With the high cost of subscription caselaw databases, we’re always looking for authoritative free sources. The Free Law Project is a California non-profit public benefit corporation whose mission is to “provide free, public, and permanent access to primary legal materials on the Internet”.  Working with PACER (Public Access to Court Electronic Records) they have collected every free order and opinion available on PACER and published them on an easy-to-use site called CourtListener.

PACER is similar to our Court Registry. It hosts case file documents and docket information for all district, bankruptcy and appellate courts. While it’s not free, it is very reasonably priced. If you’re looking for document information for a U.S. decision, we have an account with PACER and can help you find it.

CourtListener and Google Scholar should be of benefit to those firms who can’t justify subscribing to a U.S. database.

(Hat tip to The Washington Post’s The Volokh Conspiracy column.)

The library will be closed on Good Friday, March 29. The courthouse will be closed on Monday, April 1 but the library will be open for remote requests.