PLA 3104 Resources - Legal Research

How to Access UCF Library Databases and Resources from off campus

General Internet Information | Six Categories of Law Materials
Legal Research: Quick Guide - Florida - General
Abbreviations of Legal Sources | Legislative Histories

UCF Library Home Page provides links to the UCF library catalog and gateway to other resources, such as:

Public Affairs & Law Resources

• LexisNexis Academic provides access to company profiles and financial reports, government transcripts, trade journals and academic and legal databases. Their files are updated with full-text documents from general interest wire services, newspapers, and magazines from around the world.  
  • Legal Reviews - Search more than 200 law reviews and law journals concentrating on national and state issues of legal significance.
  • Federal Case Law - Search case law opinions from all the major United States federal courts.
  • U.S. Code, Constitution, & Court Rules - Search federal statutory and administrative law from a variety of authoritative sources such as: United States Code Service, United States Constitution, and Code of Federal Regulations.
  • State Legal Research - Search the case law, constitution, statutes, and other legal materials related to a specific state.
• LexisNexis Congressional gives researchers access to vast and varied information published by and about Congress, including full text of almost all Committee Reports from 1990 forward and Congressional testimony from 1988 forward. In addition to the indexing and abstracting of the CIS/Index to Publications of the U.S. Congress from 1970, LexisNexis Congressional provides the tools for:
  • searching the Congressional Record,
  • tracking proposed legislation by keyword and sponsor,
  • searching the Federal Register,
  • searching congressional committee schedules,
  • finding members of Congress, and
  • searching the National Journal.
• LegalTrac (InfoTrac database) provides articles in all major law reviews, law journals, specialty law and bar association journals, and legal newspapers on Federal and State Cases, Laws and Government Regulations, Legal Practice, and legal subjects such as Taxation and International Law. British Commonwealth and European Union cases and law are also included. Dates of coverage: 1980+
• Index to Legal Periodicals & Books (FirstSearch database) - Articles from legal journals, yearbooks, institutes, bar association organs, law reviews, and government publications originating in the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand.   Dates of coverage: 1981+ The UCF Library has the print indexes at Index K9.N75 for 1926+.
• Index to Foreign Legal Periodicals (Eureka database) contains citations from legal journals and other publications covering international law other than the United States, British Isles and British Commonwealth. Dates of coverage: 1985+
• Global Legal Information Network (Library of Congress) provides a database of laws, regulations and other complementary legal sources for various countries of the world.
• World Law Index (Eureka database) - Index to Hispanic Legislation, contains records describing the national laws, decree-laws, regulations, etc. taken from official legal gazettes of 29 countries studied by the Hispanic Law Division of the Library of Congress Law Library. These include the Spanish-speaking countries of Latin America, plus Haiti, Brazil, the Philippines, Portugal, Spain, and nations from the Portuguese-African region. Dates of coverage: 1976-1997. For later coverage, see the Global Legal Information Network.

Other Library Resources

• BNA (Portfolios Plus Library) - Tax analysis, practice tools, primary sources, and news.  Includes full text journals, Internal Revenue codes, cases, and forms.
• CCH Internet Tax Research NetWork provides federal and state tax resources, including case reporters and citators.
• FactSearch (FirstSearch database) is a guide to statistical statements on current social, economic, political, environmental and health issues, derived from some newspapers, periodicals, newsletter and documents such as the Christian Science Monitor, the Congressional Record, Congressional hearings, Daily Press Briefings of the White House, State Department and Department of Defense, and Australian, British and Canadian Parliamentary Debates. Web links to free full text are included frequently.
• PsycINFO (WebLUIS database) - from the American Psychological Association - indexed materials are selected from more than 1,300 journals published in 50 countries and 28 languages. Most records have abstracts. Dates of coverage: 1887+
• Social Sciences Abstracts (FirstSearch database) covers some 350 core periodicals in the fields of anthropology, economics, geography, law and criminology, political science, social work, sociology, and international relations. Dates of coverage: 1983+

Government Information and Related Resources

Other Useful Resources:

• GPO Access databases (U.S. Superintendent of Documents)
• THOMAS: U.S. Congress on the Internet (Library of Congress)
• Federal Government Resources on the Web: Judicial (Univ Michigan)
• Florida Division of Administrative Hearings 

rgause@mail.ucf.edu
(407) 823-2563
Last modified: February 28, 2006
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