. The research assignments and exercises focus on employment and labor law issues. Students are also introduced to specialized sources and research tools designed for and used by employment and labor law practitioners.

Recommended for the following Professional Pathways: Civil Rights/Civil Liberties; Government/Public Sector; Labor and Employment; General Practice; Litigation/Dispute/Resolution; Transactional

Note: There are no pre/co-requisites.

PROFESSIONAL PATHWAYS

Business and financial services, intellectual property and privacy, government and public interest law, general practice / chart your path, other criteria, graduation requirements.

Case Law Search and Legal Resources for Your State

Elevate your research with exclusive jurisdictional content from LexisNexis.

The best legal content for your jurisdiction is only with LexisNexis

• More case law
• More unreported case law
• More verdicts and settlements
• More briefs, pleadings, motions, and other documents

Case Law Resources Map

Click on your jurisdiction below and see for yourself how LexisNexis keeps you ahead.

Try Lexis+ exclusive  state content

Start your complimentary 7-day trial today.

Legal ChatGPT: Tips, Prompts, and Use Cases

By Catherine Brock

Apr 24, 2024

AI tools like ChatGPT are creating a buzz in the legal field. According to the Legal Industry Report 2024 , nearly one-quarter (24%) of law firms have adopted legal-specific generative artificial intelligence (GAI) tools. Survey respondents confirmed they use GAI to streamline firm processes, from drafting marketing content to finding specific statutes. 

Lawyers who have opted not to use GAI cited three primary concerns: They need to learn more about the technology, they have ethical concerns, or they don’t trust AI outputs. 

Those concerns are well-founded. Any software investment requires time-consuming research, comparison, and evaluation. GAI tools, being early in their lifecycles, are complex and not widely understood. They also have known risks, and not managing those risks can lead to reputation-damaging outcomes. 

Still, the efficiency benefits of AI software for lawyers are compelling. GAI can free lawyers from repetitive tasks so they can focus on higher-level legal strategy. That’s an appealing value proposition, especially when the tools themselves are free or low-cost. 

This guide covers the basics of ChatGPT for lawyers. Read on to find out how to use ChatGPT, the risks and limitations of GAI, the tenets of good GAI prompt writing, plus sample prompts you can try right now.

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is an AI-powered chatbot that can have human-like conversations through voice and text prompts. The bot is developed and managed by OpenAI, a technology company based in San Francisco, California.

ChatGPT and similar tools are powered by language learning models (LLM). LLMs are algorithms built on language patterns. The patterns are gleaned from analyzing huge amounts of text and attempting to predict the next word in a sentence, repeatedly. TechRadar has reported that one of ChatGPT’s models was fed 570 GB of information from online books and articles, websites, and social media. 

Once trained, LLMs can “understand” text prompts and provide human-sounding responses. As a result, you can ask ChatGPT to complete many language-based tasks, from editing a document to summarizing the War of 1812.

Will ChatGPT Replace Lawyers?

There are many opinions about AI and the future of law . One concern is that AI will eliminate or minimize the need for human lawyers. 

Rest assured, ChatGPT will not replace lawyers, at least not in the foreseeable future. While the technology sounds human, it lacks important human qualities that make good lawyers successful. These include the ability to self-correct, empathize, form opinions from personal experience, or ask follow-up questions. Some researchers also argue that ChatGPT’s reasoning capacity is quite limited.

Additionally, ChatGPT can be inaccurate. A Purdue University study concludes that ChatGPT produces incorrect answers to software programming questions more than half the time. The bot also fails at seemingly simple language tasks, such as: What is a synonym for advice that begins with F? To this prompt, ChatGPT will respond with something like, ‘A synonym for “advice” that begins with the letter “F” is “recommendation. “‘

In the legal field, advanced reasoning and data accuracy are critical to a job well done. ChatGPT and other GAI apps cannot currently compete with humans in these areas.

How Can Lawyers Use ChatGPT: Common Use Cases 

Despite its weaknesses, ChatGPT for lawyers can be a powerful resource. The key is understanding when to tap GAI’s powers and how to manage its outputs. Below are six popular ways to use ChatGPT for lawyers. 

