Westfield State College Ely Library

Law

General  |  Civil Rights Law  |  Communication and Media Law 
Constitutional Law  |  Employment Law  | Environmental Law 
 Foreign and International Law  |  Legal History  |   Municipal Codes  |  News Sources  |  State Law
US Federal Court Decisions and Documents  |   US Federal Legislation, Regulations, and Rules

General

FindLaw
http://www.findlaw.com
A comprehensive guide to legal resources on the Web.

Wex
http://topics.law.cornell.edu/wex
From Cornell's Legal Information Institute, a publicly accessible dictionary and encyclopedia of legal concepts and terminology. Articles are contributed by qualified authors in the field. Use the search box in the top left to search Wex.

LawCite
http://www.worldlii.org/LawCite/
From the Free Access to Law Movement, a conglomeration of Legal Information Institutes, LawCite is a free international legal case citator. It allows users to lookup cases and determine the citation history for the case. LawCite also includes the full-text of some cases. The database also indexes articles in Law Reviews. Essentially, this is an open source legal information database on an international scope.

Lawyer Directory from Martindale
http://www.martindale.com/
A directory of lawyers in the US and foreign countries, indexed by name, specialty, firm, and location.

Law and Technology Resources for Legal Professionals
http://www.llrx.com/
From editor, publisher, and author Sabrina Pacifici, the LLRX website offers considerable content on issues related to law and technology. Users can search articles by keyword. The site also has links to Court Rules, Forms, and Dockets searchable or browsable at the federal or state level.

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Civil Rights Law

Civil Rights and Discrimination
http://topics.law.cornell.edu/wex/Civil_rights
From the Legal Information Institute, Cornell University. Includes the full text of relevant statutes and court decisions, as well as links to organizations in the field.

Civil Rights Division, Department of Justice
http://www.justice.gov/crt/
Information on the programs of the Division, its positions on various issues, and the full text of selected cases and briefs.

National Women's Law Center
http://www.nwlc.org
Promoting the progress of females in all aspects of society, this site provides research, transcripts, press releases and other materials related to issues including athletics, education, employment, and sexual harassment.

US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
http://www.eeoc.gov/
Information on the programs of the Commission, full text of relevant laws and decisions, enforcement guidelines, and information on filing a claim.

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Communication and Media Law

Communications Law: An Overview
http://topics.law.cornell.edu/wex/Communications
From the Legal Information Institute, Cornell University. Commentary and full text of relevant statutes, regulations, and selected court decisions relating to the field of communications. Also includes links to related journals and organizations.

Copyright Law Materials
http://topics.law.cornell.edu/wex/Copyright
Another site from the Legal Information Institute, providing the full text of relevant laws and significant court decisions, plus links to government agencies and private organizations in the field.

Federal Communications Commission
http://www.fcc.gov/
Government agency in charge of regulating interstate and international radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable communications.

Privacy Rights Clearinghouse
http://www.privacyrights.org/
Non-profit consumer advocacy group which provides information and tips regarding personal privacy protection. Also includes transcripts of the group's testimony and issue papers relating to legislative hearings.

Guide to Open Government Law
http://www.rcfp.org/open-government-guide
From the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, this site is a "comprehensive guide to open government law and practice in each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia". Search the guide by keyword, browse by state, or compare laws between states.

US Copyright Office
http://www.copyright.gov/
Provides information and procedural documents relating to United States copyright law. Copyright application and other forms are available for download.

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Constitutional Law

Constitution of the United States of America
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution.html
From the National Archives, high-resolution images of the Constitution, as well as a transcript of the document.

First Amendment Center
http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org
News, commentary, and primary source materials dealing with all aspects of the first amendment. Of special interest are the the First Amendment Library and Congressional Research Service reports sections of the site. These provide links to significant court cases as well as research reports made specifically for Congress, arranged by topic area.

Religious Liberty Archive
http://www.churchstatelaw.com
From a law firm specializing in representing religious organizations, this site provides news, relevant cases, treatises, and applicable federal and state law regarding religious freedom in the United States. Most decisions are presented in full text, and some include legal commentary.

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Employment Law

Employment Law Guide (US Department of Labor)
http://www.dol.gov/compliance/guide/index.htm
An overview of federal laws and regulations affecting businesses and workers. Topics include wages, safety, benefits, and standards, as well as an index of acts by specific industry.

