What is the difference between official and unofficial reporters

Published decisions issued in state appellate court cases are often printed in two or more sources, including regional reporters and official state reporters. State court decisions may also be accessed via subscription databases and free online resources. The Bluebook ' s Table T1. Some states print their published court decisions in an official state reporter, while others only print decisions in unofficial reporters or rely on the regional reporters.

In contrast, Iowa does not print an official state reporter and has designated West as the official reporter of Iowa court decisions compiled in the North Western Reporter. Table T1. West's National Reporter System compiles state appellate court decisions from a particular region of the country into one "regional" reporter. The regional reporters are issued in series i. This website works best with modern browsers such as the latest versions of Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Edge.

If you continue with this browser, you may see unexpected results. Case Law Reporters Federal case law will be divided between three branches: U. Unreported Opinions Cases that are too recent, or that publishers do not feel are of significant importance may not be published in any of the reporters. If you need to find an unreported decision, there are a few places that provide access: - West's Federal Appendix publishes unreported decisions by the federal Courts of Appeals.

Federal Cases Database, Westlaw. Only a small percentage of court opinions are published. While most, if not all, of the opinions of the federal and state supreme courts are published, less than half of intermediate appellate opinions tend to be published.

State trial court opinions are never published, and only a tiny fraction of federal trial district court opinions are published. Most courts allow citation to published opinions only. However, there are some exceptions. When preparing a document to be submitted to a court, it is always a good idea to check the applicable court rules to confirm whether only published cases can be cited in filings with that court.

A headnote is a brief summary of a specific point of law decided in a case. Headnotes appear before the judicial opinion and are generally written by a publisher's editors. Headnotes are a great research tool but are not considered legal authority and should never be cited to. Reporters with no series indicator are in their first series. Note that "2d" and "3d" are used in legal citations instead of "2nd" and "3rd.

Cases are not reprinted from one series to the next; each subsequent series contains all new cases. What Cases are Published in Reporters? Many, but certainly not all, appellate decisions are reported published. Federal Appendix F. App'x - Official Though this reporter is published by a commercial publisher West it is considered an "official" reporter because there is no other comprehensive source that publishes these decisions.

The Federal Appendix contains "unpublished" opinions. These are decisions that do not involve new legal principles or interpretations, and because of this, were previously excluded from the official reporters thus the term "unpublished". Unpublished decisions issued after January 1, may now be cited by attorneys if a court so permits. However, the persuasive value will vary according to the preference of the court before which the decision is presented.

Federal Rules Decisions F. This reporter publishes cases dealing specifically with the Federal Rules of Evidence, Civil Procedure, and Criminal Procedure three different sets of procedural rules.