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This article is from the Legal Research FAQ, by Mark Eckenwiler with numerous contributions by others.

4.1.6 Doing Legal Research: Black's Law Dictionary

The most famous dictionary of legal terms and phrases is
Black's. Unfortunately, Black's is useful almost exclusively for
definitions of historical terms ("Lex Petronia" is my favorite, with
"enfeoffment" a close second). Black's definitions of contemporary
legal terms are often too vague to be of use, and even in those cases
where Black's provides a case quote, it's too frequently from an
obscure 1932 decision in Kentucky.

Moral: don't rely on Black's unless you're desperate or lazy, or
researching some point of purely historical interest.

 

Continue to:

• prev: 4.1.4 Doing Legal Research: Lexis and Westlaw
• Index
• next: 4.2 Doing Legal Research: Subject Area Resources

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legal, legal research, U.S. court system, statutory citation, regulatory citations