The Process

Secondary Sources: sources of information that describe or interpret the law cited by lawyers to persuade a court to reach a particular decision in a case, but which the court is not obligated to follow.

Step 1: Start with a secondary source in order to:

learn from legal experts
get most important authority
read important background information

Primary sources: a document that establishes the law on a particular issue such as a case decision or legislative act.

Step 2: Use Primary Sources

Why? --- Because it is authoritative, precedent, and controlling

Shepardizing: the process of consulting Shepard's to see if a case has been overturned, reaffirmed, questioned, or cited by later cases.

Step 3: Shepardizing

You can't use reversed or overruled authority

Step 4: Rinse and Repeat

Must keep your research up-to-date with the current law.

	Created by alicialee07 over 11 years ago

Law School Basics Note on Introduction to legal research, created by alicialee07 on 25/07/2013.