Rebecca Plevel 2022-06-23 07:50:05
For some of us it’s been longer than for others since law school and our formal legal research training. I certainly don’t remember all the research techniques I was taught in law school. I practiced law for 30 years before changing hats to become a law librarian and teacher. My practice was all in Arizona, and in Indian Country within Arizona, not in South Carolina, thus I had to learn a lot of new content and new resources in the last nine months. This has provided me, and hopefully will provide you, with some good research insights. So, let’s get back to some of the basics, and I will provide tips for using the resources here at the University of South Carolina Law Library.
Tip 1 - Bookmark www.law.sc.edu/library in your favorite browser.
This will be a good starting point in your search for resources. We will talk a little later about resources on our website and in our library that may be useful to you.
Steps in the Legal Research Process
Being able to conduct effective and efficient legal research is a vital skill for practitioners, as well as law students. The reason we conduct legal research is to find the answers to legal questions. We need to know what laws apply to the facts of our case, what facts are relevant to our client’s claim(s), what remedy we are seeking, and what cases may impact the judge’s decision. Also, we need to research productively and cost-effectively.
Your first step is to identify the legal issue(s) you need to research. That takes knowing the facts of your case or issue, and what ultimate outcome are you looking for. You also need to know what jurisdiction your case or claim is in. Draft a short concise statement of your issue(s). Do you know what statutes and rules apply to your matter? Do you know what relief is possible?
The second step, if you don’t know the law already, or if your issue is in an area of law that you are not completely familiar with, will be to look at some secondary sources. Secondary sources are legal dictionaries, treatises, handbooks and manuals, encyclopedias such as AmJur, CJS, and SC Jurisprudence, law journal articles, and even Bar magazine articles. Secondary sources can assist you with learning what statutes and rules may apply to your matter, and even what terms and vocabulary are used commonly in that area of law. All of these secondary sources are available either online or at the Law Library. The Library of Congress has a nice guide on Secondary Sources at https://guides. loc.gov/law-secondary-resources/ and one regarding Administrative Law secondary sources at https:// guides.loc.gov/administrative-law/ secondary-sources.
The third step in your research process is creating a list of search terms considering the parties, places, and things involved, the claims, defenses, and relief sought. Generating a list of relevant search terms often requires a basic knowledge of the vocabulary of the controlling area of law. That can be found by reviewing secondary sources, or maybe a controlling statute or rule. When drafting these search terms, think about alternatives or synonyms of your terms as well. Look for words which legal writers are likely to use in place of the key terms you’ve identified. Such as for car, other words might be automobile, vehicle, truck, or sedan.
Next, where and how are you going to search? As a member of the South Carolina Bar, you have access to a Fastcase subscription for free (see www.scbar.org/ fastcase). You or your firm might also subscribe to one of the paid services, Westlaw, Lexis, Casetext, or even Bloomberg Law. There are also some free resources online including Cornell’s Legal Information Institute, FindLaw, Justia, and even Google Scholar! Check out our Free Internet Legal Resources: Popular Resources Guide (https:// guides.law.sc.edu/internetlegalresources) to access these and more resources.
Tip 2 - Use more than one legal platform in your searching.
Legal research databases do not contain all the same information, and each uses different and proprietary search algorithms created by humans, so each will pull different results from the same search queries.1
So how do you construct your search terms in the search box? You can certainly search using ‘natural language’ in all the subscription and free databases, but you might not get the best results. It can be useful when you are exploring a topic new to you. The search results you get with a natural language (read ‘google search’) reflect the algorithmic decision-making by the people who designed the search engine. Your results may be based on the number of times your search terms appear in a document or on a webpage, not necessarily how relevant the results are to your legal question.
Tip 3 - Using Boolean or terms and connectors searching can tailor and refine your search.
