1. The document provides instructions for using Westlaw, a legal research database, to find and analyze Supreme Court cases. 2. It demonstrates how to search for cases on a specific topic, like same-sex marriage, and how the search results present relevant cases and highlight search terms. 3. The document then walks through analyzing a selected same-sex marriage case, explaining the structure of the case including headnotes, syllabus, opinions, and secondary sources that discuss the case.

1. WESTLAWNEXT
Constitutional Law (CRJS 210) – Cosgrove Militano
This work byValerie Lang Waldin, J.D., M.L.S., Associate Professor, HVCC is licensed under
a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
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4. For your assignment, be
sure you select
Supreme Court!
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In Westlaw, whenever
you search case law,
you will first be
brought to the 10 most
recently decided cases
in that jurisdiction.
These are like the
day’s headlines.
To actually find a case
that satisfies the
assignment, you need
to run a keyword
search.
For example, see next
slide.

6. Let’s say we want Supreme
Court cases on same sex
marriage.
Westlaw has “Google-like”
search simplicity. Just type in
your terms, in this case,
“same sex marriage”.
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7. We obtained 22
U.S. Supreme
Court cases.
Select “Most
Detail” to get a
view of how
your search
terms are used
in the cases.
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8. Your search
terms are
highlighted
with sufficient
detail to help
you determine
which case
you should
select.
Secondary sources
to help interpret the
cases and legal
concepts.
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9. The search results
default to the most
relevant first.
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10. You can sort
by date so
that the most
recent cases
(within the
past 5 years)
appear first in
the list.
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11. Let’s pick the
Windsor
case.
Initial summary
with background
information and
holding(s)
written by
Westlaw
attorney-editors
to help you
understand the
official opinion
Case
name
Citation
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12. Author of majority
opinion.
Justice Kennedy was
the only justice who
drafted the majority
opinion (no other
justices joined to draft a
concurring opinion).
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13. Other opinions (these are also found
at end of majority opinion in the body
of the case).
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14. 1. A court issues an opinion in a case.
2. A copy of the case is obtained by West,
where attorney-editors read the cases and
identify the points of law or legal issues in the
case.
3. These legal issues or points of law are
summarized in a “headnote”.
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15. The Syllabus comes after
the Headnotes.
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16. The attorneys are
listed after the
Syllabus and before
the Opinion.
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20. The print options
screen will default to
printing ALL of the
pages in the case.
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You may not have
to print out the
entire case.
Supreme Court
cases are long.
Check with Prof.
Cosgrove Militano
as to how many
pages you should
print. Here, we
chose 5 pages,
but you may have
to print out more.

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Part of your assignment is
to find two secondary
sources (news articles,
journals) that discuss this
case or issue.
One option is Westlaw
News.

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24. These news
sources are
mainly legal
news. For more
mainstream
news try
National
Newspaper
Core.
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