Google Scholar: A New Choice for Free Legal Content

Recently, Google has added Federal and State case law and legal journals to its Google Scholar Search. To access the content, go to googlescholar.com. Below the search bar, click on “Legal opinions and journals.” Click on Advanced Scholar Search alongside the search bar to further specify the results. Within the Advanced Search screen, scroll down to the Legal opinions and journals section to search all legal opinions and journals, only federal court opinions, or only state court opinions (you can even specify a state to search).

Once you have chosen a document, a tab at the top that allows you to see how the case has been cited (think quotations), which cases have cited the case, as well as documents related to yours. While these features do not provide editorial content, they are a step towards updating your research. Best of all, this database is FREE.

Google Scholar has this to say about their case law collection. “Currently, Google Scholar allows you to search and read opinions for US state appellate and supreme court cases since 1950, US federal district, appellate, tax and bankruptcy courts since 1923 and US Supreme Court cases since 1791 (please check back periodically for updates to coverage information). In addition, it includes citations for cases cited by indexed opinions or journal articles, which allows you to find influential cases (usually older or international), which are not yet online or publicly available.” Check out the Google Scholar Help section for more information

Written By Kathryn Croco Michaels, Law Librarian Fellow