Few books cause law students as much dread, pain, anger, and frustration as the bluebook. It is now in its 20th edition, more than an inch thick, and consists of over 500 pages of guidance on legal citation. You can ignore more than two thirds of the book if all you need to do is to cite cases and statutes which covers most of the first year of law school, and a lot of litigation. In fact, if you 39 re dealing only with cases, litigation documents and laws, you might be able to find the answer to your question using the cheat sheet on the inside back cover. One of the books that all 1l law students are required to purchase is the bluebook: a uniform system of citation

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Citation in legal documents is a rigid and important task that legal professionals take very seriously. The bluebook is so widespread and fundamental to the practice of legal writing that its name has become a verb: bluebooking. I mean, who cares about citations? the reality is, however, that as persuasive writers, our job is to direct the reader’s attention through our writing. Anything less than perfect citation form, is going to distract the reader and take away from the goal just like any other typos like that errant comma in this sentence. The good news, though, is that most people who create legal documents including 1l law students can ignore most of the book. Over 90% of practical legal citation can be handled if you learn 3 of the basic citation forms: cases, statutes, and law review articles. And, the beauty is, you don’t even have to learn the full rule to handle the citation.

Just remember that you will need to learn the full citation form, and the short citation form for each of these groupings. The last thing to remember is that citations are treated like separate sentences they have a period at the end.

bluebook citation form for cases

the standard citation form for cases rule 10 includes the case name, where it can be found, what court issued the opinion, and the year. The way we read this is: the case texas versus johnson can be found in volume 491 of the u.s.

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Here is how it all works: case names: in every citation the case name is underscored. The words that make up the case name are capitalized, except for conjunctions, articles, and prepositions. If one of the words in your case name is on the list, it generally must be abbreviated. You should also note that the case name is followed by a comma, which is not underscored. how to find the case: the next part of the citation indicates where the case appears in its reporter.

If you are citing to a specific rule in the case, you should identify the page from where the proposition came. A listing of the official reporters by jurisdiction, and their correct abbreviations, is found in table 1 of the bluebook. 954 what court issued the opinion and when: the next part of a case citation is to identify the court that issued the opinion and the year.

If the reporter is exclusive to a particular court, then you don’t have to list the court in the citation. If you are citing to a case that has been reviewed by a higher court after it was decided, you must indicate that fact, and what the court did with the case, in your citation rule 10.7. short forms for cases: once you have used a full citation, you will use a short citation form for all subsequent citations. The second form is the normal short form, it includes either of the parties’ names or both, followed by a pinpoint reporter citation.

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bluebook citation form for statutes

the next rule you need to know is rule 12 for citing to statutes. You start with the statute’s name if it has one , followed by the source of the statute, its’ section number section is abbreviated with § , and year. Here are a few examples: comprehensive environmental response, compensation, and liability act, 42 u.s.c. short forms for statutes are a bit more complicated because you have choices for each type of statute. The general rule in deciding between the choices is to choose a form that will not confuse the reader. Here are some examples: comprehensive environmental response, compensation, and liability act, 42 u.s.c.

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Becomes: most citation tools were developed by and for academics working in the hard or social sciences. As a result, no citation tool can create footnotes or a bibliography in perfect bluebook format. Each of the citation tools do offer a bluebook citation format, with varying degrees of success. As the chart below indicates, zotero's format is superior to the format offered by refworks and endnote. Mendeley uses the zotero format and so offers a similar degree of success in proper formatting. note: citation manually added to refworks and endnote automatically added to zotero from heinonline i have not read the nineteenth edition.

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I have dipped into it, much as one might dip one's toes in a pail of freezing water. Kurtz's dying words in heart of darkness 'the horror! the horror!' and am tempted to end there. Few books cause law students as much dread, pain, anger and frustration as the bluebook. Now in its 19th edition and more than an inch thick, the 513 page bluebook is the style manual for citing to legal documents within the united states. It is large, unwieldy, cryptic and it is an essential book that every lawyer should know how to use.