Boolean or terms and connectors is the advanced search function in the legal database platform you are using. “Boolean searching is built on a method of symbolic logic developed by George Boole, a 19th century English mathematician. Boolean searches allow you to combine words and phrases using the words AND, OR, NOT (known as Boolean operators) to limit, broaden, or define your search.”2 When the legal search engines such as Westlaw and Fastcase started allowing natural language (as in ‘ask it a question’), I started using that option almost exclusively. It was easy, it was fast, but it wasn’t always accurate, or would return completely irrelevant material. Westlaw, Lexis, and Fastcase all have advanced search functions which uses terms and connectors including AND, OR, NOT, as well as proximity, root expanders and truncation, and wildcard symbols (i.e., /# ! *). Using the advanced search, or terms and connectors, once you get used to them, will give you much better results. 3
Now you can start searching! You should use a consistent strategy in your searching, making sure that you are finding items relevant to your issue. If you are not finding relevant materials - statutes, cases, secondary sources – then you will have to revisit your search terms.
Tip 4 - Keep a research log.
A research log is your roadmap; how did you get from point A to point Y, to those perfect cases to answer your legal question or issue. List your search terms, and any changes to those terms as you go along. Where did you search – what sources, what filters did you apply. Describe the paths you took to get from point A to point Y. And list what results you get. This might seem to slow you down at first, but it may actually help you focus your research and keep you from chasing squirrels all over the Southeastern states. It might also help someone else trying to answer the same question.
Tip 5 - Read the statutes, cases, or other sources as you go.
Cases might lead you to other relevant cases. Statutes and rules may have annotations which will give you relevant cases too. Lexis and Westlaw offer annotations to statutes and court rules, but unfortunately, while Fastcase has annotations for statutes, it does not have annotations to court rules – but I am told it is coming. We do have the SC Code Annotated at the library which includes South Carolina court rules and annotations.
Tip 6 - Save the cases, statutes, rules, and other sources you find to a file on your computer or to file storage system.
Do not depend on saving your research results within the research platform (even though Fastcase, Lexis and Westlaw all let you save your research within their system) – those require an internet connection to access, a file folder saved locally does not!
The last step in your research should be to make sure all that law you just found is still good law. You need to update it all – using Lexis’ Sherpardize function, Westlaw’s KeyCite function, and/or Fastcase’s Authority Check (see Fastcase’s video tutorial on YouTube at https://bit.ly/FCauthoritychk.)
Finally, all three of these research platforms have help pages and tutorials; Lexis at https://bit. ly/lexiscusthelp, and for Westlaw at the ? symbol on their main page. Fastcase’s Help page has tutorials at www.fastcase.com/support/#tutorials.
Resources at the UofSC Law Library
How else can the UofSC Law Library help? There are lots of ways we can assist with your research needs. There is a reference librarian on duty Monday through Friday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (except law school holidays). You can send an email with a request for assistance to lawref@law.sc.edu; you can send a chat request at Ask a Librarian, https://bit.ly/AskUofSCLawLib or you can call the Reference Desk at (803) 777-5902. One limitation on our assistance—we may not be able to assist with rush requests. Don’t call from the courtroom – with the judge waiting on the bench – to ask us to get you a copy of the 1966 case annotated in a particular statute. And we cannot do your research for you; we will assist you in finding the resources you need to do your own research!
The library is open to the public, so you can come in person. Library and Reference Desk hours are listed on our website as they do change during finals and over the summer (see the Law Library Calendar link on our main page). We have a private room reserved for attorney use, near the Reference Desk. We also provide a document delivery service (50-page limit) if you can’t come in. (See, https://bit. ly/lawlibsvsbnb). We do not have printers available for patrons, but we do have a scanner and a copier. The scanner is free, and you can email the document to yourself or save it to your own flash-drive. The copier costs money and does not take cash, so you will need to purchase a copy-card at the kiosk.
More specific research help
On the library’s main webpage (that one I told you to bookmark at the beginning of this article) you will find numerous resources. At the top is the search bar for searching within our catalog. Our catalog includes the holdings within the Law Library, those at the Thomas Cooper Library on the main campus and the Caroliniana Library. It also includes items that may be available at other South Carolina academic libraries (via our library consortium, PASCAL). Links in the catalog to some online resources may not be available unless you are in the library connected via the university’s internet. You can do this on one of our public computers.
