Appellate Advocacy Research Guide: Databases

This page includes links to a number of sources that are available online through commerical providers, Bloomberg, LexisNexis, and Westlaw. Topics include:

• grammar and style guides,
• appellate advocacy texts and treatises,
• briefs and briefwriting, and
• oral arguments

Very few style guides are available in commercial databases.  The "how to" guides are most often found in print.

• Bloomberg Law now includes a law dictionary feature.  Simply type a legal term into the go box in the upper right-hand corner and select the most relevant entry under the "Barron's Law Dictionary" heading in the drop-down list to easily access the definition
• Westlaw includes Black's Law Dictionary and Words and Phrases, which provides judicial defintions and explanations ot key legal terms by jurisdiction

Only a handful of the many texts devoted to appellate advocacy are available online.  For full descriptions of these texts, see the Books section of this research guide.

Bloomberg Law

• Federal Appellate Practice: Description

Lexis

• Appellate Practice in Federal and State Courts
• Federal Standards of Review

Westlaw

• Federal Appeals: Jurisdiction and Practice
• Federal Court of Appeals Manual-6th ed

None of the major texts and practice guides listed under the Books section of this Guide are available through paid commercial databases.  Examples of actual briefs filed in actual cases, are, however, available.  Examples from briefs databases can provide a writer with ideas for arguments, new cases and ideas for structuring a brief.  But, one should not rely on someone else's judgment or legal research as a substitute for their own.  One of the advantages of books on brief writing is that in addition to examples, they provide explanation as to why an example is good or bad and how it can be improved.

Bloomberg Law

• U.S Supreme Court Briefs:  Database includes 5000+ select U.S. Supreme Court briefs filed from 1936 to present

Lexis

• U.S. Supreme Court Briefs
• One can locate examples of briefs for both state and federal jurisdictions by choosing "Briefs, Pleadings and Motions" from the Lexis+ content menu.  From there, scroll to locate your jurisdiction. You can narrow your search using the same filters available for other Lexis documents.

Westlaw

• To access appellate briefs via Westlaw, go to the All Content tab and choose 'Briefs'  the Briefs Multibase "has selected briefs from the U.S. Supreme Court, Courts of Appeals, Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, U.S. Tax Court, 51 state courts and the District of Columbia."  One can search for briefs by jurisdiction or by topic.

Courtroom Cast (LexisNexis)

• LexisNexis Courtroom Cast includes training libraries for trial advocacy, rules of evidence, and appellate advocacy. The Appellate Advocacy Training Library includes short videos with commentary on various aspects of oral argument like using cases, citing to the record, and handling hostile questions. Register for Courtroom Cast using your LUC email address. The registration link is in the upper right-hand corner. To access the Appellate Advocacy Training Library click on the 'Training' link in the black banner.

Lexis

• United States Supreme Court Transcripts : Transcripts of arguments before the United States Supreme Court since 1979.  Transcripts are received  from the Court, usually within two weeks of publication.

Westlaw

• Trial Transcripts and Oral Arguments : This database contains oral arguments for select courts including the U.S. Supreme Court and the Seventh Circuit Ciourt of Appeals going back to 2000.