• Creating, editing, and summarizing legal documents. There is much talk in the industry about using ChatGPT for legal documents. With a detailed prompt or series of prompts, the application can quickly draft, edit, or summarize documents. Any output should be carefully reviewed prior to use. 
• Performing legal research and discovery . ChatGPT legal research can summarize cases, laws, deposition transcripts, or pleadings filed with the court. 
• Transcribing voice and video recordings . With add-on tools and access to GPT-4, you can upload audio and video files and have them transcribed.  
• Assisting with client communications . ChatGPT can produce quick drafts of client emails. 
• Analyzing case details and predicting outcomes . AI-powered predictions of case outcomes can inform case strategy.
• Drafting marketing content . Small firms that don’t have a marketing copywriter on staff can tap ChatGPT to draft content for marketing collateral.

What Are Some Risks and Limitations with ChatGPT? 

Recognizing the capabilities of legal ChatGPT is one hurdle to realizing the technology’s benefits. Another hurdle is understanding how to manage the outputs of ChatGPT for lawyers. To do that, you must know GAI’s limitations. 

AI-powered chatbots are prone to hallucinations, have trouble understanding contextual nuances of the law, and have trained-in biases. As well, ChatGPT prompts and responses are neither private nor confidential.

Let’s review each of these issues in more detail.

AI Hallucinations and Inaccuracies

AI hallucinations are false or illogical responses that are presented as fact. They result from poor training data or programming oversights. 

Because AI hallucinations are common, any ChatGPT legal research should be carefully reviewed and fact-checked. Skipping that step could land you in an embarrassing situation. In 2023, New York lawyer Peter LoDuca included nonexistent reference cases, complete with quotes and judicial decisions, in a legal brief. LoDuca’s colleague Steven A. Schwartz had compiled the research using ChatGPT. 

Both lawyers were sanctioned by the courts for submitting fabricated references.

Understanding Contextual Nuances of the Law 

ChatGPT may also have trouble understanding intricate narratives and interpreting complex legal principles and precedents. The application generally doesn’t explain, without specific prompting, how legal precedents were considered in its response. If such an explanation exists, it requires full verification, given the bot’s tendency to hallucinate. 

In 2024, courts rejected a law firm’s use of ChatGPT as a source to justify the firm’s hourly rates in a motion seeking prevailing party attorneys’ fees. The court supported its rejection with three points. The third of those points, as reported by GTlaw.com , was that the firm “did not reveal whether ChatGPT had considered ‘the uniform bloc of precedent in which courts in this District and Circuit have rejected as excessive.'”

Bias and Discrimination 

The AI training process relies on published content, which inherently favors those with a voice.  Marginalized groups that don’t share their perspectives and experiences online are grossly underrepresented in that process. The unfortunate outcome is that AI-generated outputs have trained-in bias. 

Bloomberg Law highlighted this issue in 2023, noting that discrimination claims can result from using ChatGPT for employment decisions. 

Practically speaking, ChatGPT-produced documents can reinforce gender and racial bias. One study found gender bias by comparing AI-produced letters of recommendation for men vs. women. Specifically, the chatbot used the words “expert” and “integrity” to describe men, but “beauty” and “delight” to describe women. 

Without comparing outputs from different prompts, these language differences could go unnoticed. In other words, using ChatGPT may inadvertently introduce similar bias into your own documents.

Breaches in Confidentiality 

Data submitted to ChatGPT in a prompt is not confidential. OpenAI uses the information for training. An OpenAI help document explains, “When you share your content with us, it helps our models become more accurate and better at solving your specific problems.” 

Security concerns prompted financial company JPMorgan to ban the use of ChatGPT by its employees. Similarly, the US House of Representatives has prohibited staffers from using Microsoft’s AI chatbot Copilot. 

If you use legal ChatGPT for a client-related manner, it’s critical to remove client-specific data from the prompt.

8 Steps to Creating Strong ChatGPT Prompts

You can mitigate some risks of using ChatGPT for lawyers and maximize its efficiencies by having a strict prompt-writing process in place. Incorporate the seven steps below to streamline information-gathering, minimize errors, reduce bias, and eliminate confidentiality breaches.

1. Be Very Specific About What Output Format You Want 

ChatGPT can produce responses in paragraph form, bullet points, numbered steps, tables, and even HTML. When you write your query, include a description of how you would like the response formatted.

2. Give It a Clear Role to Play 

You can get more specific responses by stating the perspective ChatGPT should take. You might, for example, ask the chatbot to pretend it’s an editor reviewing a brief for adherence to Bluebook citation format. You could also summarize key tenants of a case and ask ChatGPT to respond as if it were the opposing counsel. 

