Constitutional Law & The Supreme Court
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Reports of Supreme Court Decisions
The judicial branch judges the constitutionality of laws made by the legislative and executive branches of the U. S. government. Court decisions are first published as "slip opinions" available from the clerk of the court, and finally as bound volumes in the court reporter system. Court Reporters publish the official printed record of decisions made in federal and state courts. Citations give the volume and page number of a particular Court Reporter. The following citations refer to the 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education decision:
- 347 U.S. 483 = Volume 347, page 483 of United States Reports
- 74 S.Ct. 686 = Volume 74, page 686 of Supreme Court Reporter
- 98 L.Ed. 873 = Volume 98, page 873 of U.S. Supreme Court Reports, Lawyers Edition
Lane Library has the following court reporters:
- United States Reports (U.S.) U.S. Gov. Printing Office, 1904-1974. Ref KF101 .A3
- Supreme Court Reporter (S. Ct.) West Pub Co., 1970-. Ref KF101 .S8
LexisNexis Academic
Reports of all levels of court decisions, federal and state, can be retrieved, full text, through
in GALILEO. Select Legal tab and then narrow your search to Federal and State Cases to search for reports of cases by keyword or citation.
The latest slip opinions
and bound volumes are also available in PDF format from the
U.S. Supreme Court's web site.
Articles in Journals, Law Reviews and Newspapers
FROM OFF CAMPUS, GET THIS SEMESTER'S GALILEO PASSWORD FROM YOUR ACCOUNT IN GIL.
ADDITIONAL (NON-GALILEO) DATABASES ARE ACCESSED VIA AASU EMAIL LOGIN NAME & PASSWORD.
Omnifile Full Text Mega Edition from WilsonWeb
A suite of databases for many academic disciplines including full text articles from scholarly journals. Abstracts supplied back to 1984 and full text from 1995 to the present. Select Legal as the subject area.
LexisNexis Academic

Provides full text news, business, medical, and legal information. Select the Legal tab. You can then limit your search to Law Reviews. AVAILABLE ON CAMPUS ONLY
new!
Academic Search Complete
from EBSCOhost
A multi-disciplinary database that searches a total of 10,900 publications including 4,400 peer-reviewed journals. Full text is provided for 5,300 journals.
Research Library
from ProQuest
Provides full text for over 1,040 scholarly journals and general magazines and provides abstracts and indexing
for over a hundred more. Research Library GALILEO Edition is a special subset of Research Library that has been created to avoid duplication of content available in other GALILEO resources.
Legal Collection
from EBSCOhost
Full text for more than 250 law journals. This database provides information centered on the discipline of law and legal topics, such as criminal justice, international law, federal law, organized crime, medical, labor & human resource law, ethics, the environment and much more.
Web Sites
- Federal Judicial Center
- FindLaw
- Supreme Court Collection from Cornell
- Supreme Court Decisions from FindLaw
- Supreme Court Historical Society
- Supreme Court Justices from Oyes
- U.S. Courts - The Federal Judiciary from Administrative Office of U.S. Courts
- U.S. Supreme Court official website
Selected Reference Books in Lane library
| Black's Law Dictionary | Ref KF156 .B53 1999 |
| Complete Bill of Rights: Drafts, Debates, Sources, and Origins | Ref KF4744 1997 |
| Constitutional Law Dictionary | Ref K4747.5 .C52 |
| Encyclopedia of Constitutional Amendments, Proposed Amendments... 1789-1995 | Ref KF4557 .V555 1996 |
| Encyclopedia of the American Constitution | Ref KF4548 .E53 2000 |
| Encyclopedia of the U.S. Supreme Court. | Ref KF8742 .A35 E53 2001 |
| Historic U.S. Court Cases: an Encyclopedia. Second edition | Ref KF352 .Z9 H57 2001 |
| Justices of the United States Supreme Court 1789-1969 | Ref KF8744 .F75 |
| Landmark Supreme Court Cases | Ref KF4549 .L58 1999 |
| Practical Companion to the Constitution | Ref KF4548 .L54 1999 |
| Supreme Court Yearbook. | Ref KF8741 .S863 |
| U.S. Court Cases (2 volumes) | Ref KF 385 .A4 .U15 1999 |
| United States Supreme Court Decisions 1778-1996: an Index... | Ref KF101.6 .G83 2001 |
| United States Supreme Court Digest... A subject index, 1754-present | Ref KF101 .S9 |
| West's Encyclopedia of American Law. Updated with yearbooks. | Ref KF154 .W47 1998 |
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