This page is about the legal citation style. See also Blue book.

The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation is a style guide and a widely used legal citation system in the United States. The Bluebook is compiled by the Harvard Law Review Association, the Columbia Law Review, the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, and the Yale Law Journal. Currently, it is in its 18th edition. It is so named because its cover is blue. In the UK Blue book is the nickname given to a Westminster parliamentary paper with a blue cover. ... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (473x770, 4 KB) This image is of a book cover, and the copyright for it is most likely owned either by the artist who created the cover or the publisher of the book. ... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (473x770, 4 KB) This image is of a book cover, and the copyright for it is most likely owned either by the artist who created the cover or the publisher of the book. ... Style guides generally give guidance on language use. ... Legal citation is the style of crediting and referencing other documents or sources of authority in legal writing. ... The Harvard Law Review is a journal of legal scholarship published by an independent student group at Harvard Law School. ... The Columbia Law Review is a law review edited and published entirely by students at Columbia Law School. ... The University of Pennsylvania Law Review is a scholarly journal focusing on legal issues, published by an organization of second and third year J.D. students at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. ... The Yale Law Journal, published continuously since 1891, is by far the oldest and most widely known of the eight law reviews published by students at Yale Law School. ...

Examples of Bluebook citation

The 18th edition of The Bluebook has 21 Rules. Each Rule comprises many complex, detailed Rules.

1. Structure and Use of Citations
2. Typefaces for Law Reviews
3. Subdivisions
4. Short Citation Forms
5. Quotations
6. Abbreviations, Numerals, and Symbols
7. Italicization for Style and in Unique Circumstances
8. Capitalization
9. Titles of Judges, Officials, and Terms of Court
10. Cases
11. Constitutions
12. Statutes
13. Legislative Materials
14. Administrative and Executive Materials
15. Books, Reports, and Other Nonperiodic Materials
16. Periodical Materials
17. Unpublished and Forthcoming Sources
18. Electronic Media and Other Nonprint Resources
19. Services
20. Foreign Materials
21. International Materials

A beginning writer may wish to study the first nine rules, and the five-type citations of most-frequently used materials: Cases (Rule 10), Constitutions (Rule 11), Statutes (Rule 12), Books (Rule 15), and Periodicals (Rule 16). Unless you're a practitioner, you may ignore court document citations, at least, in the beginning of your study.

Rule 1-9: Introduction and general rules

The underline and bold fonts are only added to distinguish each field. The Roman, italic and small caps fonts are required by the Bluebook for articles in law journals. The rules for practitioner citations are somewhat different (and often superseded by jurisdiction-specific requirements). An underline is one or more horizontal lines immediately below a portion of text. ... In typography, emphasis is the exaggeration of words in a text with a font in a different style from the rest of the text—to emphasize them. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... In typography, small caps (short for small capitals) are uppercase (capital) characters that are printed in a smaller size than normal uppercase characters of the same font. ...

Rule 1.2 requires each source, regardless of type (e.g., book, case, periodical), to be introduced by a signal unless the cited authority (i) directly states the proposition, (ii) identifies the source of a quotation, or (iii) identifies an authority referred to in the text. The signal should be italicized. Signals include E.g., See, Cf., and others. Each signal has a specific usage and signals within a citation are to be in a specific order. Legal citation signals are a set of brief abbreviated phrases or words used to clarify the proposition, authority, or significance of the legal citation. ...

Notes:

• The author's name is the name signed on that article. If the article says "by Jennifer 8. Lee", do not use "Jennifer Eight Lee" even if it's printed on her driver's license.
• The date of publication is the date printed on that publication.
• Except for May, June, July and September (Sept.), all months are abbreviated to the first three letters.

Jennifer 8. ...

Rule 10: Cases

The simplified general format of a case is:

Name of the case, Location of case in reporter, Cited page(s) (Court and jurisdiction, Year or date of the decision), [optional] Subsequent history.

such as:

United States v. MacDonald, 531 F.2d 196, 198-89 (4th Cir. 1976), rev'd, 435 U.S. 850 (1978).