3. Provide Very Detailed and Unambiguous Context 

The clearer the prompt, the better the output. An effective prompt provides all relevant context and background information. Those details help the bot interpret the purpose of your request. With a better understanding of your purpose and scope, ChatGPT can more quickly deliver the information you need. 

4. Scrub Prompt for Confidential Information

Before you hit enter on a ChatGPT query, do one more review to ensure the prompt is free of confidential information. All client data should be removed from contracts, descriptions, and research outlines. 

5. Assign a Series of Simpler Tasks Instead of One Complex Task 

Larger queries are best broken down into smaller prompts. This allows you to get more detailed about each sub-task. You should arrive more quickly at the information you want as a result. 

In a contract editing scenario, for example, you might ask the bot first to review the document for brevity and word choice. You could use a second prompt to request a review for typos. 

6. Ask Follow-Up Questions

Use follow-up questions to improve ChatGPT’s output. In a follow-up, you can add new information or ask the chatbot to focus, simplify, or broaden its response. For example, if a research request returns a technical answer, you can request that the response be rephrased in layman’s terms.  

7. Request Citations and Dig into the Sources 

If you are using GPT-4 with a paid subscription, ask for source information. Review those sources carefully to ensure they exist, and that they have the corresponding information. 

Note that GPT-3.5 cannot provide citations. This model currently powers the free version of ChatGPT. 

8. Evaluate and Adjust the Outputs Before Using

When using ChatGPT for legal documents, consider any output a draft. Even if the output seems spot-on, you must review and adjust it to fit your intended purpose. Using the output without modification can lead to generic answers and documentation.

Sample ChatGPT Prompts for Lawyers 

Below are six sample ChatGPT prompts for lawyers that incorporate the recommendations noted above. 

• Contract review: Review this legal brief for grammar, punctuation, and clarity. Potential follow-up: Review this legal brief for word choice and brevity.   
• Contract summary: Summarize this contract into a table that outlines parties, duties, fees, deadlines, rights granted, and representations. Potential follow-up: Expand on the rights granted section. 
• Deposition summary: Act like a paralegal and summarize key points plus any inconsistencies or admissions within this deposition. 
• Contract drafting: Draft a nondisclosure clause to include in a work-for-hire agreement used for freelance graphic designers. 
• Legal research: Outline the statutes in Texas that govern workplace discrimination . 
• Analysis and strategy : Summarize legal arguments for (detailed description of the issue). Potential follow-up: Summarize the legal arguments against (detailed description of the issue).

Best Legal AI Tools for Your Firm 

Leveraging AI software to draft, review, summarize, and analyze documentation can deliver huge efficiencies for your firm. You can maximize your time savings by choosing a GAI solution that’s lawyer-specific and embedded within the internal tools you already use. This prevents the extra step of having to access an external, web-based interface. 

Effective lawyer-built AI applications include MyCase IQ, Juro AI Assistant, and Casetext.

MyCase IQ can update the style and tone of a document or generate a quick summary. The application’s roadmap also includes the ability to draft client messages, translate documents, and create tasks and events. MyCase IQ is built into MyCase case management software. 

Note that MyCase IQ has critical security features that law firms require. Client data and queries are not used for ChatGPT training, nor is that information ever exposed to other users. MyCase IQ also encrypts all data at rest and in transmission. Additionally, MyCase IQ follows the user permissions specified in MyCase. If an internal user doesn’t have permission to access a specific case, that user cannot query MyCase IQ on that client’s information.

Juro AI Assistant 

Juro’s contract automation platform uses AI to produce contract drafts based on parameters you set. It can also review documents for risks, summarize contracts and clauses, and share drafts across teams. 

Legal research application Casetext now has an AI assistant called CoCounsel, powered by GPT-4. CoCounsel can draft documents and deposition outlines, search for information, develop timelines, and more.

ChatGPT for Lawyers: Maximize Your Time

ChatGPT and AI tools that use its LLMs can automate or expedite a law firm’s most tedious tasks. You can start legal research and draft, edit, and summarize nearly any document, from a dense contract to a client email summarizing the case outcomes. 

There are risks to using AI in the legal field, with negative outcomes ranging from inaccurate legal citations to the leakage of client information. But these risks can be mitigated. For one, it’s important to work with a trusted technology provider that builds GAI specifically for the legal field. Thoughtful prompting and disciplined fact-checking are also necessary. 

