What Is the Second Primary Source of Legal Authority

Summaries are not primary sources, but they are one of the fastest ways to find a primary authority in a particular jurisdiction. The collections contain many citations on court decisions on specific topics and sub-themes. They are listed alphabetically by theme. They also include an index volume, a word and phrase volume (where you can search for specific words that can lead you to a particular topic), and a comprehensive table of contents. Each topic has its own table of contents, which is useful if you`re not sure which subtopic exactly to focus on. Although they cannot be directly invoked as a legal authority, secondary sources remain among the most important authorities that can be used in legal arguments. Legal research sources are divided into two categories: primary and secondary. Primary sources include laws, rules, regulations and jurisprudence. Secondary sources are much more diverse and include law journals and journal articles, legal encyclopedias, treatises and law summaries. Primary sources are not necessarily binding – it depends on the jurisdiction in which your case is pending. You learned about binding and persuasive authority in the chapter on the structure of justice in the United States. Binding authority binds the court, but persuasiveness is not binding.

Not all primary sources are binding authorities, i.e. not all primary sources are necessarily binding. For example, court decisions are primary sources, but they can only be a persuasive authority, depending on the jurisdiction. No secondary source is an authoritative authority – they are only persuasive authorities. The reformulations of the law are an excellent example of such an authority. Many courts are perfectly comfortable quoting a particular section of a reformulation to explain a particular legal issue. Similarly, jury instructions from state and federal courts across the country are used as an authoritative reference when submitting jury instructions. Given the breadth of the definition, it is not surprising that secondary sources can be as diverse in nature and purpose as different methods of evaluating legislation and jurisprudence. For example, many secondary sources take the form of recent authoritative articles, some of these bodies compile case law or laws from many jurisdictions, and still others are in the form of live or recorded seminars. And this only scratches the surface of all available secondary sources of law. Given the raw size of resources that the term encompasses, it may be useful to define «secondary sources» first.

Restatements provide general rules for specific areas of law. They are drafted as laws, but they do not constitute a right of review unless a court has adopted them. Drafted by panels of experts in specific areas of law, the reformulations are written on a variety of topics, including tort, contracts, product liability, and ownership. Reformulations are very useful because they provide a basic understanding of the relevant principles and contain detailed annotations divided by jurisdiction. There are a number of reasons why secondary sources are so important to the practice of law. One of the main reasons is that secondary sources may reflect the prevailing view of how courts interpret primary sources. Some secondary sources are so authoritative that the courts themselves base their decisions on them. The North Eastern Reporter also includes court decisions from Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts and Ohio. Judicial decisions of the Connecticut Supreme Court can be found in both the official Connecticut Reporter (the quote is Conn.) and the Atlantic Regional (commercial) Reporter (the quote is A.). Other business journalists include the South Western Reporter (SW) and the Southern Reporter (So.).

These and other journalists are included in the later subchapter on the legal citation. Regional journalists were created to reduce the number of different publications that a law library had to accommodate in order to be complete. For example, you wouldn`t need the reports from New York, Illinois and Indiana; only the North Eastern Reporter is needed to have the most important decisions of all these states. In fact, there are many secondary sources that may even point you to the most relevant cases and laws that you can examine and rely on for the legal issue under investigation. Many even carefully distill the legal issues of the referenced primary authorities for easy consumption, making understanding a previously unknown area of law relatively quick and painless. For starters, as mentioned above, using secondary sources in your research process usually leads to a more complete understanding of the legal issue in question. Being able to know not only what the law says, but also what others say about the law, can add a clearly reliable flavor to your legal argument. American Law Reports contains lengthy articles on specific legal topics, some of which are narrower than others. Articles, commonly referred to as ALRs, often provide an overview of the national treatment of a topic and contain detailed annotations. Notes are usually divided by jurisdiction, subtopics are referenced, and most articles contain references to other ALR articles that are related or may be of interest. If secondary sources don`t really establish the law, why should they care? If you know the topic you need to look for, go to the table of contents and read each subtopic until you find the area that is relevant to your problem.

Each subtopic is assigned a number, such as a chapter number (for example, 100.100, below). Just find the chapter number on the following pages in the topic and read the quotes. Each quote is accompanied by a very short summary (usually one sentence) of the judgment. Many states have their own digests, and there are also regional digests. Here`s an example of what a section might look like in a digest: Many secondary sources have value beyond citability in a legal argument. In particular, many titles offer valuable information about current court decisions or new laws. Some may analyze new legal authorities to break down their meaning into more digestible terms, while others consider the potential impact of a new judgment or law. Even more secondary sources may examine current legal trends or the current state of a particular area of law, based on recent court decisions or updates to legislation.