Deciphering Legal Citations: About this Guide

Citations are simply references to legal authority.  Most include these common elements:

• —  Name of the legal authority
• —  Volume or title number
• —  Abbreviation for the name of the publication
• —  Page or section number
• —  Date

This guide is intended to help researchers identify and retrieve the legal authority behind some of the more common legal citations.  It is divided into these sections. 

• Constitutional, congressional, and administrative sources of law, including statutes and administrative codes - includes examples of common citations and links to online sources for the cited legal authority.
• Judicial sources of law, such as court cases - includes examples of common citations and links to online sources for the cited legal authority.
• Online resources - includes links to websites and guides that can help you with legal citations, and a description of the content in Hein Online, which is available in each Alaska State Court Law Library location.