# Do Lawyers Really Use Those Impressive Collections of Cases Volumes? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 2, 2010, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204 "2010-11-02T14:20:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/61 "2010-11-04T14:25:38Z")
**Noel Prosequi,** that was a nice answer. You still have case law interpreting statutes. That is why our statutes tend to be shorter than those in civil law countries, although this is changing in certain bodies of law. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/62 "2010-11-04T14:38:29Z")
Well, until 1975 (or so) Massachusetts still had laws on the books, which prohibited “witchcraft”. Now, having laws dealing with non-existent activities, seems like a good reason to review and toss out obsolete laws. Take adultery-in most states, adultery is a crime. Only the laws against it are rarely (if ever) enforced. ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/63 "2010-11-04T16:04:53Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > Well, until 1975 (or so) Massachusetts still had laws on the books, which prohibited “witchcraft”. > Now, having laws dealing with non-existent activities, seems like a good reason to review and toss out obsolete laws. > Take adultery-in most states, adultery is a crime. > Only the laws against it are rarely (if ever) enforced. But that is an issue with the legislature not with the courts. While I may find laws against adultery to be repugnant, I don’t see why they would be unconstitutional\*. If laws are truly stupid, you should be the people drafting the laws not the lawyers trying to make sense of the laws. - I haven’t researched the issue since family law doesn’t interest me much, and it hasn’t ever come up at work. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/64 "2010-11-04T20:38:17Z")
About the law against ‘witchcraft’: If you’re accused of a crime that’s physically impossible to commit, can you use the fact it’s impossible as an element of your defense? Obviously, it seems like your main defense would be the fact nobody could possibly prove beyond a reasonable doubt that _you_ committed the _specific_ acts you are being charged with, but would it be worthwhile to call attention to the fact ‘witches’, as the law conceives them, are imaginary beings that are said to do impossible things? (And for all that, depending on the nature of the specific actions associated with a charge of ‘witchcraft’, it might just be easier to claim it’s your religion and that the law violates the First Amendment.) ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2010, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/65 "2010-11-04T20:51:02Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > About the law against ‘witchcraft’: If you’re accused of a crime that’s physically impossible to commit, can you use the fact it’s impossible as an element of your defense? > > Obviously, it seems like your main defense would be the fact nobody could possibly prove beyond a reasonable doubt that _you_ committed the _specific_ acts you are being charged with, but would it be worthwhile to call attention to the fact ‘witches’, as the law conceives them, are imaginary beings that are said to do impossible things? > > (And for all that, depending on the nature of the specific actions associated with a charge of ‘witchcraft’, it might just be easier to claim it’s your religion and that the law violates the First Amendment.) What if the crime was to “fraudulently … pretend” to commit witchcraft? That’s the case in Canada: > [@](#): > > Section 365 of the Canadian Criminal Code, R.S. 1985,c.C-46 is one of a group of five offenses which deal with false pretenses. It states: > > "Every one who fraudulently > > ``` > (a) pretends to exercise or to use any kind of witchcraft, sorcery, enchantment or conjuration, > > (b) undertakes, for a consideration, to tell fortunes, or > > (c) pretends from his skill in or knowledge of an occult or crafty science to discover where or in what manner anything that is supposed to have been stolen or lost may be found, > > ``` > > is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction." Presumably, it would be a defence to this charge if you could demonstrate that you actually had magic powers … 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2010, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/66 "2010-11-05T04:24:38Z")
Your demonstration could be conjuring an acquittal from the judge and jury. ---
**Author:** ![Noel\_Prosequi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b19c9b/32.png) [@Noel\_Prosequi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noel_Prosequi)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2010, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/67 "2010-11-08T22:11:24Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > This is why lawyers are “needed”-the ambiguity of the law (written by lawyers) gives rise to the need for lawyers to interpret the ambiguous laws. > Frankly, all laws ought to be reviewed every 25 years or so-and the obsolete ones tossed out-but that would upset the legal tradition. As others have observed, it is not the lawyers who make the complexity, it is reality, and the lawyers are forced to follow along as best they can. The idea of reviewing all laws every 25 years sounds like a good idea. The problems with that process are, however, deep. I doubt you have a good idea of exactly _how much_ law there is, and the scale of the task of reviewing every jot and tittle of it. And every jot and tittle is necessary, because laws interact with each other. The real problem is one which plagues all legislative draftspersons - the law of unintended consequences. It turns out that beyond the level of the trivial it is not possible while drafting statutes to perfectly anticipate every variation on a theme which might arise in real life. As Gandalf said, not even the very wise can see all ends. And if we are demolishing and rebuilding the law every 25 years, the risk of mis-fixing something that ain’t broke escalates enormously. I know some countries endeavour to do it. English-derived countries generally don’t, for these reasons, and because the common law has built in error correction mechanisms that others have described, as do legislatures, that don’t require demolishing and rebuilding the whole structure from the ground up. ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2010, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/68 "2010-11-08T22:35:38Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > This is why lawyers are “needed”-the ambiguity of the law (written by lawyers) gives rise to the need for lawyers to interpret the ambiguous laws. > Frankly, all laws ought to be reviewed every 25 years or so-and the obsolete ones tossed out-but that would upset the legal tradition. > [@Noel\_Prosequi](#): > > As others have observed, it is not the lawyers who make the complexity, it is reality, and the lawyers are forced to follow along as best they can. As has been said [over](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13039872&postcount=67) and [over](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=7138538&postcount=15). ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2010, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/69 "2010-11-08T23:15:32Z")
The library I work in is technically a law library even though we don’t have a law school (paralegal and legal studies undergrad degrees but not law). To keep this accreditation we have to keep all the Southern Reporters and numerous other titles even though the only time students use them is when they’re given an assignment (about once a quarter in one particular class) to find this case _specifically in those books_ (i.e. no Westlaw or Internet). IMO it’s a waste since our particular Westlaw subscription contains the vast majority of what’s in there and other databases and free websites make up much of what’s not in Westlaw. The pocket inserts that come in for our various law books are about the thickness of an instruction manual for a DVR and they cost hundreds of dollars per year (thousands all totalled) and, again, they’re so rarely used it’s pitiful because they’re available online. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2010, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/70 "2010-11-08T23:33:04Z")
One more point on why honoring precedent is a good thing: because in the end, the best scenario is that we don’t need a court because people obey the law to begin with. As has been pointed out, reality is so complex that no law is going to completely and unambiguously cover all situations – there are always going to be situations where a rational person can make an argument for deciding things either way. If every civil or criminal case was decided based only on the statute and common sense, then nobody could tell ahead of time if they were in fact obeying the law. By making precedent binding, people who want to obey the law can be much better assured that their interpretation of what’s legal is going to be the same one that a judge would use. ---
**Author:** ![MichaelEmouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/michaelemouse/32/101_2.png) [@MichaelEmouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelEmouse)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2010, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/71 "2010-11-08T23:41:06Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > The library I work in is technically a law library even though we don’t have a law school (paralegal and legal studies undergrad degrees but not law). To keep this accreditation we have to keep all the Southern Reporters and numerous other titles even though the only time students use them is when they’re given an assignment (about once a quarter in one particular class) to find this case _specifically in those books_ (i.e. no Westlaw or Internet). > > IMO it’s a waste since our particular Westlaw subscription contains the vast majority of what’s in there and other databases and free websites make up much of what’s not in Westlaw. The pocket inserts that come in for our various law books are about the thickness of an instruction manual for a DVR and they cost hundreds of dollars per year (thousands all totalled) and, again, they’re so rarely used it’s pitiful because they’re available online. You mention free websites. Would you happen to remember some of their names? Is Quicklaw used in the US? ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2010, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/72 "2010-11-09T00:15:28Z")
Isn’t Quicklaw the Canadian version of Lexis? ---
**Author:** ![Hello\_Again](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2010, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/73 "2010-11-09T00:25:42Z")
> [@MichaelEmouse](#): > > You mention free websites. Would you happen to remember some of their names? [Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law](http://www.law.cornell.edu/) [FindLaw’s Cases and Codes](http://www.findlaw.com/casecode/) [Justia.com](http://www.justia.com/) > [@](#): > > Is Quicklaw used in the US? No, never heard of it. Our pay-for-play research tools are Lexis-Nexis and Westlaw. Which (differently from Quicklaw as I’m gathering) have a way of showing the pagination of the online cite identical to the paper cite, so there is no apparent difference in what you used, unless the source is ONLY reported on Lexis/Westlaw, like an unreported case. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2010, 7:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/74 "2010-11-17T07:04:08Z")
