Encyclopedias, digests and other sources giver references to laws and court cases by using citations such as 410 US 113 or 237 F2d 62 or RC 2305.16.
Statutes: A citation to a statute consists of an abbreviation which stands for the name of a law book, plus numbers indicating the title (subject category) and section or paragraph.
Court Cases: A citation to a court case consists of an abbreviation plus numbers indicating the volume and page number.
For other abbreviations see the tables of abbreviations in the front of the volume from which you got the citation. There is also a list of abbreviations in Black's Law Dictionary (GOV REF KF 156 .B53). Numbers following abbreviations (such as F2d or ALR3rd) indicate particular series.
Abbreviation | Meaning |
---|---|
AmJur | American Jurisprudence |
CFR | Code of Federal Regulations |
CJS | Corpus Juris Secundum |
F | Federal Reporter |
F.Supp | Federal Supplement |
Fed. | Federal Reporter |
LEd | Supreme Court Reports, Lawyer's Edition |
NE | Northeastern Reporter |
OAC | Ohio Adminstrative Code |
Ohio ST | Ohio State Reports |
OJur | Ohio Jurisprudence |
OS | Ohio State reports |
OOps | Ohio Opinions |
RC | Ohio Revised Code |
SCt | Supreme Court Reporter |
US | U.S. Reports |
USC | United States Code |
USCA | United States Code Annotated |
Most style manuals contain basic formats for citing documents in research. However, because of the variety of types of documents, it can be difficult to figure out how to create a citation. The standard guide is the Blue Book: A Uniform System of Citation, in print. [A short and limited guide is online.] Some samples below, but you may have to adapt the format of your citation to reflect the spirit of the structure if you cannot find an exact match. In general, the idea of citation is that you can find a source again, and that your citations are reasonably standardized and consistent. Some of the databases will supply citations for each document.
Georgetown Law School -- includes some video tutorials
The Publications Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA Style) has a section on "Legal References."