Employment Law Materials (Cornell University)
http://topics.law.cornell.edu/wex/employment
From the Legal Information Institute, Cornell University. The full text of relevant statutes and court decisions, plus links to other Web sites.

OSHA Regulations and Compliance Links
http://www.osha.gov/index.html
The website for the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

Right to Work States
http://www.nrtw.org/rtws.htm
Identifies those states with "right to work" laws on their books, and provides access to the full text of the corresponding legislation. From the National Right to Work Foundation.

US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
http://www.eeoc.gov/
The agency responsible for enforcement of federal laws on employment discrimination. Describes the EEOC's programs and gives the full text of relevant laws, decisions, and enforcement guidelines.

US National Labor Relations Board
http://www.nlrb.gov/
The agency responsible for representation elections and investigation of unfair labor practices. Includes full text of the NLRB's decisions and regulations, as well as a manual of procedures and compliance.

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Environmental Law

Environmental Law Materials
http://topics.law.cornell.edu/wex/Environmental_law
From the Legal Information Institute, Cornell University. Includes the full text of relevant federal laws and links to other federal and state agencies and private organizations in the field.

US Environmental Protection Agency: Laws, Regulations, and Dockets
http://www.epa.gov/lawsregs/index.html
Provides access to the full text of major environmental laws as well as current and proposed regulations and guidance documents.

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Foreign and International Law

Comparative & Foreign Law Guides
http://www.llrx.com/category/1050
In-depth articles provide overviews of legal systems, resource guides, and information on performing legal research in several countries.

Constitution Finder
http://confinder.richmond.edu/
Links to texts of constitutions of foreign countries. Texts are in English unless otherwise noted.

World Legal Information Institute
http://www.worldlii.org/
Developed by various international legal information institutes, a database linking users to legal resources for countries worldwide. Users can browse by country or region. Users can also search by keyword. Some of the content is hosted on-site, and in other cases links are provided to foreign websites.

Globalex
http://www.nyulawglobal.org/globalex/
From the Hauser Global Law School Program of NYU, the Globalex site offers encyclopedic introductions to various areas of international law, accompanied by extensive lists of sources (some online). Some resources listed are subscription-services. The section "Foreign Law Research" can be browsed by country. "International Law Research" can be browsed by topic area.

Nations of the World
http://www.loc.gov/law/help/guide/nations.php
From the Library of Congress, a collection of links to legal information for countries. Choose a country and the website will display links for the categories of Constitution, Executive (government), Judicial, Legislative, and Legal Guidelines and Miscellaneous. The site also similarly provides access to U.S. state legal information by selecting the "United States" link from the top toolbar.

Electronic Information System for International Law
http://www.eisil.org
From the American Society of International Law, a non-partisan organization chartered originally by Congress, a web directory linking to primary source materials (laws, treaties, charters) and related resources of international law. The directory can be searched by keyword or browsed by topic area. Topics include human rights, criminal, economic, and environmental law.

Foreign Law
http://www.willamette.edu/wucl/longlib/foreign_law/index.html
From the Law Library of Willamette University. Links to international organizations, treaties, constitutions, and national courts around the world. Also see links
to International Law.

United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law
http://untreaty.un.org/cod/avl/index.html
From the United Nations, a library of international legal materials, including treaties, lectures, research guides, and more. The Historical Archives has topic categories to browse for historical documets. The Lecture Series includes video and audio files discussing international legal topics such as disaster prevention, international civil aviation, migration law, and armed conflict. The Research Library povide links to treaties, jurisprudence, scholarly reports, and more off-site.

Global Legal Information Network
http://glinfoundation.org/
Database of international laws sponsored by the Library of Congress. Public access to english language summaries of laws and related legal writings for numerous countries. Use the associated Guide to Law Online for additional international legal resources.

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Legal History

The Avalon Project: Documents In Law, History, and Government
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/avalon.htm
From the Yale University Law School. The full text of historically significant legal documents from ancient times to the present, but mostly since the 17th century.

Guide to Legal History Resources on the Web
http://tarlton.law.utexas.edu/rare/legal-history.html
From the University of Texas at Austin Law Library. Links to documentary sources, libraries, and archives.

History of the Federal Judiciary
http://www.fjc.gov/history/home.nsf
From the US Federal Judicial Center. Brief biographies of all federal judges and outline histories of all federal courts from 1789 to the present.

