1. Looting the Federal Treasure-House: Gems of Government Information
James M. Donovan, J.D., Ph.D. Reference/Access Services Librarian
University of Georgia Law Library
What types of legal information are available for free on the Internet? Primary legal documents as well as law-related commentary abound on the Internet
Researchers will find federal codes, pending legislation, administrative rules & regulations, as well as current appellate-level case law
Will discuss best sites for finding primary federal materials
Why? Researchers who depend primarily on popular search engines to locate legal documents likely will miss mounds of valuable information.
Because search engines do not, arguably cannot, collect and index all data available on the Web.
One study published in Nature during July 1999, found that the Web houses an estimated 800 million pages. Yet search engines index a mere 16%, at best. On the other hand, a general search can yield hundreds of results, too many to review, that in any event provide no clue as to the usefulness and authority of the source.
It is possible to limit searches to .gov domain, but if you know where to go, direct is best! YOUR TIME IS VALUABLE!!

2. U.S. Constitution FindLaw
Annotations of U.S. Supreme Court cases through June 2000
Easy to navigate
Hyperlinks between Constitution sections
Hyperlinks to U.S. Supreme Court cases
Can find the text of the U.S. Constitution at many web sites.
Some sites have better formatting and are much easier to read than others
Other sites that you visit may include historical documents or hypertext links between sections of the Constitution
ONLY 2 sites, GPO ACCESS and FINDLAW include U.S. Supreme Court case law.
FINDLAW - The FINDLAW version of the Constitution is more easily navigable than the GPO Access site.
FINDLAW – started as a list of Internet legal resources used for a workshop for Northern California Law Librarians.
Purchased by West Group in (who promised to preserve its format)

3. Findlaw Hyperlinks to U.S. Supreme Court Cases
Sample page from FINDLAW’s U.S. Constitution Annotations for the 27th Amendment
Includes an analysis and interpretation of the Constitution prepared by the Library of Congress’ Congressional Research Service.
Includes annotations of U.S. Supreme Court cases decided through June (includes older cases, example 1899)
FINDLAW has added links between the footnotes and sections of the Constitution, as well as links to Supreme Court cases through 2000 cited in the annotations.
Findlaw
Hyperlinks between footnotes
Hyperlinks to U.S. Supreme Court Cases

4. Founders’ Constitution
Anthology of primary sources for the Constitutional text
Arranged by Constitutional section
Published as a joint venture of the University of Chicago Press and the Liberty Fund

6. LEGISLATIVE MATERIALS

7. LATE BREAKING NEWS ALERT!!!
GPO TO CEASE PRINT DEPOSITORY PROGRAM? ALL ELECTRONIC FUTURE LOOMS!!
Only “Essential Titles” to be distributed, although at this time it is not clear what those will be

8. U.S. Code
Office of the Law Revision Counsel - source for the printed official version of the US Code. This is the most authoritative source.
GPO Access - contains archived versions of Code from 1994 with annual supplements and 2000
Cornell - easily searched, hyperlinks among code sections
No web sites offer a full text up-to-the minute version of the U.S. Code.
No web sites offer annotations.
The best site for searching and viewing the U.S. Code is Cornell. Cornell – first law site on the Internet in 1992.
Cornell’s site contains the most recent version of the Code made available by the U.S. House of Representatives. Well-formatted. Easily searched. Hyperlinks among code sections
The House of Rep Office of the Law Revision Counsel is the official source for the printed version of the U.S. Code. The text of the U.S. Code is made available by the Office of Law Revision Counsel of the U.S. House of Reps
GPO Access - The GPO Access site contains 2000 Ed., and its first supplement

9. Here’s an example of the various ways you can search the U. S
Here’s an example of the various ways you can search the U.S. Code at the Cornell site.
Listing of all titles/ search individual title. Note this is the most efficient way to search. No need to search full code (which will take a few minutes), if you know what title your section should be included in.
Table of Popular names - with links to full text if available. Example – try typing Interstate Commerce Act into Google and you’ll get lots of info about the Act, but not necessarily the text of the act.
If you have a citation, plug it in
Or search full text. Clicking on find will retrieve documents matching your terms.

10. Updating your search results
Let’s talk about updating your search results.
Remember I said none of the U.S. Code sites are 100% up to date.
At Cornell always visit the updates section.

