LRAC Legal Research Class Site (Gotschall)

A legal secondary source (aka secondary authority) is writing about the law (aka primary authority). Legal secondary sources have two main purposes:

1.  Provide an explanation of the law

2.  Provide citations to primary authorities such as cases, statutes, regulations, etc.

A secondary source is often the BEST STARTING POINT for legal research, especially when you are unfamiliar with the area of law.

You can save a lot of time at the beginning of your research by locating a good secondary source. Ideally, you would like a secondary source that is authorative, current, and specific to your jurisdiction (if possible) which provides in-depth treatment of your topic.

There are a VARIETY of different types of secondary sources.

Legal Dictionaries

Legal Encyclopedias 

• Like a normal encyclopedia except only covers legal topics
• A good place to start for a brief overview of an area of the law 
• American Jurisprudence and Corpus Juris Secumdum are the two most widely used
  • Both cover nearly all legal topics
  • Not jurisdiction specific (however does cite primary authority from specific jurisdictions)
• State specific encyclopedias cover the law specific to a state 
• Examples:
  • American Jurisprudence (Am Jur) 
  • Corpus Juris Secundum (CJS)
  • California Jurisprudence
  • Texas Jurisprudence