Legal Research

Sources of Law

Legislative, Executive, Judicial

Legislative

Statutes

Executive

Regulations

Judicial

Opinions

Structure of Court Systems

Court of Last Resort

^

Intermediate Appellate Courts

^

Trial Courts

U.S. Federal Court System

U.S. Supreme Court

^

U.S. Court of Appeals

^

U.S. District Courts

Texas Court System

Supreme Court/Court of Criminal Appeals

^

Appeals Courts

^

County Courts

Authority

Greatest Weight to Lowest Weight

Primary

Makes Law

Secondary

Interpets Law

Binding

In Heirarchy chain. Court must listen to

Persuasive

Not in hierarchy chain. Court doesn't have to listen to

Hierarchy of Authority

HIGHEST-Constituions (If applies, always binding)

Statutes(If applies, always binding)

Regulation (If applies, always binding)

Judicial Opinions (Binding or persuasive)

LOWEST-Secondary Sources(Always Persuasive)

Hierarchy of Judicial Opinions

High Court

^

Intermediate Appellate Courts

^

Trial Court

Primary Sources

Process: How the Law is Made

Publication: Where the law is published

Statutes

Prohibit Conduct

Require Condcut

Permit Conduct

Civil v. Criminal

Federal Statutes

Congress via Art.1 from Constitution

H.R.-House S.-Senate

Process for Federal Statutes

1. Reps/Sen introduce, delibrate, and vote on legislation

2. If both chambers pass same bill, goes to President

3. If makes it past President, it becomes Law

4. Published as Public or Private Law (Chrono Order: Pub. L. No. 119-1

Publication of Federal Statutes

Slip Laws, Statutes at Large, United States Code

Slip Laws

First official publication of the law

Statutes at Large

Slip laws published in chronological order for each congressional session

United States Code

Codified statutes organized by topic

U.S.C.A-Westlaw

U.S.C.S-Lexis

Annotated Codes

Contain citations to cases and other authoriries interpreting the statute in additiona to the statutory language

Locations of the United States Code

Weslaw/Lexis

HeinOnline

Govinfo.gov

Office of Law Revision Counsel

Congress.gov

Library

Texas Statute Creation

Texas Legisilature via Art.3

House and senate

One session each odd numbered year

Federal Issue-State Court

U.S.S.C.

^

State High Court

^

State Intermediate

^

State Trial

State Issue-Federal

State High**

^

U.S.S.C

^

Circuit Court of Appeals

^

Federal Disctrict

Texas Statutes Process

Same as Federal Legislative process

General and Special Laws of Texas: Texas Session Laws/Texas Code

General and Special Laws of Texas Laws

Texas Session Laws

Chapters published in chronological order each legislative session

Texas Codes

Codified Statutes -- Organized into topical Codes (ABC, Tex Code)

Red Flag

No Longer good law

Yellow Flag

Indicates negative treatment

Blue Striped Flag

Case is being appealed

Green Flag

Citing references are available with no negative treatment

Green Square

Postive Treatment

Red Square

Negative Treatment

Orange Square

Superseded by Statute

Yellow Triangle

Caution

Agency

Power to execute and enforce those statutes

Federal Regulations Process

Agency creates regulation from enabling statute

Federal Register (Proposed) --> Federal Register (Final) --> C.F.R. (Final Regulation)

Federal Register (Proposed)

Gives public notice of new rules

Specified time given for submitting comments regarding proposed regulation (Usually a month)

Federal Register (Final)

Final Regulation Published

Code of Federal Regulations

Finak Regulation Codified

Federal Register

Published daily, contains federal administrative rules and regulations.

Texas Regulations Process

Mirrors Federal

Texas Register(proposed) --> Texas Register(final) --> Texas Administrative Code (Codified)

Texas Register

Published Weekly

Judicial Opinion-Publication

Published chronologically in the west reporter systems

Unreported Opinions

Not all opinions are published due to them not wanting to establish new law

Trial court opinions, Mem Op,

May affected precendents

Judicial Opinions-Parts

Citation and Court

Parties/Caption/Case Name

Dock Number

Decision Date

Synopsis

Headnotes

Opinion

Headnotes

Similar Topics of the Case

KeyCite

An aid to legal research developed by the editors of Westlaw®.