You have Lawtel in N America. Since that is brilliant. I argued a case in the High Court once and saw the report online; that evening. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2010, 7:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/75 "2010-11-17T07:17:05Z")
Yes and no. All but the very oldest stuff is on computers these days and all but the oldest lawyers (those in their 80s and beyond) use the computers whenever possible. The books are very expensive, but so is the online service. There are competing online services, with some being only about $40 a month, which is quite reasonable. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/76 "2010-11-18T06:19:20Z")
> [@Noel\_Prosequi](#): > > Lastly, old-fashioned indexes are a useful resource. Volumes of law reports have an index at the end of each volume, which are typically accumulated every few years or so into a stand alone bound volume. The fact that a human mind has addressed the significance of cases and extracted their importance for the purpose of creating an index is often somehow better than doing a crude word search. I have found cases that way when database searches failed in the way database searches typically do - nothing returned, or far too much returned. This. Using only search engines to do research is dangerous in my experience. You can miss analogous cases simply because they don’t feature the key words you are using. ---
**Author:** ![Hello\_Again](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/77 "2010-11-18T12:29:26Z")
> [@Spoke](#): > > Using only search engines to do research is dangerous in my experience. You can miss analogous cases simply because they don’t feature the key words you are using. The indexes are a feature of the search engines, at least in the US they are. You can browse using the Headnote/Keynote indexing system just as easily online, if not more so. More is usually gained by shepardizing (seeing what cases cite your case) than a pure keyword search anyway. Key word is a jumping off point. It’s a bit difficult to have this conversation since the online products are not the same across the common law legal world. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 12:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/78 "2010-11-18T12:41:21Z")
Westlaw, Lexis are fairly standard actually. The two companies own fairly most of the law reporters in the common law world even though the name of the products and the company may not be the same. In Tim Kevan’s [Art of War](http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0747594643?ie=UTF8&tag=httptimkevanb-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=19450&creativeASIN=0747594643) the senior counsel actually fall prey to the trap of using online sources exclusivly. He fails to notice a small sub section on screen which limits the time period for new claims to 1 year for this particular case and thus by the time he gets to drafting pleadings his case is time barred. It is actually noticed by our protagonist who actually read it in a commentary of the same. Its actually meant to be ironic in context, as earlier on the senior counsel is supposed to be fairly techphobic as opposed to our savvy protagonist. ---
**Author:** ![Hello\_Again](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/79 "2010-11-18T14:26:35Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Westlaw, Lexis are fairly standard actually. The two companies own fairly most of the law reporters in the common law world even though the name of the products and the company may not be the same. > > In Tim Kevan’s [Art of War](http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0747594643?ie=UTF8&tag=httptimkevanb-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=19450&creativeASIN=0747594643) the senior counsel actually fall prey to the trap of using online sources exclusivly. He fails to notice a small sub section on screen which limits the time period for new claims to 1 year for this particular case and thus by the time he gets to drafting pleadings his case is time barred. . Isn’t that an indictment of skimming, not an indictment of online sources? A small subsection can be missed on paper as well. I actually prefer paper statutory sources in general (lexis, in particular, is criminally negligent in their failure to indent subsections). That really doesn’t have anything to do with the OP, or the post I commented on, which were about case reporters and whether you find all the relevant precedent. I’m pretty sure the online search tools are at least somewhat different, earlier in the thread it seemed to become apparent to me, that outside of the US the pagination online does not match the pagination of the paper reporter, making the online and book citation notably different. ---
**Author:** ![dzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@dzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dzero)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204/80 "2010-11-18T14:33:35Z")
I used to use the keyword system exclusively. [Shepardizing](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepard%27s_Citations) was only to insure that that none of the cases you relied on had been questioned or overturned. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-lawyers-really-use-those-impressive-collections-of-cases-volumes/559204.md?page=5)