The above citation points to a decision made by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (4th Cir.) in 1976 and reversed by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1978. The case's title is: United States v. MacDonald where the plaintiff was the United States represented by some United States Department of Justice attorneys and the defendant was a murderer named Jeffrey Robert MacDonald who killed his wife and two daughters in 1970. To use a database to retrieve the case, you may only need to enter "531 F.2d 196", the case citation. In law, a reporter is a series of books which contain court opinions. ... The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit is a federal court located in Richmond, Virginia with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts: District of Maryland Eastern District of North Carolina Middle District of North Carolina Western District of North Carolina District of South... Year 1976 (MCMLXXVI) was a leap year starting on Thursday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Federal courts Supreme Court Circuit Courts of Appeal District Courts Elections Presidential elections Midterm elections Political Parties Democratic Republican Third parties State & Local government Governors Legislatures (List) State Courts Local Government Other countries  Atlas  Politics Portal      The Supreme Court of the United States (sometimes colloquially referred to by the acronym... Year 1978 (MCMLXXVIII) was a common year starting on Sunday (link displays the 1978 Gregorian calendar). ... A plaintiff, also known as a claimant or complainer, is the party who initiates a lawsuit (also known as an action) before a court. ... DOJ headquarters in Washington, D.C. Justice Department redirects here. ... United States Attorneys (also known as federal prosecutors) represent the U.S. federal government in United States district court and United States court of appeals. ... A defendant or defender is any party who is required to answer the complaint of a plaintiff or pursuer in a civil lawsuit before a court, or any party who has been formally charged or accused of violating a criminal statute. ... Dr. Jeffrey Robert MacDonald (Born: October 12, 1943) a former Green Beret in the U.S. Army, who was tried and convicted in 1979 for the murder of his pregnant wife and two daughters. ... 1970 (MCMLXX) was a common year starting on Thursday. ... // The United States Reports, the official reporter of the Supreme Court of the United States Case citation is the system used in common law countries such as the United States, England and Wales, Ireland, Canada, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Australia and India to uniquely identify the location of past court...

To cite a U.S. Supreme Court decision, the court and jurisdiction field must be omitted because the name of the reporter already says it all, because — where the Federal Reporter, cited in the preceding example, covers many United States Courts of Appeals — the United States Reports covers only the Supreme Court. For example: In law, a reporter is a series of books which contain court opinions. ... The United States courts of appeals (or circuit courts) are the mid-level appellate courts of the United States federal court system. ... The United States Reports are the official records of the rulings of the Supreme Court of the United States. ...

Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 116 (1973).

There are additional rules dealing with undecided cases, unpublished interim orders, unpublished decisions, and many other legal documents. A beginner may not use these documents very often.

Rule 11: Constitutions

The United States only has 51 constitutions. That means constitutions are very easy to cite.

To cite the Article 1, Section 9, Clause 2 of the United States Constitution: Wikisource has original text related to this article: Article One of the United States Constitution Article One of the United States Constitution describes the powers of the legislative branch of the United States government, known as Congress, which includes the House of Representatives and the Senate. ... The United States Constitution is the supreme law of the United States of America. ...

U.S. CONST. art. I, § 9, cl. 2.

To cite the Section 2 of the 14th Amendment: Amendment XIV in the National Archives The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution (Amendment XIV) is one of the post-Civil War amendments (known as the Reconstruction Amendments), intended to secure rights for former slaves. ...

U.S. CONST. amend. XIV, § 2.

To cite the Preamble to the United States Constitution: Wikisource has original text related to this article: Preamble to the United States Constitution The preamble to the United States Constitution consists of a single sentence (a preamble) which introduces the document and its purpose. ...

U.S. CONST. pmbl.

To cite a state constitution, in this case, the Article 4, Section 7 of New Mexico: Capital Santa Fe Largest city Albuquerque Area  Ranked 5th  - Total 121,665 sq mi (315,194 km²)  - Width 342 miles (550 km)  - Length 370 miles (595 km)  - % water 0. ...

N.M. CONST. art. IV, § 7.

If the constitutional provision has been repealed, you may simply cite the year of the repeal, or include the repealing provision in full. For example, the 18th Amendment (prohibition) was ratified in 1919 and repealed in 1933 by the 21st Amendment: Amendment XVIII in the National Archives Prohibition agents destroying barrels of alcohol. ... The term Prohibition, also known as A Dry Law, refers to a law in a certain country by which the manufacture, transportation, import, export, and sale of alcoholic beverages is restricted or illegal. ... Year 1919 (MCMXIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar). ... 1933 (MCMXXXIII) was a common year starting on Sunday. ... Amendment XXI (the Twenty-first Amendment) to the United States Constitution repealed the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which had mandated nationwide Prohibition. ...