With the right approach, AI can unlock a new layer of efficiency in your law firm. Ready to learn how MyCase IQ can streamline firm processes and maximize your time? Schedule a demo today .

Search Resources

For the record newsletter.

Insights on running a successful law firm with case management, client intake, billing and payments, tech innovation, and more.

Related resources

Will AI Replace Lawyers? 3 Expert Opinions

An official website of the United States government

Here’s how you know

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Take action

• Report an antitrust violation
• File adjudicative documents
• Find banned debt collectors
• View competition guidance
• Competition Matters Blog

New HSR thresholds and filing fees for 2024

View all Competition Matters Blog posts

We work to advance government policies that protect consumers and promote competition.

View Policy

Search or browse the Legal Library

Find legal resources and guidance to understand your business responsibilities and comply with the law.

Browse legal resources

• Find policy statements
• Submit a public comment

Vision and Priorities

Memo from Chair Lina M. Khan to commission staff and commissioners regarding the vision and priorities for the FTC.

Technology Blog

Consumer facing applications: a quote book from the tech summit on ai.

View all Technology Blog posts

Advice and Guidance

Learn more about your rights as a consumer and how to spot and avoid scams. Find the resources you need to understand how consumer protection law impacts your business.

• Report fraud
• Report identity theft
• Register for Do Not Call
• Sign up for consumer alerts
• Get Business Blog updates
• Get your free credit report
• Find refund cases
• Order bulk publications
• Consumer Advice
• Shopping and Donating
• Credit, Loans, and Debt
• Jobs and Making Money
• Unwanted Calls, Emails, and Texts
• Identity Theft and Online Security
• Business Guidance
• Advertising and Marketing
• Credit and Finance
• Privacy and Security
• By Industry
• For Small Businesses
• Browse Business Guidance Resources
• Business Blog

Servicemembers: Your tool for financial readiness

Visit militaryconsumer.gov

Get consumer protection basics, plain and simple

Visit consumer.gov

Learn how the FTC protects free enterprise and consumers

Visit Competition Counts

Looking for competition guidance?

• Competition Guidance

News and Events

Latest news, ftc expands patent listing challenges, targeting more than 300 junk listings for diabetes, weight loss, asthma and copd drugs.

View News and Events

Upcoming Event

Older adults and fraud: what you need to know.

View more Events

Sign up for the latest news

Follow us on social media

-->   -->   -->   -->   -->  

Playing it Safe: Explore the FTC's Top Video Game Cases

Learn about the FTC's notable video game cases and what our agency is doing to keep the public safe.

Latest Data Visualization

FTC Refunds to Consumers

Explore refund statistics including where refunds were sent and the dollar amounts refunded with this visualization.

About the FTC

Our mission is protecting the public from deceptive or unfair business practices and from unfair methods of competition through law enforcement, advocacy, research, and education.

Learn more about the FTC

Meet the Chair

Lina M. Khan was sworn in as Chair of the Federal Trade Commission on June 15, 2021.

Chair Lina M. Khan

Looking for legal documents or records? Search the Legal Library instead.

• Cases and Proceedings
• Premerger Notification Program
• Merger Review
• Anticompetitive Practices
• Competition and Consumer Protection Guidance Documents
• Warning Letters
• Consumer Sentinel Network
• Criminal Liaison Unit
• FTC Refund Programs
• Notices of Penalty Offenses
• Advocacy and Research
• Advisory Opinions
• Cooperation Agreements
• Federal Register Notices
• Public Comments
• Policy Statements
• International
• Office of Technology Blog
• Military Consumer
• Consumer.gov
• Bulk Publications
• Data and Visualizations
• Stay Connected
• Commissioners and Staff
• Bureaus and Offices
• Budget and Strategy
• Office of Inspector General
• Careers at the FTC

FTC Announces Rule Banning Noncompetes

• Competition
• Office of Policy Planning
• Bureau of Competition

Today, the Federal Trade Commission issued a final rule to promote competition by banning noncompetes nationwide, protecting the fundamental freedom of workers to change jobs, increasing innovation, and fostering new business formation.

“Noncompete clauses keep wages low, suppress new ideas, and rob the American economy of dynamism, including from the more than 8,500 new startups that would be created a year once noncompetes are banned,” said FTC Chair Lina M. Khan. “The FTC’s final rule to ban noncompetes will ensure Americans have the freedom to pursue a new job, start a new business, or bring a new idea to market.”

