FindLaw
for Legal Professionals: An Overview
By
Beth Bland
Special to Wisconsin Law Journal
April
27, 2005
As
many legal professionals know, FindLaw is a one-stop legal information Web site
geared toward a broad audience. The Web site states it is “the highest-trafficked
legal Web site, providing the most comprehensive set of legal resources on the
Internet for lawyers, businesses, students and individuals.” Its history
begins in 1995 when Timothy Stanley and Stacy Stern compiled a list of Internet
resources for a Northern California Law Librarians' workshop. The response to
the materials was so positive they decided to post the information on the Web
so others could use it as well. In January 1996, FindLaw was launched, and it
became an independent division of West Group in 2001. (http://company.findlaw.com/company_info.html).
This
article will briefly describe FindLaw's content from the viewpoint of a legal
professional. The Web site is at www.findlaw.com.
The first page provides buttons with links to the sections on the site. Depending
on your needs there are several areas to chose from: “Legal News,” “For
Legal Professionals,” “For Students, For the Public,” “For
Business,” and “For Corporate Counsel.” Below these choices are
quick links to “Find a Lawyer,” “Search Findlaw” that allows
you to search the whole Findlaw site, “Search for News,” and “Search
Cases and Codes” state and federal.
Other
search options are available including LawCrawler which is a legal Web and databases
search engine that searches for only legal information on the Web. We can search
legal Web sites at law schools, government sites or specific countries, lawyers,
forms, or documents specific to a given section of the law.
For
the Public covers issues concerning the everyday person, such as Accident and
Injury, Bankruptcy, and Personal Injury. By entering our ZIP code FindLaw for
the Public will provide information such as articles, links, and attorney listings
relevant to our locality or state. By drilling down in a particular subject you
can find a wide variety of resources. For example under “Divorce and Child
Custody” you can find a local attorney or law firm, direct links to our specific
state's divorce and child custody laws, articles, frequently asked questions,
forms, and relevant FindLaw resources.
“For
Business” (a/k/a For Small Business) includes information on a wide variety
of business legal issues including incorporation, labor law taxation, and choice
of business entity. Anyone interested in starting a business could look at “Licenses
and Permits,” “Financing,” or “Naming Your Business.”
Anyone wanting to review the different types of businesses could find information
about “Sole Proprietorships,” “Partnerships,” “Corporations,”
and “Limited Liability Companies” and why you would chose one or the
other.
“For
Corporate Counsel” provides tools such as law firm articles, commentary,
and CLE information. Again searching by topic locates a variety of information
aimed at the in-house lawyer. “Labor and Employment,” for example, takes
the visitor to a page about “Featured Articles,” the latest news, review
state specific resources such as cases and codes, get information on professional
organizations, federal government resources, labor and employment Web sites, and
selected Westlaw databases. LawCrawler (http://lawcrawler.findlaw. com) linked
under law firm articles allows you to search for over 7,000 law firm articles.
If you register on this page you can get profiles of attorneys including a lawyer's
litigation history. Registration is free.
“For
Students” provides information on topics such as law schools and paralegal
programs, and preparing for the bar examination. We can also search “Legal
Careers,” check various employment directories and recruiters, as well as
browse message boards and read legal news stories.
“For
Legal Professionals” displays different options that can be used for legal
research. Across the top of the page there are tabs to “Resources By Practice
Area,” “Resources By Jurisdiction,” “Cases and Codes,”
“News and Analysis,” and “Research a Lawyer.” Also on this
page is a list of links to “Law Firm Articles,” “Case Summaries
Search,” “Contracts and Forms,” “Legal Careers,” and
“Legal MarketCenter,” all of which go to other areas of FindLaw's Web
site.
An
item of note on this page is “My Current Location,” just below the tabs
at the top of the page. Here we can set our location for targeted advertising
links in our area, such as lawyers or law offices, usually found in the margins
of the page.
Resources
By Practice Area
Use
the links listed to access a wide variety of legal topics. If you don't see your
topic you can chose the “Other Legal Indices” link that takes you to
a list of links to other legal Web sites. There is also a lengthy list of legal-related
Web sites with a brief description of each one, for example, “Hieros Gamos,”
“'Letric Law Library,” and the “Internet Legal Resource Guide.”
“General
Search Services” sends us to a page of search engines. There are links, for
example, to well known search engines such as Google, and meta-search engines
such as DogPile (“A [meta-search engine is a] search engine that queries
other search engines and then combines the results that are received from all.”
www.pcwebopedia.com/TERM/m/metasearch_engine.html).
We can also browse “News and Analysis,” “Case Summaries,”
and “Law Firm Articles.”
