AALL CITATION FORMATS COMMITTEE

¶1 The seemingly insignificant legal citation is a linchpin of the law. Citations enable lawmakers to legitimize their actions by linking their rulings to established legal authority. Citations also lead citizens to the laws they are expected to obey. Our citation conventions have weathered exponential increases in litigation, legislation, and regulation. Their quiet success is attributable to a congruence between generally accepted citation standards and the structure of our legal literature. This congruence, however, is disintegrating as computer technology reshapes our legal record.

¶2 Our current citation rules were crafted for the gilded age of the law book. Successive layers of information technology --- first online databases, then bulletin boards and CD-ROMs, and lately the Internet --- are amassing an unwieldy electronic legal record which is largely uncitable using conventional citation standards. Specialized citations could be devised for each new layer of this electronic record, but the wiser course is to design a set of universal citation standards which can be used to locate law both in books and any subsequent electronic format.

¶3 Incompatibility between book-based citation rules and electronic law is only part of the problem. Even if the architecture of the book could be magically superimposed on electronic literature, the marketplace would not allow it. At least one law book publisher claims copyright protection over its pagination scheme ¹ --- a scheme which has long enjoyed the imprimatur of the premier American legal citation manual. ² The fact that this preferred pagination cannot be freely incorporated into competing electronic products further undermines the utility and universality of the current law book citation rules. New citation standards are needed which are both vendor-neutral ³ and medium-neutral. ⁴

¶4 As information managers, law librarians have a great professional stake in successful citation reform. ⁵ The next citation standards must maximize access to the law by enabling researchers to overcome both bibliographic and technological barriers to finding points of legal authority. Similarly, the new citations must foster a gradual and orderly expansion from printed to electronic legal literature. The citations of tomorrow must be durable enough to serve researchers through successive generations of information technology --- including the unseen post-Internet culture. To address these many concerns, the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) launched its Universal Legal Citation Project.

¶5 The history of this project is dry, but crucial for those who would understand the provenance of the resulting standards. In Spring 1994, AALL's president formed a Task Force on Citation Formats to consider and develop medium-neutral citation standards for legal materials. ⁶ Later that same year, the Association expressed an official position on the issue when its Executive Board passed a resolution calling for "a system of citation that permits reference to legal or law-related information in any medium, print or electronic, without requiring reference to proprietary products of any particular publisher . . . " ⁷ Operating under these mandates, the task force studied several citation systems before recommending a generic version of a proposal devised for use in Wisconsin courts. In 1994, the State Bar of Wisconsin Technology Resource Committee recommended that the state create an authoritative electronic archive of opinions issued by its courts and that archived opinions be retrievable through a "universal citation" system. The proposed citation was to be both medium- and vendor-neutral and consist of four data elements: ⁸

1996, Wis App, 235, 15
[year], [authority/case], [case number], [paragraph number]

¶6 By making only minor modifications in the Wisconsin proposal, the AALL Task Force on Citation Formats was able to adapt it for national use. Ultimately, the Task Force recommended a medium-neutral case citation of five data elements ⁹:

Jones v. Smith, 1996, Wis App, 235, 15
[case name], [year], [court], [opinion number], [optional paragraph number]  

¶7 After open discussion within the membership, the AALL Executive Board adopted the recommended case citation. ¹⁰ The task force was dissolved and replaced by a Standing Committee on Citation Formats, which is now developing a body of universal citation rules for American law. ¹¹ The first work-product from this committee is the draft User Guide to the Universal Case Citation (the User Guide) that follows this introduction.

¶8 The User Guide serves two purposes. First, the very act of drafting such a guide provides a "road test" of the proposed universal case citation. Even the most sensible citation proposal on paper will fail miserably if researchers cannot actually construct citations by following a small, understandable body of citation rules. This particular road test demonstrates that the universal case citation can effectively identify decisions from courts of every level in all American jurisdictions. Indeed, the proposed citation may be adaptable to cite international and many foreign court decisions.

¶9 Second, the User Guide is a blueprint for other participants in citation reform. Here, too, modest success can already be claimed. The courts of both Maine ¹² and South Dakota ¹³ have already adopted an electronic case citation which is substantially identical to the universal proposal. Other jurisdictions --- including Arkansas, Arizona, California, and New Jersey --- are at various points on the road toward a universal case citation.

¶10 The legal academy is also warming to the task of citation reform. After receiving both an early draft of the User Guide and related materials advocating citation reform, the editors of the latest Harvard Bluebook added Rule 10.3.1 to their citation manual. The new rule directs researchers to use an "official public domain citation" when such a citation is available for a decision. ¹⁴ The Bluebook's official public-domain citation closely resembles the universal case citation --- so much so that the User Guide actually implements the otherwise general guidance of Rule 10.3.1.

