Last revised: August, 2008

U.S. Supreme Court Decisions

Scope: This guide describes how to locate a U.S. Supreme Court case by name, citation and subject. If you have any questions or would like further assistance, please contact the U.S. Government Information, Maps & GIS Services staff at govdocs@umd.edu or 301.405.9165.

A note on citation format:

Legal citations take a different form than journal article citations. As an example, the case Roe v. Wade would be cited: Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), indicating that it can be found in Volume 410 of the United States Reports beginning on page 113. The same case can also be found in the Supreme Court Reporter at 93 S.Ct. 705, meaning Volume 93 beginning at page 705. These two are called parallel citations. It is the same case published in two different reporters. For more information on types of citations, and where to find the print volumes, consult the UM's Guide to Finding Legal Citations.

Print Sources for Supreme Court Cases

Reporters:

• United States Reports (cited as U.S.)
  The official government version of Supreme court Decisions.
  1790- Present. Note that very recent opinions are only available online, slip opinions are no longer distributed in paper format to depository libraries.
  LOCATION: UMCP McKeldin Library, U.S. Government Information Reference
  CALL NUMBER: JU 6.8:
  Supreme Court Opinions
  http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/opinions.html
  
• Supreme Court Reporter (cited as S.Ct.)
  Published by West Publishing. Annotated and also uses the Key Terms system, useful for subject searches.
  1882 - present.
  LOCATION: UMCP McKeldin Library, Periodical Stacks
  CALL NUMBER: KF101.U54
  
• United States Supreme Court Reports, Lawyers' Edition (cited as L.Ed. or L.Ed.2d.)
  Annotated, also contains editorial summaries and summaries of briefs of counsel.
  1790 - present.
  LOCATION: UMCP McKeldin Library, Periodical Stacks
  CALL NUMBERS: KF101.U53, KF101.U53 ser.2, and KF101.U533
  
• U.S. Law Week (cited U.S.L.W.)
  Looseleaf service, contains more timely information about decisions and docket information, i.e., upcoming cases to be heard
  July 1955 - Present
  LOCATION: UMCP McKeldin Library, Periodical Stacks
  CALL NUMBER: K25.N5 (latest editions in McKeldin Reference Stacks)

• United States Supreme Court Digest
  V. 14-14A Table of cases: cases arranged alphabetically.
  V. 15 Alphabetically by Defendant-Plaintiff
  V. 16 Words and Phrases (uses West's Key terms)
  
  LOCATION:UMCP McKeldin Library, Reference Desk
  CALL NUMBER: KF101.U525

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Online Sources for Supreme Court Cases

There are several Web sources for accessing the full text of Supreme Court Case decisions.

Supreme Court Website
This website has slip opinions, electronic versions of the United States Reports (volume 502 onward), and other useful information for Supreme Court cases. They caution users that print versions are the official source.

http://www.supremecourtus.gov

The Legal Information Institute
This website provides online access to Supreme Court decisions since May 1990 through Project Hermes. They also have over 300 of the most important historical cases available online in a separate file.

http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct

FLITE
This website has case decisions from 1937-1975. Users can search by case name or keyword.

http://supcourt.ntis.gov/

Findlaw
This website has access to decisions from 1893 to the present. Users can search by year, case name, full text, or citation.

http://www.findlaw.com/casecode/supreme.html

LexisNexis Academic
This database includes case decisions 1790 - present in the Legal section of their site. It can be searched by case name or citation. It also has law reviews and news from secondary literature resources.

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Example of searching for the same case using print and electronic sources.

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