U.S. CONST. amend. XVIII (repealed 1933).

or

U.S. CONST. amend. XVIII, repealed by U.S. CONST. amend. XXI.

Amendments use the same format for repeals:

U.S. CONST. art. I, § 2, cl. 1 (repealed 1913).

or

U.S. CONST. art. I, § 2, cl. 1, repealed by U.S. CONST. amend. XVII, § 1.

Note:

• The article number must be written in Roman numerals (e.g. I, II, III, IV, ...).

Roman numerals are a numeral system originating in ancient Rome, adapted from Etruscan numerals. ...

Rule 12: Statutes

To cite an individual provision of the United States Code: The United States Code (U.S.C.) is a compilation and codification of the general and permanent federal law of the United States. ...

Title number Code abbreviation § Specific section (Date of code edition cited).

such as:

28 U.S.C. § 1291 (1994).

(For the full text of the cited statue, visit: Title 28 > Part IV > Chapter 83 > § 1291.)

Rule 15: Books

AUTHOR'S FULL NAME, BOOK'S TITLE cited page (editor's full name ed., publisher year of the edition) (original publication date)

such as:

CHARLES DICKENS, BLEAK HOUSE 50 (Norman Page ed., Penguin Books 1971) (1853).

In this case, Charles Dickens's Bleak House is cited. This book was first published in 1853, but is now in the public domain. The edition cited here was edited by Norman Page and published by Penguin Books in 1971. The cited page is page 50. “Dickens” redirects here. ... Bleak House is the ninth novel by Charles Dickens, published in 20 monthly parts between March 1852 and September 1853. ... 1853 was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ... It has been suggested that Penguin Modern Poets, Penguin Great Ideas be merged into this article or section. ... Year 1971 (MCMLXXI) was a common year starting on Friday (link will display full calendar) of the 1971 Gregorian calendar. ...

Rule 16: Periodicals

Rule 16.3: Consecutively Paginated Journals

The simplified general format is:

Author's full name, Article's title, Volume number JOURNAL TITLE Start page, Cited page, (Published year).

The author's name of a journal article must not be set in small caps.

Patricia J. Williams, Alchemical Notes: Reconstructed Ideas from Deconstructed Rights, 22 HARV. C.R.–C.L. L. REV. 401, 407 (1987).

If the cited journal lacks a volume number, use the published year as a substitute:

Thomas R. McCoy & Barry Friedman, Conditional Spending: Federalism's Trojan Horse, 1988 SUP. CT. REV. 85, 100.

The year 1988 now moves to the volume number's place.

Rule 16.4: Nonconsecutively Paginated Journals and Magazines

The simplified general format is:

Author's full name, Article's title, Journal's title, Date of issue, at First page, Cited page.

such as:

Barbara Ward, Progress for a Small Planet, HARV. BUS. REV., Sept.-Oct. 1979, at 89, 90.

If the article is not signed, the author's name must be omitted:

Damages for a Deadly Cloud: The Bhopal Tragedy Will Cost Union Carbide $470 Million, TIME, Feb. 27, 1989, at 53.

Rule 16.5: Newspapers

The simplified general format is:

Author's full name, Article's title, Journal's title, Date of issue, at Start page.

such as:

Ari L. Goldman, O'Connor Warns Politicians Risk Excommunication over Abortion, N.Y. TIMES, June 15, 1990, at A1.

Unlike journals, only the first page number of a newspaper article is given. If the article is an editorial, op-ed, or letter to the editor, place that designation in plain text before its title.

Criticism

The Bluebook is notorious for being too rule-oriented, too concise, and too cryptic in comparison to the more helpful citation system guides used in other academic fields (e.g., Turabian). It has been criticized for the somewhat bizarre nature of some of its rules, such as having two separate styles: one for academic legal articles (where citations are always footnoted), and one for court documents (where citations are usually inline). Turabian is the popular name of a format for the writing style of research papers (such as the arrangement and punctuation of footnotes and bibliographies). ... A footnote is a note of text placed at the bottom of a page in a book or document. ...

