Guides: American Legal History Research Guide: Resources to Start Your Search

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Overview

The following legal resources are essential building blocks to use while conducting legal research. The majority of the resources below will be historical in nature. More targeted resources of note relating to specific themes and time periods can be found on other subpages in the navigator.

Dictionaries

Legal dictionaries are great resources to explore general meanings of legal terms in legal documents. Searching for legal dictionaries contemporary to your topic can provide clarity in understanding how individuals understood the law historically.

HeinOnline - Legal Dictionaries
A link to Spinelli's Law Library Reference Shelf collection on HeinOnline, featuring an extensive collection of historical law dictionaries.
Digital Georgetown - Legal Dictionaries
A link to Digital Georgetown's collection of digitized historical dictionaries.

Bouvier's Law Dictionary and Concise Encyclopedia by Bouvier, John, 1787-1851.; Rawle, Francis, 1846-1930.
Publication Date: 1914
Scholarly treatment of legal concepts while in date. Other editions range from 1839 - 1914 (with 1914 being the final publication date).
A dictionary of law consisting of judicial definitions and explanations of words, phrases, and maxims, and an exposition of the principles of law : comprising a dictionary and compendium of American and English jurisprudence by Anderson, William C. (William Caldwell)
Publication Date: 1893

Newspapers (Historical)

The following newspaper databases offer centuries worth of primary historical materials for research purposes.

Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers
Put together by the Library of Congress. Spans 1827-1998.
Early American Newspapers, Series I (1690-Recent Past, and African American Newspapers, 1827-1998)
Full text searchable digitized resource of "the first draft of history" in the form of newspapers from 1690-1922. Note: scan down on title page to access African American Newspapers, Series 1.
America's Historical Imprints - Series I
A robust resource that includes "Early American Newspapers" listed in this section. Includes all sorts of Broadsides, Pamphlets, Deeds, Letters, and much more. Covers years 1639 - 1800.
America's Historical Imprints - Series II
Similar to Series I, this collection covers the years 1801 - 1819.
Proquest Historical Newspapers - Washington Post
Spans 1877-1997
Proquest Historical Newspapers - New York Times
Spans 1851-2009
Proquest Historical Newspapers - Chicago Tribune
Spans 1847-1963
Proquest Historical Newspapers - Baltimore Sun
Spans 1837-1988
Proquest Historical Newspapers - Los Angeles Times
Spans 1881-1990
Accessible Archives
A large collection of American Newspapers, predominantly from the 19th century. Of particular note are the African American Newspapers, Civil War Newspapers (such as Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper), and Women's Newspapers

Practice Books/Legal Treatises

Making of Modern Law - Legal Treatises, 1800-1926
Full-text searchable collection of 21,000 British and American legal treatises from the 19th and early 20th centuries. The 10 million+ pages available in this database are viewable as PDF images. Content was originally published in these microfilm sets: Nineteenth-Century Legal Treatises and Twentieth-Century Legal Treatises.
HeinOnline - Legal Classics
An extensive digital collection (over 14,000 titles) of the most highly regarded legal works in history.

Imported Eighteenth-Century Law Treatises in American Libraries, 1700-1799 by Herbert A. Johnson
Call Number: KF1 .J6 1978
ISBN: 0870492209
Publication Date: 1978-04-01
Attempts to answer the question of what law books, published between 1700-1799 was an American Lawyer most likely to own. For greater access to bibliography please refer to the English Short Title Catalogue below.

English Short Title Catalogue
Bibliographic resource that catalogs works (monographs and serial letterpress) published in English between 1473 - 1800. Conditions set out by ESTC include:
"Printed before 1801.
Printed in the British Isles, Colonial America, United States of America (1776-1800), Canada, or territories governed by Britain, in all languages.
Printed in any other part of the world, wholly or partly in English or other British vernaculars.
With false imprints claiming publication in Britain or its territories, in any language."

Statutes (Historical)

ProQuest Legislative Insight
Explore legislative histories going back to the 1st Congress of the United States of America using this resource.
State Statutes - A Historical Archive
Containing nearly 2,000,000 pages of superseded state statutes, HeinOnline's "State Statutes: A Historical Archive" is invaluable in analysis of creation of historical statutes.

