IF THEY AREN'T BINDING, WHY USE THEM?

I DON'T KNOW WHERE TO START!

I NEED SOME CASES FAST

I NEED TO PREPARE FOR MY EXAMS

IF THEY AREN’T BINDING, WHY USE THEM?

Hornbooks, treatises, law reviews and legal encyclopedias are vital legal research tools, even though courts aren’t obligated to follow them. These resources can help you in at least three ways:

• If you know very little about a subject area, such secondary sources can quickly reveal the major concepts, terms, forums and procedures used by practitioners in that area. As a result, you will be better equipped to search the indexes and tables of contents of digests and primary sources.
• These materials are good preliminary sources of citations to cases, statutes and law review articles, which you can read later.
• Some secondary sources are sufficiently authoritative that they can be cited themselves to persuade the court of your position.

I DON’T KNOW WHERE TO START!

West’s Nutshell Series® and West’s Hornbook Series®

You will no doubt discover at times that you know absolutely nothing about the legal subject you need to research. (Even experienced practitioners find themselves in this predicament.) An ideal place to start would be in one of West’s Nutshell Series. There are more than 115 titles in the Nutshell Series, and each is a concise treatise on one of more than 70 legal topics, such as product liability, evidence and taxation. For more extensive treatment and more citations, consult a text from West’s Hornbook Series, which is made up of comprehensive treatises covering well-settled principles in major subject areas.

Corpus Juris Secundum®

American Jurisprudence 2d

Corpus Juris Secundum (CJS®) and American Jurisprudence 2d (Am Jur® 2d) are comprehensive legal encyclopedias. They contain easy-to-read explanations of legal principles derived from cases and statutes with citations to cases, statutes and law review articles. Each is supplemented with regular "pocket part" inserts containing amendments to the main volume and recent case citations. In addition, Am Jur 2d contains references to American Law Reports (ALR®) annotations; CJS contains relevant West topics and key numbers.

If you have access to Westlaw, you can search Am Jur 2d and the Internal Revenue and Insurance titles of CJS online. With Westlaw, you are not confined to fixed classifications and topic headings. You can even enter descriptions in plain English (Natural Language), e.g., when does retroactive application of a tax statute violate due process.

I NEED SOME CASES FAST.

Cases are useful to the researcher in at least two ways:

• They are the final determination of the law, and they are often amply supported with citations to other cases.
• If published in reporters from West’s National Reporter System®, they provide West topics and key numbers that you can use in case digests and on Westlaw.

American Law Reports (ALR) Annotations

After you have familiarized yourself with a legal topic, you might look for more detailed analysis in American Law Reports (ALR) available in print and on Westlaw. ALR contains cases followed by exhaustive "annotations": encyclopedic essays on the general topic discussed in each case. These annotations are full of citations to cases, state and federal statutes, and secondary materials. ALR is updated annually with supplementary inserts.

Law Review Articles

Law reviews—scholarly journals published by virtually all accredited law schools—are also excellent sources of case citations. They also contain thorough discussions of current issues and trends in the law.

Fortunately, most law reviews are available on Westlaw. You can search hundreds of publications at once using either the Terms and Connectors or Natural Language search method. Whatever your Westlaw search method, you can jump directly from most citations in your retrieved document to the cited documents themselves.

Run searches in either the Texts & Periodicals–All Law Reviews, Texts & Bar Journals database (TP-ALL) or the individual law review databases.

I NEED TO PREPARE FOR MY EXAMS.

Thomson West can provide you with several resources designed to help you understand, organize and remember material for your exams:

West’s Black Letter Series®

Each of the 22 titles currently available in West’s Black Letter Series condenses the principles of a standard law school course into a brief outline.

Sum and Substance "Quick Review" Outline Series

Quick Review outlines are keyed to leading law school casebooks and contain features such as capsule summaries, the 10-5-2 Hour Study Guide and sample exams.

Exam Pro Civil Procedure

Exam Pro offers sample exams and corresponding answers with detailed analysis to help you understand the subject more thoroughly.