Finding a Topic | Preemption Checks | Spading | Research Help | Writing Help
Finding a Topic
BNA Databases
BNA publications provide in-depth news and analysis of current events along with applicable statutes, administrative regulations, decisions, and cases in a variety of legal subject areas including business law, criminal law, environmental law, labor law, and intellectual property. Excellent for current awareness of legal developments and finding a topic for a student note.
Social Sciences Research Network (SSRN)
Abstracts and full-text scholarly working papers in law, economics, and other fields. Papers are published here before submission to academic journals.
Congressional Quarterly Publications
CQ Researcher offers in-depth analysis of major issues in the news. CQ Weekly covers Congressional news and both provide background on public policy issues.
Split Circuits – A blog dedicated to tracking developments concerning splits among the federal circuit courts.
How Appealing - A blog devoted to appellate litigation.
The Adjunct Law Prof Blog - Click the tag for "Law Review Ideas" in the archive.
ACS ResearchLink – Hosted by the American Constitution Society for Law and Public Policy, this website fosters collaboration between practitioners and law students by providing a bank of legal research topics. The resulting papers are sent to the practitioner who proposed the topic and posted on the ResearchLink database.
Out of the Jungle – Thoughts on the present and future of legal information, legal research, and legal education, written by law librarians. Very nice checklist for writing articles in the post on “Law Review Writing Time” ( August 13, 2006)
ZiefBrief – Research tip blog from the University of San Francisco Law Library. Links to sources for topic ideas in the post on “Summer Reading – Finding Paper & Law Review Topics” (April 28, 2006)
Legal Scholarship Blog - This is a good source for what's hot in the legal field. It collects law-related calls for papers, conferences, and workshops.
Heather Meeker, Stalking the Golden Topic: A Guide to Locating and Selecting Topics for Legal Research Papers, 1996 Utah L. Rev. 917. Available from HeinOnline, LexisNexis & Westlaw.
Richard Delgado, How to Write a Law Review Article, 20 U .San Francisco. L. Rev. 445 (1986). Available from HeinOnline.
Preemption Checks
Lexis and Westlaw – Note that coverage on Lexis & Westlaw generally begins around 1980. Many law reviews are not included at all, and others have only selected coverage. Do not rely solely on Lexis/Westlaw for your preemption check!
Index to Legal Periodicals - Searchable index of articles going back to 1908. ILP is a much more comprehensive tool for locating law reviews. Selected full text is available; once you’ve identified a citation, use HeinOnline, JSTOR, or the print journal collection (3 rd floor) to retrieve a copy.
Other Periodical Indices – Indexes for periodicals covering many other areas of scholarship are available at the main Mason library.
WorldCat – A database containing library holdings all over the world. Do a subject and keyword search to determine whether a book has a section or chapter devoted to your topic.
Cases – Particularly if one of your cases has been appealed, update it regularly using Shepard’s or KeyCite to track the latest developments.
Writing Help
Elizabeth Fajans. Scholarly Writing for Law Students: Seminar Papers, Law Review Notes, and Law Review Competition Papers. Law Library – RESERVE KF250.F35 2011 (older editions on the Third Floor).
Eugene Volokh, Academic Legal Writing: Law Review Articles, Student Notes, and Seminar Papers. Law Library - RESERVE KF250 .V6 2010 (older editions on the Third Floor).
Spading
Citations
Cardiff Index to Legal Abbreviations. Online, free. Enter a title to find the abbreviation; or enter the abbreviation to find the title.
Bieber's Dictionary of Legal Abbreviations. Copies are available at the Circulation Desk, in the Reference area (KF246.B46 2001), and on Lexis.
World Dictionary of Legal Abbreviations (Reference collection, K89.K38) if your cite is not listed in Bieber’s.
Books
Start with the GMU Catalog. We share the catalog with the main campus library. If your book is located at another campus library, request it using the ILLiad request form. For more information on borrowing from other libraries see the Borrowing from Other Libraries page.
If GMU does not own your book, use WorldCat to find all the necessary information for filling out the ILLiad request form. Most importantly, please include the OCLC, or Accession, number in your request form. This unique identifier ensures that we borrow the precise edition of the book you are requesting.
Loans from other libraries can take up to 10 days, so plan ahead when possible. It may be faster for you to visit another library yourself. Use WorldCat to see whether a local library owns your material. See below for details on visiting other law libraries in the region.
Articles
Check the GMU E-Journal Finder to locate electronic copies of journals. Follow the link to the database noted for your journal. Some journals are available in PDF files, others are not. Links to HeinOnLine and JSTOR will surely include the full text in PDF format. Except for very recent articles, nearly all law review articles are available in HeinOnLine in PDF format.
