Ring-Necked Pheasant [Fish and Wildlife Service Photo]

Law Library

Law Collection
Guide to Legal Research
Online Legal Resources

Law Collection

The Law Collection is an integral part of the Library. It consists of United States Reports; Federal and regional reporters, selected state, territorial, and tribal codes; legal treatises; Interior legal and administrative material; legislative history materials; and legal periodicals. Particular emphasis is on material pertaining to the environment, Native Americans, and administrative law. These legal research tools are available in print, microform and CD-ROM.

Reference librarians, including a Law Librarian, are available to assist with legal research and to explain library policies.

Guide to Legal Research

Online Legal Resources

U.S. Department of the Interior employees may use fourteen database services to discover and obtain Congressional, Executive, and Judicial documents, and articles from journals, conference proceedings, magazines, newsletters, and newspapers.

Seven of these services include coverage of law --

Westlaw patron workstation access

The Library has acquired free IP-authenticated access to Westlaw at the DOI Library's patron workstations. No user ID or password is needed, and patrons may use Westlaw's All Primary Law National Practice collection, which combines all federal and state primary law into a single, integrated legal research tool that includes the following:

50 State Caselaw - Appellate and trial court cases, includes the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Virgin Islands

50 State Administrative Codes and State Administrative Executive and Municipal Materials - Includes administrative regulations and registers, attorney general opinions, insurance bulletins and administrative decisions on securities, and environmental and workers' compensation matters.

Federal Caselaw - Includes U.S. Supreme Court, U.S. Court of Appeals, U.S. District Courts, and specialized case law.

United States Code Annotated - Includes Titles 1-50, the Constitution, federal court rules, and notes of decisions for current coverage of cases construing and applying federal statutory law.

CFR and Federal Register - Access to the Code of Federal Regulations and Federal Register (back to July 1980), along with other federal administrative and executive materials.

All are integrated with KeyCite and include full-text plus editorial enhancements such as the West Key Number System and case synopses and headnotes. This subscription also includes Westlaw's StatutesPlus feature, offering links to documents on Westlaw related to federal and state statutes for faster interpretation, including cases, analysis, legislative history, law reviews, statutes, administrative codes, Key Numbers, and more.

Additional resources available as part of the All Primary Law National Practice collection include the Congressional Record (back to 1985), the Federal Acquisition Regulations, West's McKinney's Forms, U.S. Attorney General Opinions (since 1977), Comptroller General Decisions (since 1921), Federal Court Rules, and United States Code Legislative History (since 1948).

Internet

All Library computers have access to the Internet. Consult our lists of selected Internet resources, which describe web sites on subjects of interest to the Department of the Interior, including law. Library staff have also produced the following guides:

General Reference
Federal Government Publications
U.S. Department of the Interior Publications
Governments Includes links to the web sites of federal agencies, states, insular areas and freely associated states, tribal governments, and local governments in the Washington, D.C. region.
Journal Articles and Reports
Libraries