Cryptic styles

The current systems of citation are also artificially limited by the printing process. Many cryptic abbreviations were created to cram more footnotes on a page. This can make a Bluebook-compliant article very difficult to study. A layperson may have a difficult time figuring out which abbreviation refers to which journal (e.g.: TUL. MAR. L.J. means Tulane Maritime Law Journal; if a reader knows little about Tulane University or maritime law as a legal branch, this citation can be difficult to decipher). This article does not cite any references or sources. ... This article is about the journal as a written medium. ... Tulane University is a private, nonsectarian, coeducational research university located in New Orleans, Louisiana. ... Admiralty law (also referred to as maritime law) is a distinct body of law which governs maritime questions and offenses. ...

The Bluebook also encourages content-specific omission of page indicators. Unlike most other citation systems, it seldom uses "page", "p." or "pp." (plural form) to indicate page numbers. At most, the Bluebook uses "at". If it is allowed to omit the "at", it is required to do so. Look up Plural in Wiktionary, the free dictionary Plural is a grammatical number, typically referring to more than one of the referent in the real world. ...

Internet and other digital sources

Most researchers today use the Internet daily or even hourly. In addition to legal databases such as Westlaw and LexisNexis, many researchers use Internet- CD-ROM-, or DVD-ROM-based reference materials. Some of them may use Wikipedia. By definition, Internet materials are indispensable to cyber law researchers. However, Rule 18 of the 17th edition Bluebook, published in 2000, was generally regarded as not good enough even as a guidebook. (Note: see the guide to citation to Wikipedia below.) The examples and perspective in this article do not represent a worldwide view. ... Nexis redirects here. ... The CD-ROM (an abbreviation for Compact Disc Read-Only Memory (ROM)) is a non-volatile optical data storage medium using the same physical format as audio compact discs, readable by a computer with a CD-ROM drive. ... DVD is an optical disc storage media format that is used for playback of movies with high video and sound quality and for storing data. ... Wikipedia (IPA: , or ( ) is a multilingual, web-based, free content encyclopedia project, operated by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization. ... Cyber law (also referred to as cyberlaw) is a term used to describe the legal issues related to use of communications technology, particularly cyberspace, i. ...

The Bluebook preference is to cite a printed copy if it is available, and digital copies should be cited only when a printed copy is not available. However, since many publishers of newspapers, books and periodicals, government offices and even courts are providing digitized materials online, many researchers may use printed materials only once in a while. Some materials, such as courtroom transcripts, are usually only available as scanned PDF files or even sound recordings. Today, it becomes more and more unreasonable to ask writers or readers to get a printed copy of something from a library. A transcript is a written record of spoken language. ... In computing, a scanner is a device that analyzes images, printed text, or handwriting, or an object (such as an ornament) and converts it to a digital image. ... The Portable Document Format (PDF) is the file format created by Adobe Systems, in 1993, for document exchange. ... Methods and media for sound recording are varied and have undergone significant changes between the first time sound was actually recorded for later playback until now. ... Julio Pérez Ferrero Library - Cúcuta, Colombia A modern-style library in Chambéry A library is a collection of information, sources, resources and services, organized for use, and maintained by a public body, an institution, or a private individual. ...

To help people and a computer recognize the boundary of a URL, many citation systems encourage the use of "less than" and "greater than" signs to enclose URLs (e.g., <http://www.wikipedia.org/>). Bluebook does not follow this convention. It uses no punctuation. Therefore, a long and confusing URL may not be quickly deciphered by eye or even by a computer program. // Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is a technical, Web-related term used in two distinct meanings: In popular usage, it is a widespread synonym for Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) — many popular and technical texts will use the term URL when referring to URI; Strictly, the idea of a uniform syntax for... For technical reasons, :) and some similar combinations starting with : redirect here. ... A computer program is a collection of instructions that describe a task, or set of tasks, to be carried out by a computer. ...

The 18th edition is improved. For example, it now includes rules about citing weblogs. However, it will take time to see if the improved rules will be helpful to researchers. A weblog (now more commonly known as a blog) is a web-based publication consisting primarily of periodic articles (normally, but not always, in reverse chronological order). ...

Court document citation

The system of court document citation was developed for the least-advanced typewriters. An over-burdened law clerk sitting in front of an inexpensive mechanical typewriter does not have the luxury being able to choose from various typefaces and fonts. A typewriter also does not help its user create footnotes. The development of such a different system is therefore reasonable. However, with advancement of personal computation and word processors, the progress of technologies may one day make the old system obsolete. Mechanical desktop typewriters, such as this Underwood Five, were long time standards of government agencies, newsrooms, and sales offices. ... In the United States, Canada and Brazil, a law clerk is a person who provides assistance to a judge in researching issues before the court and in writing opinions. ... For the origin and evolution of fonts, see History of western typography. ... A font can mean: A member of a typeface family; or digital font - file format that encapsulates a typeface family in a database. ... A word processor (also more formally known as a document preparation system) is a computer application used for the production (including composition, editing, formatting, and possibly printing) of any sort of viewable or printed material. ...