If the journal is not available electronically using the E-Journal Finder, check the GMU catalog for print copies. For articles in journals not in the law library, you can request articles using the ILLiad request form. Include the ISSN or OCLC number of the journal in your request form. Also be sure to include the necessary information for the lending library to find and photocopy the article you want – author, title, page range, etc.
ILL for articles is usually fast because lending libraries normally photocopy and fax or email the article to us.
Congressional Materials
You can find many Congressional documents, including bills, Senate and House reports and documents, hearing transcripts, legislative histories, and the Congressional Record in the ProQuest Congressional database. Many of these documents are available in PDF format. Coverage of the Congressional Record and House and Sentate reports is extensive, going back to the early sessions of Congress.
Many congressional materials, bills, and laws from 1993 forward are also available in PDF format at FDsys.gov.
For PDF versions of Public Laws published in United States Statutes at Large use HeinOnLine (1789 to 2008) or the free FDSys (1951 to 2008, and Public Laws as slip laws 1994 to present). The FDSys versions are official and certified to be authentic and unaltered from their original form.
For tracking the status of a bill currently in Congress, or finding a Senate or House hearing from 1994 forward, use Thomas, a free service of the Library of Congress.
For more detailed information on finding congressional material, please see our Federal Legislative History research guide.
USC, CFR, and Federal Register (FR)
HeinOnline provides comprehensive coverage in PDF of the USC, CFR, and Federal Register (FR) as follows: USC (1925 to present), CFR (1938 to present), and FR (1936 present).
The Government's free FDSys provides PDF versions of the USC (1994 to present), CFR (1996 to present), and Federal Register (1994 to present), too. The FDSys versions are official and certified to be authentic and unaltered from their original form.
Newspapers
The law library keeps a couple of weeks' worth of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, and the Washington Business Journal, as well as the American Lawyer, Lawyers Weekly, and Virginia Lawyers Weekly. Ask at the circulation desk.
Historical Newspapers in PDF
Proquest Historical Newspapers – Atlanta Constitution 1868-1945; Boston Globe 1872-1927; Chicago Tribune 1849-1987; Christian Science Monitor 1908-1997; Los Angeles Times 1881-1987; NY Times 1851-2007; Wall Street Journal 1889-1993; Washington Post 1877-1994.
American Periodical Series - Lesser known and short run American newspapers, magazines, and journals from 1740 to the mid 1940's. Examples include: New Englander (1843-1885) and Outing Magazine (1906-1911).
Nineteenth Century US Newspapers – Lesser known papers from the 19th century. Examples include Montgomery Daily Advertiser (1847-1965), Raleigh Register (1800-1886), and Virginia Sentinel (1854-1868).
Early American Newspapers, 1690 to 1976 - Fully searchable issues from over 710 historical American newspapers, focusing largely on the 18th and early 19th centuries.
Harper's Weekly in HarpWeek - Digital replica of Harper's Weekly, an authoritative, illustrated political news magazine covered in HarpWeek from 1857-1912.
Times [London] Digital Archive – 1785-1985
Chronicling America: Historic America Newspapers – Free database of the Library of Congress. Digitized select, U.S. papers from 1836 to 1922.
Contemporary Newspapers
With the exception of what the Law Library keeps for a couple of weeks and the digitized historical newspapers, you will have to use the ILLiad request form to request microfilm of the paper you need. Be sure to first use Lexis or Factiva to verify all the information about the article – title, author, date, page – before filling in the ILLiad request form. Below are listed the ISSN and OCLC numbers for the most commonly requested papers. For others, please use WorldCat to obtain the OCLC (accession) number that you need for the ILLiad request form.
- New York Times – ISSN 0362-4331; OCLC 1645522
- Wall Street Journal – ISSN 0099-9660; OCLC 4299067
- Washington Post – ISSN 0190-8286; OCLC 226935
- Richmond Times-Dispatch – OCLC 9493729
Working Papers
SSRN: The Social Science Research Network (SSRN) provides access to working papers in social science research, including law. These papers are not necessarily in final format. You should cite to an article in a published journal, not SSRN, if it has already been published.
Most local undergraduate academic libraries are NOT open to the public. Academic and other law libraries have restricted access:
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obtain a Reader ID Card from LC’s visitor office in the Madison building; closed stacks, book retrieval can take up to 2 hours |
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must show GMUSL ID |
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must show GMUSL ID and a letter from GMUSL Reference Librarian |
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open except during exams; must show GMUSL ID |
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open except during exams; must show GMUSL ID |
Research Help
The reference librarians have extensive experience in legal, business, and general research. We each have a J.D. and a Masters in Library Science. Please call (703-993-8076 or 703-993-8111), email, or stop by with questions (First Floor Library, Room 141). We can save you a lot of time.
For more information on specific research topics such as Intellectual Property, Foreign and International Law, and Legislative History, consult the GMU Law Library Research Guides.