Cite Recognition (10/09)
Searching for documents that reference cases, statutes, rules or regulations can sometimes be a tricky endeavor. Consider a search for references to rule 26 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Authors have been known to use a variety of formats to mention this rule. Some of the formats used are the following:
- Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 26
- Fed. R. Civ. P. 26
- Fed. R. Civ. Pro. 26
- Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 26
- FRCP 26
Crafting a search to find all the variations of this rule is both difficult and lengthy. Fortunately, LexisNexis has developed cite recognition to take the guess work out of the process. Using any of the formats from the list above will retrieve references to the rule in case law, statutes, regulations, treatises, law reviews and legal journals.
For instance, the following search in Federal Court Cases, Combined retrieves 301 cases:
frcp 26 and date is 6/2009
When you look at the result list from this search, you find that the search retrieves cases citing Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 26 no matter how it was cited by the court. This not only makes searching for rules extremely easy, it reduces the amount of errors generated from more complicated searches. This abbreviated form also works for the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure (FRAP), the Federal Rules of Evidence (FRE), and the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure (FRCRP).
Statutes and regulations may also be searched by their citations. As an example, any of the following formats retrieve documents citing to the applicable statute or regulation:
- 11 usc 501
- 26 cfr 1.401(a)-13 — finds both 26 CFR 1.401(a)-13 and Treasury Reg 1.401(a)-13
- 26 usc 401 — finds both 26 USC 401 and Internal Revenue Code 401
- cal pen code 123
- ny cplr 103
While cite recognition can be used to find statutes, it cannot be used by itself to find subsections of statutes or regulations. For instance, a search for 26 usc 401(a)(9) retrieves all instances of 26 USC 401 and is not limited to just references for subsection (a)(9). One way to deal with this is to run a search for the section using cite recognition and then adding the section and subsection as an additional term. As an example, the following search can be used to find references to 26 USC 401(a)(9):
26 usc 401 and 401 a 9
When you run a citation for a case, you retrieve all instances where that case is cited. If the search is run in a case-law database that contains the case, then the case is the first document in the list. For instance, if you run a search of 439 u.s. 212 in Federal Court Cases, Combined the search retrieves 165 results and Corbitt v. New Jersey, 439 U.S. 212, 99 S. Ct. 492, 58 L. Ed. 2d 466, 1978 U.S. LEXIS 144 is the first case retrieved. Note: when running searches for United States Supreme Court cases with a United States Reporter citation, use periods after the U and S, otherwise the system will ignore the US as a noise word.
For additional information on searching case law, rules and statutes, visit the LexisNexis® Support Center.
