Library

Government 239: Comparative Constitutional Law
Selected Sources for Research

Photo Credit: European Court of Human Rights. Used by permission.

Professor: George Isaacson
Librarian: Ginny Hopcroft
Fall 2006

The list of resources below is organized by function. You will probably initially read articles from print and online journals to understand and begin to analyze your topic. You may also consult web sites for background and analysis. You are then likely to search for international constitutional law cases mentioned in the articles or exemplifying your topic, and the final section lists sources for case law.

Journals and Indexes/Databases

International Journal of Constitutional Law Online 2003-

Constitutional Law journals acessed through Bowdoin
Lexis Nexis Academic Online Date coverage varies: All articles are fulltext. Database provides legal information and news. Under “Legal Research” the sections for Secondary Literature—legal news and law reviews--and International Legal Materials will be most useful.
Index to Legal Periodicals Main Per Index 1926-: Print citation index to U.S. law journals.

Westlaw Campus Online: Contains laws and statutes of the federal government and all 50 states as published in United States Code Annotated. Also includes: federal and state court cases; federal regulations published in the Federal Register and the Code of Federal Regulations; American Law Reports, a research tool that collects and analyzes every court case decided on a particular point of law; an encylopedia of state and federal law; articles from law reviews and journals; and European Union law sources.

Academic Search Premier Online 1990-
Public Affairs Information Service (PAIS) Online 1972-: Citation index only. PAIS indexes "publications on all subjects that bear on contemporary public issues and the making and evaluation of public policy, irrespective of source or traditional disciplinary boundaries.
CIAO
Online 1990?-: CIAO is a full text database of working papers, conference proceedings, policy briefs and some articles for the study of international relations, published from 1991 forward, and produced collaboratively by the Columbia University Libraries and Columbia University Press.

Web Sites

Comparative Constitutional Law Research Guide http://www.ll.georgetown.edu/intl/guides/compcon/
European Court of Human Rights http://www.echr.coe.int/echr
Constitutions of Nations Throughout The World http://www.concourt.am/wwconst/index.html
World Wide Constitutional Courts Links to constitutional courts and equivalent bodies http://www.concourt.am/catalog/ccourt.htm
Human and Constitutional Rights http://www.hrcr.org
Researching Constitutional Law on the Internet http://www.lib.uchicago.edu/~llou/conlaw.html

See section called Case Reports, Books, Journals, Articles, and Current Commentary

World Legal Information Institute http://www.worldlii.org/ http://www.worldlii.org/catalog/270.html

Case Law

Please see the Library Course Guide for Constitutional Law for an overview of case citation and basic structure of U.S. case law reporters.

Information to help you locate international cases:

Name of case.
Date.
Country or jurisdiction of court.
Legal terminology and/or keywords for subject.

International Legal Materials
American Society of International Law
Main Periodical; also a section of LexisNexis

Web Sites and Databases for Case Law:

LexisNexis Academic

Westlaw Campus
Under the heading "European Union Library," select "European Union Case Law"

European Court of Human Rights
http://www.echr.coe.int/

Researching Constitutional Law on the Internet
http://www.lib.uchicago.edu/~llou/conlaw.html

World Legal Information Institute: Courts and Case Law
http://www.worldlii.org/catalog/2172.html

European Law: portal European Caselaw through EUR-LEX and CELEX
http://europa.eu.int/documents/index_en.htm

World Law Guide (Courts/Cases)
http://www.lexadin.nl/wlg/courts/nofr/courts.htm

Global Courts: Supreme Court Decisions from Around the World
http://www.globalcourts.com/

Constitutional Courts from the Council of Europe
http://www.venice.coe.int/site/dynamics/N_court_links_ef.asp?L=E