On Westlaw®, KeyCite can trace case history, retrieve secondary sources, categorize legal citations by legal issue, and perform other functions.

Shepard's (LexisNexis)

Citing decisions,

The Lexis Nexis version of Keycite

Citators

Helps us determine if primary sources is still good law by seeing how subsequent authorities have treated it

Help use determine if there are other authorities that we can use

Red Striped Flag

Case is no longer good for at least one identified point of law

West Key Number System

Digest System

Organized via similar

Identify legal issues address in the opinion and assign key number

KeyCite-Helps verify history and treament of a case

Secondary Sources

Writings about the law

Provide commentary and analysis by experts

Synthesize and cite to primary sources

Cites when dealing with an underdevelopmend area of law with little primary authority on point

Use primarily for background research

Types of Secondary Sources

Legal Encyclopedia

Treatises

Practice Guides

Restatements

Model Codes and Uniform ACts

American Law Reports

Law Review and other Periodicals

Legal Encyclopedia

Meant to cover all of the law of the jurisdiciton

Not intended to be comprehensive

National Legal Encyclopedias

American Jursiprudence 2d

Corpus Juris Secundum

State Legal Encyclopedias

Texas Jurisprudence

California Jurisprudence

Treatises

Covers a specific area of law from a scholarly perspectice and is meant to be comprehensive on that area

Often cites to law of multiple jurisdictions

Examples-Nimmer on copyright, Dobbs The Law of Torts

Practice Guides

Covers a specific area of law from a practitioner perspective, with practice tipis, checklists and forms

Often cites to law of a single jurisdiciton

Examples: Texas Litigation Guide, Texas Drunk Driving Law

Restatements

"Restates" the common law (existing caselaw) in a legal practice area -- distills it into a series of rule statements to identify trends in common law in an effort to make the common law more cohesive across jurisdictions

Intended audience is courts

Examples: Restatement of Law-Torts

Model Codes & Uniform Acts

Provides template for statutory language to promote unformity among jurisdictions

Intended audience is state legislatures

Language can be adopted in full or part by jurisdictions-which transforms them into primary sources

Examples-Model Penal Code, UCC

American Law Reports

An article that summarizes a narrow legal issues, then cites authorities from multiple jurisdictions, as well as secondary sources, that address that issues

Gives overview of the current state of the law regarding a specific legal issue

Allows you to quickly see whether cases have been decided on that specific issue in your jurisdiction.

Law Reviews and Other Journals

Academic Law reviews published quarterly, semianually or annually

Covers wide range of legal topics and cover them in depth from a scholarly perspective

Used for legal research

Legal Periodicals

Includes newspapers, newsletters, blogs published daily, weekly or monthly

Cover breaking legal developments and organizations activities

Used for current awareness

Highest source of law

Constitution of the Jurisdiction

Federalism

Two distinct court systems

State and Federal

Choice of Law

Federal Courts hearing issues governed by State Law

States hearing issues governed by federal law

Popular Names Table

Link titles of legislation to their codified locations in the code

Vernon's Texas Codes Annotated

Codified sources of Texas Statutes

Session Laws

Published chronologically

Codified Statutes

Organized by subject

Enumerated Powers

Law-making powers specifically enumerated by the constitution for the federal government

Reserved Powers

State Powers/Law-making power over everything else

Types of Enumerated Powers

Taxation, Immigration, Money, Mail, War etc.

Organic Statute

Creates an agency to regulate a particular area

Enabling Statute

Delegates additional authority to an already existing agency

Why a case is unreported

Focusing on facts vs actual law

No new legal implications

Bizzare fact pattern

Powers of Municipality

Political subdivisions of the state

Local Government Code

Municipal Code to enact ordinances

Process for Municipal Code

Ordinances pass by governing body of municipality

Mayor can sign/not sign and allow to become law after 4 days/send back to governing body for reconsideration

Published in official newspaper before taking effect

Becomes a municipal codes

Texas Municipal Codes-Publication

Municode

American Legal Publishing

General Code

Municipal Law

Manage intention and needs of citizens