Researching the Law in the United States for LLM Students

This guide is designed for LLM students studying at the Robert Crown Law Library at Stanford Law School. It provides resources for those seeking an introduction to U.S. law, starting points for U.S. legal research, and information about studying at the law library.

Immediately below this introduction, we've provided a list of frequently-used resources available to you.

The remainder of the guide is divided into the following sections:

• Resources about the U.S. government structure;
• Resources on the U.S. legal system;
• Information about legal secondary sources (including legal dictionaries and citations); 
• Resources for legal primary sources;
• Information about starting points for non-legal research; and
• Information on study aids, course reserves, and other useful information for studying at the law school library.

During your time at SLS, we hope you take advantage of the myriad resources available to you through the library. Some of the most frequently-used resources are:

• Robert Crown Law Library Student Services page
  • Including a section specifically for advanced degree students.
• Legal Databases page
  • List of databases available to you through the law school, including information on Bloomberg Law, HeinOnline, Lexis, and Westlaw.
• Searchworks
  • The library's catalog (which includes resources from all campus libraries, including the law library), which you can use to search for books, databases, journals, and more.
• Articles+
  • The library's catalog for articles.
• Connecting from off-campus
  • FAQs and information if you need to access online resources from off-campus.
• Questions? Contact us!
  • We can be reached by email (reference@law.stanford.edu); by phone (650-725-0800); via our Zoom reference office; or by making an appointment with a librarian.