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Municipal Codes

American Legal Publishing - Online Library
http://www.amlegal.com/library/
Full text of the laws of over 200 municipalities in 30 states.

Municode.com \ Online Library
http://www.municode.com/Library/

Provides browseable access to the full text of over the municipal code of each state.

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News Sources

American Lawyer
http://www.americanlawyer.com/index.jsp
National news on the law profession, with current articles and videos available from the site. The site for American Lawyer also features surveys and rankings on the profession and firms.

National Law Journal
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/index.jsp
Daily news in all fields of law, with earlier articles on selected subjects.

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State Law

Constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
http://www.malegislature.gov/Laws/Constitution
Full text of all articles and the preamble of the Massachusetts Consititution.

Findlaw: State Cases and Codes
http://www.findlaw.com/casecode/state.html
Links to official and unofficial Web sites providing the full text of state cases and codes.

The General Laws of Massachusetts
http://www.malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/
The full text of the code of laws currently in effect, searchable by section or keyword.

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Opinions
http://www.findlaw.com/11stategov/ma/maca.html
The full text of opinions from 1998 to date.

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US Federal Court Decisions and Documents

The Federal Judiciary Homepage
http://www.uscourts.gov
"Clearinghouse for information from and about the Judicial Branch of the U.S. Government". Provides research and statistics on the federal court systems of the United States. Links are provided to the websites of the various courts, as well as to the full text of federal court rules, and other publications.

SCOTUSblog
http://www.scotusblog.com/

From Bloomberg Law, a website tracking the Supreme Court. Use the search box to locate briefs associated with Supreme Court decisions.

Findlaw: US Supreme Court Opinions
http://www.findlaw.com/casecode/supreme.html
Provides the full text of all decisions from 1893 to date. Can be searched by citation, party, and words in text.

Findlaw: US Supreme Court Briefs
http://supreme.lp.findlaw.com/supreme_court/briefs/index.html
Briefs presented by both sides (party briefs) and others (amicus briefs), as well as transrcipts of oral arguments are provided in different electronic formats.

The History of the Supreme Court
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/
Sponsored by New York Life Insurance and PBS, this website features essays introducing topics related to the Supreme Court. Topics include presidential appointment, freedom of expression, sexual harassment, Separation of Powers, and more. The site also includes lesson plans for teachers k-12, a time-line of events, and an encyclopedia.

Supreme Court Collection
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/
From the Legal Information Institute, Cornell University. Provides the full text of all US Supreme Court decisions since 1990, plus 610 of the most significant earlier decisions. Indexed by topic, date, and parties.

Oyez: U.S. Supreme Court Multimedia
http://www.oyez.org/
Created by facutly of Northwestern University, with grants and support from the National Science Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities, a website offering audio files of actual hearings from Supreme Court cases.

Landmark Supreme Court Cases
http://www.landmarkcases.org/
Developed to provide teachers with a full range of resources and activities to support the teaching of landmark Supreme Court cases, helping students explore the key issues of each case. The "Resources" section features basic building blocks such as background summaries and excerpts of opinions that can be used in multiple ways.

OpenJurist
http://openjurist.org/
OpenJurist provides access to case law for the Supreme Court dating back to 1790 and lower Federal Courts dating back to 1880. Cases are searched by keyword, using a google-powered search engine. Users may also browse by series and citation.

United States Tax Court
http://www.ustaxcourt.gov
Official website of the U.S. Tax Court, this site provides background on the Court as well as access to Tax Court opinions (beginning 1/1999), rules, and docket records (beginning 5/1986).

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US Federal Legislation, Regulations, and Rules

Code of Federal Regulations
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/browse/collectionCfr.action?collectionCode=CFR
From the US National Archives and Records Administration. The full text of regulations issued by Federal agencies.

Federal Rulemaking
http://www.uscourts.gov/rules/newrules4.html
Official text of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, Civil Procedure, Appellate Procedure, and Evidence. All files in .PDF format.

US Code (Searchable)
http://uscode.house.gov/search/criteria.shtml
From the US House of Representatives. A search engine retrieving the full text of federal laws in force.

United States Statutes at Large: 1789-1873
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwsl.html
Browseable, scanned-images of full text of U.S. Statutes at Large (Public Laws) of the first forty-two Congresses. Though not keyword searchable, a page heading index is provided for the set as a whole, as well as an individual topic index for each volume.

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URL: http://www.lib.wsc.ma.edu/law.htm
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Last updated May 8, 2013