A little further down that main Law Library page, there is a link to Legal Research Guides by Topic (https://guides.law.sc.edu/topical- guides) which has a great many resources that are available to you, including guides on specific areas of law. On the Research page of the library’s website, there are links for our Special Collections (historical SC legal records) (https://guides. law.sc.edu/special-collections), and a link to our Faculty Scholarship at Scholar Commons (http://scholarcommons. sc.edu/law/) which provides access to journal articles written by UofSC faculty, including the law faculty. And, last but not least, our Circuit Riders Guide, (http://guides.law.sc.edu/Circuit- Riders) which is a basic guide to South Carolina legal research.
We have a guide for South Carolina Legal Resources (https://guides. law.sc.edu/SCLegalResources/) which includes digital access to a great many of the South Carolina legal resources, including statutes dating back to 1682. In addition to this digital access, we have print copies of all the South Carolina Code and its prior iterations, along with the South Carolina Reporter, the Southeastern Reporters, South Carolina and South Eastern Digests, SC Jurisprudence, and a number of handbooks and manuals about discrete areas of law and about South Carolina law in particular. These are mostly located on the first floor in the reference section.
There are many resources in our library that are not online but are available for use in the library. This specifically includes a complete copy of the 1962 South Carolina Code (we are not able to digitize it yet due to copywrite restrictions by the publisher), as well as superseded provisions in the current 1976 SC Code from 1976 to 2000 which may or may not be available online. We also have many South Carolina appellate Briefs and Records, pre-2014. On the Case Law tab of the South Carolina Legal Resources Guide https://guides.law.sc.edu/SCLegalResources is a finding aid for the Briefs and Records which are housed in the Law Library.
Another unique and publicly accessible resource in print at the Law Library are the Acts and Joint Resolutions of the General Assembly of the State of South Carolina, 1868-2010. These are great for doing historical legislative research. The scstatehouse.gov site (www.scstatehouse.gov/newlaws.php) contains the current Legislative session, and a link to their Archives going back to 1980. In 2011, the SC Legislature stopped producing the Acts & Joint Resolutions in print. There is digital access to the Acts and Joint Resolutions from 1731-1986 via the subscription service, LLMC Digital, but you will need to access it from one of the public computers at the library. There is access for free to some of the older Acts and Joint Resolutions via our catalog on HathiTrust (search “South Carolina Acts and Resolutions” and filter for Open Access availability). We also have the SC House and Senate Journals in print in the library. Print copies of the Journals of the SC House of Representatives from 1843 forward are available on the first floor, as are print copies of the Journals of the SC Senate from 1846 forward. The South Carolina Legislature’s website has the SC House Journals available from only 1986 to present, and the Journals of the SC Senate are available from 1990 to present (www.scstatehouse.gov/ajournal.php).
The SC House and Senate Journals are a great place to do legislative history research! To do this historical research, you must start with the South Carolina Code. The last complete revision of the entire South Carolina Code Annotated was in 1976. Since 1976, the South Carolina Code Annotated has been updated by replacing individual volumes as needed. A statute can be amended many times after its original enactment, and it is often necessary to compare the text of a current statute to its earlier versions. For example, lawyers might review changes made by the South Carolina General Assembly to argue legislative intent or to determine the law in effect at the time of a particular transaction, incident, or crime. You will find only some information as to legislative intent in the South Carolina legislative materials. The South Carolina legislature does not keep a verbatim transcript of House and Senate activities. After about 1975 you might be able to find video recordings of some hearings and meetings, but not all at www.scstatehouse.gov/video/archives.php.
Tip 7 - Contemporaneous news reports may provide insight into legislative intent that is not in the formal record.
To begin, you will first review the history line of the particular statute, which includes the original enactment, as well as subsequent amendments. The history line will also provide the prior versions of the code section(s) if the statute was enacted prior to the current 1976 Code, such as those published in the 1962, 1952, 1942, 1932, 1922, 1912, and/or 1902 Codes, the General Statutes (G.S.) and/or Revised Statutes (R.S.) with various section numbers, as far back as it goes. Listed after the prior versions is the enacting Act number. After the enacting Act, the history line provides references to amending Act(s) in chronological order.