Supreme Court Records and Briefs (& Other Materials)

HeinOnline - U.S. Supreme Court Library
Extensive database of U.S. Supreme Court related materials. Complete with books on the court, Rules of the Court dating back to 1790, and the complete U.S. Reports dating back to 1754.
Making of Modern Law: U.S. Supreme Court Records and Briefs, 1832-1978
Access older briefs. Search by U.S. Reports citation or keywords.
Library of Congress - U.S. Supreme Court Records and Briefs
Guide to accessing Supreme Court records and briefs via the LoC. Accessing older materials requires a visit to the Library of Congress itself. LoC is one of only ten depository libraries for the print of the Supreme Court Records and Briefs. The collection begins in 1832 for transcripts, only from 1854 to present are records and briefs printed.
U.S. Supreme Court - Where to Find Briefs
A Supreme Court provided guide to finding briefs via Westlaw, LexisNexis, and other sources.
HathiTrust - Rose's Notes on the United States Supreme Court Reports
An early citator that competed with the more enduring Shepard's Citations. Rose's Notes offered summaries, essays, and annotations alongside citations to subsequent citing references. Also available via LLMC.

Biographies

Oxford African American Studies Center (Biographies)
A rich biographical resource containing over 16,000 individual biographies. Each individual profile also features helpful bibliographies for further research.
People of the Founding Era: A Biographical Resource
Resource containing biographic information for individuals living between 1713 and 1815. Allows for prosopographical research on nearly 75,000 individuals.
Women's Legal History Biography Project
A biological compilation of women as attorneys. Varying depth to individual biographies, but the more in depth offerings contain very helpful resources and links to pursue further research.
Biographical Directory of Federal Judges
Provides biographical information on all federal judges from the U.S. District Courts, U.S. Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court from 1789 - present.
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
Contains more than 60,000 biographies of individuals prominent in the shaping of British History. Of use in studying influences on early American law.
Biography in Context
Helpful resource for researchers looking for contextual content surrounding famous figures. However, the resource has a strong bias towards more modern individuals.

The Encyclopedia of Native American Biography by Donald A. Grinde; Bruce E. Johansen; Donald A. Grinde Jr.
ISBN: 9780805032703
Though intended for an adult audience, this is an easily read collective biographical work listing hundreds of Native & non-Native Americans who played significant roles in Native American history & culture.
The Lives of the Constitution by Joseph Tartakovsky
Call Number: KF4550 .T37 2018
ISBN: 9781594039850
Publication Date: 2018-04-10
In a... blend of biography and history, Joseph Tartakovsky tells the... story of our Constitution through the eyes of ten extraordinary individuals--some renowned, like Alexander Hamilton and Woodrow Wilson, and some forgotten, like James Wilson and Ida B. Wells-Barnett.

Helpful Modern Guides

The Yale Law School Guide to Research in American Legal History by Morris L. Cohen; John B. Nann
Call Number: KF240 .N35 2018
ISBN: 9780300118537
Publication Date: 2018-06-19
The study of legal history has a broad application that extends well beyond the interests of legal historians. An attorney arguing a case today may need to cite cases that are decades or even centuries old, and historians studying political or cultural history often encounter legal issues that affect their main subjects. Both groups need to understand the laws and legal practices of past eras. This essential reference is intended for the many nonspecialists who need to enter this arcane and often tricky area of research.
Making Legal History by Anthony Musson (Editor); Chantal Stebbings (Editor)
Call Number: K140 .M45 2012
ISBN: 9781107014497
Publication Date: 2012-01-26
Drawing together leading legal historians from a range of jurisdictions and cultures, this collection of essays addresses the fundamental methodological underpinning of legal history research. Via a broad chronological span and a wide range of topics, the contributors explore the approaches, methods and sources that together form the basis of their research and shed light on the complexities of researching into the history of the law. By exploring the challenges posed by visual, unwritten and quasi-legal sources, the difficulties posed by traditional archival material and the novelty of exploring the development of legal culture and comparative perspectives, the book reveals the richness and dynamism of legal history research.

See also, "Making Legal History" in eBook format here.

Researching Legal History in the Digital Age - Morris L. Cohen
An open access article, from influential law librarian Morris L. Cohen, on conducting legal research. Contains a wealth of techniques and resources to navigate your own legal research.

American Legal History Research Guide

Contents