Just Research

by Laurel Currie Oates, Anne Enquist

Oates and Enquist (both Seattle U. School of Law) take a new approach to legal research by focusing on issues rather than sources and emphasizing free and fee-based electronic sources. They cover the basics, such as how the US legal system works and what it requires in terms of citations, then move to researching issues governed by state statutes, federal statutes, and local ordinances, researching common law and constitutional issues, researching issues governed by state, federal or local rules, cite checking, and researching practice information such as that about judges, law firms, corporation, or people. They give practice pointers along the way, show screens to expect, give steps to develop research plans, and show the capabilities of various electronics sources as well as their limitations. Annotation ©2005 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Paperback

First published April 15, 2005

Reviews

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not gonna lie to you. This was exceptionally boring - in fact, one of the most boring reading experiences I've had at least since grad school, if not inclusive of my endless grad school reading. That said, I did learn some stuff about legal research, and now know that I can use Google's Advanced Search feature for just about everything, so that's a plus.

In all seriousness, I think this is probably a really useful text for those just getting started in legal research (i.e., me), and I probably would have been thrilled with it had I not just listened to two separate sets of legal research lectures on CD. How many hours of learning about legal research does a non-lawyer girl need? I guess we'll find out.