11. 1. Check Table of Amendments for Public Laws
2. Retrieve full text of
Public Law
1. Check Table of Amendments
for Public Laws
A common response from the server:
You can follow the instructions on this page and manually update your code section.
First visit the House of Representatives Internet Library to obtain the Table of Amendments for Public Laws.
2. Second, visit Thomas to read the full text of any public laws that have amended the code section that you’re interested in.

12. When you visit the House Internet Library (uscode. house
When you visit the House Internet Library (uscode.house.gov) you will look for your title and code section in the table of amendments.
In this instance, we see that our code section has been amended by Public Law section 1 g 2
We now need to visit Thomas to read the full text of Public Law

13. Here at the Thomas site, we can find Public Law 106-44
Here at the Thomas site, we can find Public Law You can browse public laws by their numbers.
We can check section 1 g 2 and find the language that amends our code section.
Section 106 is amended by striking 120 and replacing with 121

14. Tracking Current Legislation & Legislative History
Thomas
Public laws -
summaries 1973 (93rd Cong) - present
full-text 1989 (101st Cong) - present
Bills - summaries & status 1973 –, full text 1989 –
Congressional Record – present
Committee Reports – present
GPO Access
Public laws – 1995 (104th Cong) - present
Bills (103d Cong) - present
Congressional Record – 1994 (vol. 140) - present
Committee Reports – 1995 (104th Cong) - present
Two highly recommended sites for tracking current legislation and legislative history. Many more listed in written materials. If you are interested in legislative information, these two should be your first Internet stop.
Legislative history research refers to efforts to track the progress of a bill through the legislative process and to examine documents created thru that process.
Generally, 2 purposes:
Determine legislative intent
2. Determine the status of a bill
Thomas -- Because this site was designed by librarians at the Library of Congress, it is easily navigable.
GPO Access – Government Printing Office
Both have full text of public laws, bills, Congressional Record and Committee Reports. Thomas coverage is broader, yet GPO Access has other materials as well.
Note GPO Access also has US Code, US Constitution, Federal Register, CFR, Weekly Compilation of Presidential documents, Congressional Directory.

15. Named for Thomas Jefferson, this excellent web site from the Library of Congress.
Note title: Legislative Information on the Internet - the best source for federal legislative information available on the Internet
Public laws – a little misleading - The full text of public laws can be accessed by Public Law number from the 101st Congress (1989) to present.
Summaries of Public Laws are provided for the 93rd Congress (1973) to the 100th Congress(1988).
How Congress Makes Laws LINKS:
Congressional Directory contact info, committee membership
This web site contains Congressional Record (from the 101st Congress, 1989 to present
Roll call votes
Committee reports and links to committees

16. Note tabs at top of page – Legislative, Executive, & Judicial
GPO = Government Printing Office
GPO Access provides history of bills including status. Full text of congressional bills, documents, hearings, reports, Congressional Record, public laws and committee prints.

17. GovTrack
THOMAS is toying with the idea of establishing alerts about new legislation. Until that happens, you might be interested in GovTrack. This new site allows you, after free registration, to specify subjects using terms assigned by the Congressional Research Service. Choosing from this list, you can then have updates ed to you either daily or weekly.

18. EXECUTIVE MATERIALS

19. Federal Regulations Code of Federal Regulations
GPO Access -includes superseded volumes
Cornell’s LII
Federal Register
GPO Access
CFR is available at both Cornell and GPO Access
Note that the GPO Access site includes superseded volumes of the CFR while the Cornell site mentioned below includes the most recent version of the CFR.
Cornell’s LII - This web site provides an improved front-end to the most recent version of the CFR placed on the Internet by the GPO Access.
As with the U.S. Code at Cornell that we looked at in detail earlier, you can search the CFR from this site by citation, a detailed table of contents, an index of all section headings or the Government Printing Office search engine.
FEDERAL REGISTER - GPO Access –
The GPO’s database includes the Federal Register (Volumes 59-70). The volumes are searchable by keyword or date. You can sign up for an ed daily TOC. The homepage also has an direct link to the latest issue.

20. Note the Revision Date Note revision date
Update results using Federal Register. Same process as print.
If you’ve forgotten how to use tables and update, there is an explanatory page on the GPO Federal Register pages.
PDF versions are also available from the Cornell LII site.
Note the Revision Date

21. e-CFR
Compare the “Revised of” date of the official CFR, with that of the electronic but still experimental CFR that is updated daily. This version is accessed via GPO Access, and can be useful as a guide, but it cannot be cited as legal authority.