Inconsistency between editions

Some revisions between editions often create what are regarded as arbitrary and capricious changes that can make a legal citation mean something different between citations. An example is the change of the see signal between the 15th edition and the 16th edition. In the 15th edition, see signified that a particular source clearly supports the proposition and no signal signified that a source stated the proposition. The 16th edition changed the see signal to sources that state or support the proposition. The 17th edition changed the see signal back to the same as the 15th edition. Thus, many documents written during the time of 16th edition used see in instances in which all other editions would require use of either a see signal or no signal. In addition, practitioners often follow the version of the Bluebook they learned whilst in law school, and as a result of this sort of change it may often not be immediately apparent how a practitioner intends for a signal to be interpreted (e.g., whether "see" denotes an inferential jump or whether the cited authority flat-out states the rule). Legal citation signals are a set of brief abbreviated phrases or words used to clarify the proposition, authority, or significance of the legal citation. ...

Another example is Rule 10.4 for court names and jurisdictions. In the 17th edition, Rule 10.4(b) states that for court citations, "Omit the jurisdiction if it is unambiguously conveyed by the reporter title," but the 18th edition states "Omit the jurisdiction (but not the court abbreviation) if it is unambiguously conveyed by the reporter title." Thus Dubrueil v. Witt, 80 Conn. App. 410 (2003) is the proper citation under the 17th edition and Dubreuil v. Witt, 80 Conn. App. 410 (App. Ct. 2003) is the proper citation under the 18th edition.

Challengers

To make legal citation more intuitive and logical, several other alternatives have been proposed. The ALWD system appears to be the Bluebook's most widely used competitor. The journals published at the University of Chicago Law School use the Maroonbook, which is noted for its simplicity and flexibility. Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... The University of Chicago Law School, having recently celebrated its centennial in the 2002-2003 school year, has established itself as a high profile part of the University of Chicago. ...

Learning aids

Mary Miles Prince, the Coordinating Editor of the Bluebook and librarian of Vanderbilt University Law School's library, is the author of Prince's Dictionary of Legal Citations (currently in its seventh edition), a companion to the Bluebook published by William S. Hein & Co., which contains examples of how to cite virtually every well-known primary and secondary legal authority according to Bluebook rules.

Lawmanac (http://www.lawmanac.com/) also published a set of Microsoft WinHelp offline legal reference materials that includes "Legal Citation & Style: A Course for All Legal Writers and Legal-Support Staff" by C. Edward Good. This learning aid also covers ALWD. Microsoft WinHelp is a proprietary format for online help files that can be displayed by the Microsoft Help browser winhelp. ...

Citation to Wikipedia

The Harvard Journal of Law and Technology has adopted the following format for citations to articles in Wikipedia: Harvard Journal of Law and Technology, also known by the acronym JOLT, is a semi-annual student publication of Harvard Law School. ...

• [Signal] Wikipedia, [article], http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/[article] (as of [date], [time] GMT) [(optional explanatory parenthetical)].

Here is an example:

• See Wikipedia, Bluebook, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluebook (as of Mar. 21, 2006, 20:50 GMT) (describing history and application of the Bluebook).

This format derives from Rule 18.2 of the 18th edition of the Bluebook, though the date parenthetical differs slightly. The parenthetical here is designed to specify the exact version of the article to which the author is referring, recognizing that articles can and do change often. The date and time used should correspond exactly to the latest version listed in the article's Wikipedia history page that states the proposition for which you are citing it. Use of GMT conforms to the timestamp format used in those history entries (e.g., use 24-hour notation to avoid AM/PM).

See also

• Legal citation
• ALWD Citation Manual
• The Chicago Manual of Style
• Legal citation signals

Legal citation is the style of crediting and referencing other documents or sources of authority in legal writing. ... Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... The Chicago Manual of Style (CMS) is a style guide for American English published by the University of Chicago (from which it receives its name). ... Legal citation signals are a set of brief abbreviated phrases or words used to clarify the proposition, authority, or significance of the legal citation. ...

External links

• The Bluebook Official Site
• Introduction to legal citation