Legal Research Guides and Tutorials
Statutory Research, Cases and Digests, Administrative Law, Secondary Resources, Legislative History, Internet Research
Legal research guide for professionals
Zimmerman's Research Guide
The Federal Register Tutorial
How to Shepardize
Company information guide
Legal news sites
International and foreign law resources
Legal Assistant Today
Paralegal links
The world’s largest free database of legal questions and answers. Search by legal category and state. Also allows submission of questions to be answered by legal experts.
COLORADO LEGAL RESOURCES:
Colorado Research Sources
Colorado Research Resources
Colorado Research Corner
Colorado Case Resources (PDF)
Rocky Mountain Paralegal Association
ColoradoMoreLaw.com
Handout of Legal Resources at the ACC Library (PDF)
Legal Resources at the ACC Library (PDF)
The legal research process and the primary and secondary
sources.
Legal Reference for the Non-Law Librarian
Includes a thorough listing of Colorado legal print and online
resources. Compiled by the librarians at the Colorado Supreme
Court Library.
PORTALS, DIRECTORIES, SEARCH TOOLS:
>General-purpose search engines: Google, Yahoo!
>Web subject directories: Google Directory: www.google.com/Top/Society/Law, Yahoo! Directory: http://dir.yahoo.com/Government/Law, LexisOne Legal Web Site Directory www.lexisone.com/legalresearch/legalguide/legal_guide_index.html
>Specialized search sites: AltLaw www.AltLaw.org, LexisOne www.lexisone.com, Cornell Legal Information Institute (LII) http://www.law.cornell.edu, WashLaw http://www.washlaw.edu, Meta-Index for US Legal Research http://gsulaw.gsu.edu/metaindex or SearchLaw.com, PreCYdent www.precydent.com/#
>Law portals: Justia.com, FindLaw.com , WashLaw http://www.washlaw.edu (these also have search tools)
>Selected Web logs (blawgs): Legal Research Blog http://law.onecle.com/archives, Legal Research 101 http://albanylawlibrary.wordpress.com/category/legal-research-101
About Internet Resources
The Internet is a vast storehouse of free legal resources. The most important US primary law (the text of statutes, regulations, and cases) is available online. Likewise the Web is an enormous depository of secondary sources (finding aids, descriptions, and explanations of the law).
The Web’s strength is several-fold: it makes readily available the most basic, fundamental legal information for an overview, as well as for starting and supplementing legal research for both beginners and experienced researchers. The Web also shines in providing access to the latest news and views of the legal field before it has been filtered through the standard scholarly and commercial publishing resources.
A weakness of the free Web is that the online primary law does not come with annotations; such descriptive and explanatory editorial commentary attached to each law by the compilers is only available in the legal subscription online databases and in print resources. Likewise, most scholarly secondary material is still only available in the fee-based databases and print resources. Despite these limitations, the free Web is an invaluable tool and viable partial alternative for all legal researchers.
The best starting points on the Web for legal information are some well-known, obvious sites as well as lesser-known sites. The general-purpose search engines Google and Yahoo! are sometimes useful tools for starting and supplementing legal research. Additionally, Web portals and subject directories provide access to the wealth of legal sites for almost every imaginable topic and purpose. Portals are one-stop jumping-off points to tools, services, and resources that are comprehensive (like Yahoo!) or subject-specific (Law.com). Subject directories are organized listings of sites by topic. Not to be forgotten are Web logs (blawgs) which provide extremely current information not easily found elsewhere.
Many people are unaware that, in addition to being versatile search engines, Google and Yahoo! contain comprehensive subject directories of virtually every topic to be found on the Internet. Also, there are little-known specialized legal search engines as well as major portals for every type of legal information. Some of these are hybrid sites with overlapping multiple features and functions.