22. Federal Government Agencies
If you’re doing regulatory/administrative research, in addition to the CFR & Federal Register, you might want to visit a particular federal administrative agency web site. The best place for locating government agencies info is First Gov.
FirstGov is the award-winning official U.S. gateway to all government information.
FirstGov is an interagency initiative administered by the U.S. General Services Administration.
Customer feedback is the driving force for how information is organized.
On FirstGov.gov, you can search more than 51 million web pages from federal and stategovernments, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories.

23. Other sites can be used to identify administrative resources, such as the FEDERAL WEB LOCATOR, and FEDWORLD.

24. Forms.gov
If what you need is a form, FORMS.GOV might be your first option. It makes immediately available about 2000 forms that are searchable by form number, agency, and even by form name.

25. JUDICIAL MATERIALS

26. Federal Case Law Meta-Indexes
Links to U.S. Supreme Court, Circuit Courts and District Courts
Include specialized courts such as U.S. Bankruptcy Courts, U.S. Court of International Trade
One possibility for locating Federal Case law is to use a meta-index. Meta-index is a term meaning comprehensive index.
Meta-indexes will provide links to U.S. Supreme Ct. Circuit Courts and District Courts as well as specialized courts such as Bankruptcy or International Trade.

27. Federal Case Law Meta-Indexes
Let me show you my three favorite meta-indexes for federal case law.
Federal Judiciary - maintained by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.
Intended to be a clearinghouse from and about the judicial branch of the U.S. government.
Links to ones mentioned previously plus Federal Judicial Center, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, U.S. Sentencing Commission, and other sites of interest.
3. Emory - includes clickable map
4. Villanova’s Federal Court Locator

28. U.S. Supreme Court FindLaw Supreme Court Decisions since 1991 (PDF)
Decisions since 1893 (html)
Free citator service to other Supreme Court and Circuit cases
Hyperlinks to other Supreme Court cases
Supreme Court
Decisions since 1991 (PDF)
FedWorld
Decisions between only (html)
U.S. Supreme Court
The court’s official site offers PDF of the bound volumes from 502 (1991), and slips to the present.
For earlier volumes, FedWorld.gov offers vols (1937 through 1975). The format is HTML, and all words are distractingly in caps.
Cornell’s LII - contains all opinions of the court issued since May of 1990 & 600 most important historic decisions.
Most comprehensive:
FindLaw’s database of the Supreme Court decisions since 1893 (US Reports 150‑) is browsable by year, cite, case title & full text.
FindLaw includes U.S. Reports page breaks.
Free citator service also hyperlinks to other Supreme Court cases
Also has court rules, docket, calendar, ** briefs from the present and back to the Oct term
If all of these website have your head swimming…you can have court info delivered directly to you. Cornell’s LII site offers to send you automatically the syllabi of court decisions on the day they are issued. If you wish to obtain the full opinion of a case, just back, and they’ll send you the full opinion – FREE. New in 2004, you can subscribe to a PREVIEW alert service, which updates you by on cases that are PENDING before the court, but have not yet been decided.

29. Federal Courts of Appeals
Omnibus Searching Capability
for Federal Courts
FindLaw formerly had this capacity, but it no longer exists
LexisOne does allow limited omnibus searching, but only for the last five years, and requires free registration
Cornell’s Legal Information Institute, however, still allows this function:
In your materials, lists of individual circuits web pages.

30. Federal Courts of Appeals
Cornell’s LII
Search all U.S. Federal Courts of Appeals simultaneously via the web

31. Federal District Courts
Use a meta-index such as FindLaw.
You must go to each individual District Court to do research. Free access is uneven: By one analysis, about 35 district courts out of 94 allow access to at least some opinions without going through PACER
Many District Courts have home pages with court calendars, dockets, some court rules and forms, but very few of them offer the full text of opinions.
Use a meta-index such as FindLaw or USCourts

32. Conclusion: What federal materials are available via the web?
U.S. Constitution with Supreme Ct. annotations
U.S. Code - unannotated
U.S. Supreme Court cases
U.S. Court of Appeals cases - last 5-7 years
U.S. District Court cases - very few
Code of Federal Regulations & Federal Register
Agency materials galore
Final advice – bookmark your favorite sites – Cornell, FindLaw, Thomas, GPO Access

33. The End