Legal Research for EducatorsThis book is in the form of a bibliographic essay, and addresses the needs of educators seeking access to legal research materials. The first item discussed is court decisions and examples are given which demonstrate the importance of legal precedent. An explanation is given of the complicated systems for reporting court decisions and how the educational researcher can find a case, read it, and apply its findings to the particular problem at hand. A section is devoted to finding information about legislation, codes and statutes, and understanding legislative intent. Included in this section are discussions on hearings and reports, researching bills that fail, determining the status of pending legislation, and state legislation. The next three sections discuss finding and using federal agency publications, list useful legal periodicals and reference works, and describe law library indexing systems. The final section discusses the revolution that has been brought to law libraries by the advent of computerized legal research and explains how an educator may make use of the complex resources available through computerized searches. (JD) |
Common terms and phrases
abbreviations academic law library Administrative agency allow amended annotated appear appellate courts assigned attorneys beginning bill Board call number catalog Chapter citation classified Code committee Congress Congressional connector contain court decisions depository determine digest topics discuss documents edition Education example Federal Register followed frequently give given government publications headnotes hearings House important issue journals judge key number kind law library Legal Periodicals legal research Legal Resource Index legislation Lexis listed locate major materials MICHIGAN Office particular passed phrases produce publications published reference regulations reports Rights school district schoolteacher Senate similar sometimes sources statute step subject headings subject index substitute Supreme Court teacher tenure terminal tions titles tool United States Code usually valuable volume West Westlaw written