Once a bill is passed by the South Carolina General Assembly and signed by the governor, the new law is assigned an Act number, otherwise commonly known as the SC session laws. The South Carolina Joint Acts and Resolutions are published by the South Carolina Legislature for each legislature. Act numbering does not carry over from one legislature to its successor, instead, each new legislature begins with Act 1, thus in South Carolina, act numbering restarts every other year. Print copies of SC Acts and Joint Resolutions are located on the first floor of the law library. The full text of South Carolina Acts from 1980 forward is accessible through the Legislation (www. scstatehouse.gov/legislation.php) and Archives (www.scstatehouse. gov/aacts.php) pages of the South Carolina Legislature website. You can also find the pdf version of Volumes of Acts and Joint Resolutions beginning from the 2012 Regular Session on the South Carolina Legislature website at www.scstatehouse. gov/Archives/aandjr.php.
After you have determined what SC legislative Act or Acts are the basis for the statute you want to know more about, you can then find references to the bills from which the legislation arose (House or Senate bills). Those references and documents will most likely be contained in the records of the South Carolina Legislature, specifically the SC Senate and House Journals. The Law Library holds a complete set of the SC Senate and House Journals on the first floor. The South Carolina Legislature website has Senate Journals online dating back to 1990 and the House Journals online dating back to 1985 in a searchable database. (www.scstatehouse.gov/ research.php).
These Journals are organized by date, so it will take some pursuing and searching to find the specifics you are looking for.
Tip number 8 - Ctrl+F (PC) or Command+F (Mac) will give you a search box to search a webpage or document for key words.
Conclusion
This article’s goal was to provide a refresher lesson on conducting effective and efficient legal research as well as tips and pointers about the resources at the University of South Carolina Law Library, including finding legislative history. Part of being efficient in your legal research is to do some planning before you start researching. To be effective, you must know the facts of your case or issue, decide what the issue really is, and maybe even read some secondary sources before you get into the meat of your research query online.
And then when you get stuck, you can contact the Reference Librarians as the UofSC Law Library for some help. Whether it’s helping formulate the research query, or finding the resource material that is not online, or even just pointing you in the direction of the book you found in the catalog, this is what we do, and we love doing it. See you online, or in the library. And follow us on social media!! @UofSCLawLib on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Rebecca Plevel is a reference librarian at the University of South Carolina Law Library. Before joining the law librarian cadre, Rebecca practiced law in Arizona for 30 years, the last 19 in Flagstaff. She worked as an Assistant Tribal Attorney, a Deputy County Attorney, a Tribal prosecutor, and a solo practitioner during her career. She thanks her colleagues at UofSC who have painstakingly drafted our LRAW Research online text for the 1L research classes, from which she borrowed some tips, screenshots, and tricks for doing legal research.
Endnotes
1 Robert Ambrogi. Legal Research Services Vary Widely in Results, Study Finds. Above the Law. July 24, 2017. https://abovethelaw.com/2017/07/legal-research-services-vary-widely-inresults-study-finds/ (retrieved on 4.14. 2022)
2 Shauntee Burns. What is Boolean Search? New York Public Library. February 22, 2011. www.nypl.org/blog/2011/02/22/what-boolean-search (retrieved 4.6.2022)
3 Resources for Boolean terms or Terms and Connectors:
• Robert Crown Law Library, Stanford Law School. Case Finding and Advanced Searching Strategies; Terms & Connectors vs. Natural Language (Oct 15, 2021) https://guides.law.stanford.edu/cases/boolean
• University of Minnesota Law School. Technology Tuesdays: Boolean Searching. (Apr. 18, 2021) https://libguides.law.umn.edu/TechTuesdays
• Eve Ross. Boolean Searching - AND OR NOT. Pop-Up Tech Talks. Sept. 18, 2019. https://bit.ly/GuidesSCLawLibBoolean
• American Association of Law Libraries. The New On-Line Search Fundamentals. (2014) https://bit.ly/AALLTIKit2014handout
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