The FTC estimates that the final rule banning noncompetes will lead to new business formation growing by 2.7% per year, resulting in more than 8,500 additional new businesses created each year. The final rule is expected to result in higher earnings for workers, with estimated earnings increasing for the average worker by an additional $524 per year, and it is expected to lower health care costs by up to $194 billion over the next decade. In addition, the final rule is expected to help drive innovation, leading to an estimated average increase of 17,000 to 29,000 more patents each year for the next 10 years under the final rule.

Noncompetes are a widespread and often exploitative practice imposing contractual conditions that prevent workers from taking a new job or starting a new business. Noncompetes often force workers to either stay in a job they want to leave or bear other significant harms and costs, such as being forced to switch to a lower-paying field, being forced to relocate, being forced to leave the workforce altogether, or being forced to defend against expensive litigation. An estimated 30 million workers—nearly one in five Americans—are subject to a noncompete.

Under the FTC’s new rule, existing noncompetes for the vast majority of workers will no longer be enforceable after the rule’s effective date. Existing noncompetes for senior executives - who represent less than 0.75% of workers - can remain in force under the FTC’s final rule, but employers are banned from entering into or attempting to enforce any new noncompetes, even if they involve senior executives. Employers will be required to provide notice to workers other than senior executives who are bound by an existing noncompete that they will not be enforcing any noncompetes against them.

In January 2023, the FTC issued a  proposed rule which was subject to a 90-day public comment period. The FTC received more than 26,000 comments on the proposed rule, with over 25,000 comments in support of the FTC’s proposed ban on noncompetes. The comments informed the FTC’s final rulemaking process, with the FTC carefully reviewing each comment and making changes to the proposed rule in response to the public’s feedback.

In the final rule, the Commission has determined that it is an unfair method of competition, and therefore a violation of Section 5 of the FTC Act, for employers to enter into noncompetes with workers and to enforce certain noncompetes.

The Commission found that noncompetes tend to negatively affect competitive conditions in labor markets by inhibiting efficient matching between workers and employers. The Commission also found that noncompetes tend to negatively affect competitive conditions in product and service markets, inhibiting new business formation and innovation. There is also evidence that noncompetes lead to increased market concentration and higher prices for consumers.

Alternatives to Noncompetes

The Commission found that employers have several alternatives to noncompetes that still enable firms to protect their investments without having to enforce a noncompete.

Trade secret laws and non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) both provide employers with well-established means to protect proprietary and other sensitive information. Researchers estimate that over 95% of workers with a noncompete already have an NDA.

The Commission also finds that instead of using noncompetes to lock in workers, employers that wish to retain employees can compete on the merits for the worker’s labor services by improving wages and working conditions.

Changes from the NPRM

Under the final rule, existing noncompetes for senior executives can remain in force. Employers, however, are prohibited from entering into or enforcing new noncompetes with senior executives. The final rule defines senior executives as workers earning more than $151,164 annually and who are in policy-making positions.

Additionally, the Commission has eliminated a provision in the proposed rule that would have required employers to legally modify existing noncompetes by formally rescinding them. That change will help to streamline compliance.

Instead, under the final rule, employers will simply have to provide notice to workers bound to an existing noncompete that the noncompete agreement will not be enforced against them in the future. To aid employers’ compliance with this requirement, the Commission has included model language in the final rule that employers can use to communicate to workers. 

The Commission vote to approve the issuance of the final rule was 3-2 with Commissioners Melissa Holyoak and Andrew N. Ferguson voting no. Commissioners Rebecca Kelly Slaughter , Alvaro Bedoya , Melissa Holyoak and Andrew N. Ferguson each issued separate statements. Chair Lina M. Khan will issue a separate statement.

The final rule will become effective 120 days after publication in the Federal Register.

Once the rule is effective, market participants can report information about a suspected violation of the rule to the Bureau of Competition by emailing  [email protected] . 

The Federal Trade Commission develops policy initiatives on issues that affect competition, consumers, and the U.S. economy. The FTC will never demand money, make threats, tell you to transfer money, or promise you a prize. Follow the  FTC on social media , read  consumer alerts  and the  business blog , and  sign up to get the latest FTC news and alerts .

Press Release Reference

Contact information, media contacts.

Victoria Graham  Office of Public Affairs