Resources
By Jurisdiction
Returning
to the top of the “Legal Professionals” home page, the “Resources
By Jurisdiction” tab lists links to federal, state, and international law,
as well as to the U.S. Code and Supreme Court cases. Beginning with “Federal,”
links include the three branches of government, and the federal courts. The “Federal”
page itself includes information such as Independent Agencies including the CIA
and Federal Trade Commission, Quasi-Government Organizations such as FinanceNet
(information on financial management topics) and Legal Service Corporation (which
funds legal aid programs), and Miscellaneous Non-Government such as C-SPAN, plus
Federal Resource Indexes and Guides which includes links to the Library of Congress,
Congressional E-mail addresses, and links to government Web sites.
Under
“State Law” you can find state specific information for the state of
your choice. These usually link to statutes, regulations and any publicly available
case law from the state. Under “Wisconsin” the first links are to the
“Wisconsin Constitution,” “Statutes and Annotations,” the
“Administrative Code,” and information on Bills and Acts (via the state
legislature's Web site). A “Federal” heading lists two resources for
the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, one from FindLaw and the other from Chicago-Kent
College of Law at the Illinois Institute of Technology, and also to the U.S. District
Court for the Western District of Wisconsin's Web site.
At
the State law level, there are links to the Wisconsin Supreme Court and Court
of Appeals opinions from the Court's Web site and the State Bar's Web site. In
addition, FindLaw provides a link to its own repository of state Supreme Court
and Court of Appeals opinions found elsewhere on the site. The links to local
ordinances can also be very helpful.
Continuing
under the “State” heading, Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission
decisions from 1989 forward are available by a link to the State Bar's Web site,
and a list of selected municipal codes and ordinances are available through links
to certain publishers or the municipality itself. Also on the page are links to
relevant federal legislation via the Library of Congress' Thomas Web site. Federal
bills are broken out by Wisconsin's eight representatives and two senators. Included
is a link to the state legislature's Web site for state bill information. Below
these choices are links to Westlaw, to News, and to case summaries.
Cases
and Codes
The
“Cases and Codes” tab links to not only the same state sites, but also
the federal laws. There are links to the U.S. Code, the Code of Federal Regulations,
and the Federal Register. Be careful with the currency of these, always read the
fine print. Under the “U.S. Federal Laws” heading, the “Case Law”
section provides links to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Courts of Appeals, and the
Federal Judiciary homepage, as well as links to the Federal Claims Court, Tax
Court, District Courts, Bankruptcy Courts, and International Trade Court. There
are links to entities outside the Judicial Branch, such as the Court of Veterans
Appeals and the Armed Services Board of Contract Appeals. Finally, there are links
to the cases, codes, statutes and regulations of the individual states.
News
and Analysis
The
“News and Analysis” tab at the top of the Legal Professionals page features
Top Legal Headlines chosen by Findlaw. The “U.S. Law” section further
down the page breaks news into different categories such as “Politics,”
“Technology,” and “Environment.” “Special Coverage”
provides information about recent news headlines. Other news is available through
international, entertainment, and sports links.
Research
a Lawyer
Our
final tab on the “Legal Professionals” page is “Research a Lawyer.”
The first page under this tab gives us the choice to “Search by Name”
or “Search by Experience.” “Search by Name” takes us to a
page where you can enter the attorney's name, or if searching by law firm, the
name of the firm, its location, and practice area. “Search by Experience”
provides several different options, such as search for a lawyer or law firm by
legal issue, by jurisdiction or judge, or by office location.
From
either page, or the main “Research a Lawyer” page, you can search for
Canadian lawyers, at an outside Web site called Lexpert Canada. We can choose
to search by lawyer or firm, practice area, year admitted to the bar, and location.
There is also a sort option if you want to rank the results in a particular way.
Returning
to “Research a Lawyer” you can click on the link to “Thomson Legal
Directory” in the left margin, or return to “Research a Lawyer”
and click on the link. This “research tool [combines] an attorney's litigation
history on Westlaw with the attorney's profile on FindLaw [, providing] a simple,
efficient, fully documented resource.” (www.thomsonlegalrecord.com/info/).
You can search for a lawyer or firm, or by legal issues, jurisdiction, or location.
From this list of results, you can choose a profile that includes a biography
and recent cases, as well as links to reported cases on Westlaw.
Conclusion
FindLaw
provides comprehensive, plain-English legal information to businesses and individuals,
as well as information, resources and services for law practice and legal career
development, including free case law, an online career center, breaking legal
news, newsletters, message boards, service directories, continuing legal education
and legal search tools. (http://company.findlaw.com/pr/
2005/030905.smbizcenter.html) It is a good reference for the legal professional
in need of a starting point for his or her research.
Beth
Bland is a library clerk at Whyte Hirschboeck Dudek S.C.