¶11 Following the AALL and Wisconsin initiatives, the American Bar Association (ABA) has designed its own recommended universal citation.¹⁵ The ABA model has been a useful tool to refine the AALL proposal. Three features of the ABA model have been incorporated into the latest version of the AALL universal case citation.¹⁶ The resulting universal citation --- illustrated in figure 1 --- consists of five sequential data elements.

¶12 The current AALL proposal and the ABA model differ in only one major respect. The difference concerns the court abbreviation data element --- which is the most complex element in a medium-neutral case citation. ¹⁷ This difference, however, should not overshadow the many similarities between the proposals which should augur well for cooperation between the organizations.

¶13 This endeavor will require an effective working partnership among the different elements within the legal profession. The capacity to adopt new citation standards rests with courts, legislatures, administrative agencies, bar associations, and law schools. Few within these corridors of power have the law librarian's patience, interest, or expertise to craft and test endless iterations of citations for the varied legal materials issued by American jurisdictions. So it is only natural --- if not necessary --- that law librarians should assume a leadership role in framing a new set of citation standards for the American legal community. To this end, the AALL Citation Formats Committee presents this draft User Guide to the AALL Universal Case Citation for public study and comment. Suggestions to improve either the universal case citation or the User Guide should be conveyed to the AALL Citation Formats Committee. ¹⁸

* ©American Association of Law Libraries, 1997.

** The introduction to the Draft User Guide was prepared by Bruce Kennedy, a member of the 1996-97 Citation Formats Committee of the American Association of Law Libraries, and Associate Professor of Law and Law Librarian, University of Toledo College of Law, Toledo, Ohio.

¹ See West Publishing Company v. Mead Data Central, 616 F. Supp. 1571 (D.C. Minn. 1985), aff'd, 799 F.2d 1219 (8th Cir. 1986), cert. denied, 479 U.S. 1070 (1987), in which West Publishing successfully asserted that wholesale use of its pagination by a competing online publisher would infringe West's copyright interest in the arrangement of cases in its court reports. For a discussion of the interrelationship between the West copyright litigation and the need for vendor-neutral citations, see James Wyman, Freeing the Law: Case Reporter Copyright and the Universal Citation, 24 FLA. ST. U.L. REV. 217 (1996).

² See generally THE BLUEBOOK: A UNIFORM SYSTEM OF CITATION 165 tbl.T1 (16th ed. 1996). The Bluebook instructs researchers to cite to the West court reports in preference to other commercial court reports. For example, for Supreme Court cases too new to appear in the official United States Reports (U.S.), the researcher is directed to cite to the West Supreme Court Reporter (S. Ct.) in preference to all other commercial reporters. Similarly, for state cases The Bluebook directs researchers to cite to the appropriate West regional reporters unless the researcher is citing home precedent to the courts of that state.

³ A vendor-neutral citation contains no proprietary data elements and makes no reference to a proprietary publication. Thus the reporter citation 100 F.2d 200, 201 is not vendor-neutral for two reasons. First, the citation directs a researcher to a West publication containing the case. Second, West has laid claim to a proprietary interest in its pinpoint pagination. By contrast, 100 Ark. 200, 201 is vendor-neutral because no proprietary claim clouds the use of any data element in the citation and because no private party owns the Arkansas Reports. The term "public domain citation" also appears in debates about citation reform. However, any difference between the terms "vendor-neutral citation" and "public domain citation" may not represent a useful distinction, since the absence of any proprietary control is the critical component of both concepts.

⁴ A medium-neutral citation consists of data elements which have intellectual or locational relevance without regard to the physical medium in which a document is fixed. By this test, the citation 100 Ark. 200, 201 is not medium-neutral, since the data elements representing the volume and page where the case is found have relevance only in a printed medium and have no natural meaning in electronic formats. Redefining cases in medium-neutral terms is possible by assigning a chronological accession number to each case. Thus the sixth opinion issued by the United States Supreme Court in 1996 can be cited in medium-neutral terms as 1996 US 6. The data elements of this citation retain their meaning in any physical format in which the case is published.

⁵ For a detailed discussion of the many concerns of law librarians, see TASK FORCE ON CITATION FORMATS, AM. ASS'N L. LIBR., REPORT (1995), reprinted in 87 L. LIBR. J. 577 (1995), and available on the Internet at March 1, 1995 Report, AALL Task Force on Citation Formats (visited Jan. 9, 1997) <http://law.wuacc.edu/aallnet/citeform.html> [(visited April 21, 1998) <http://www.aallnet.org/committee/citation/taskforce.html>].

⁶ Id. at ¶¶ 1-3.

⁷ 26 AM. ASS'N L. LIBR. NEWSL. 161 (1994).

⁸ WIS. STATE BAR TECHNOLOGY RESOURCE COMM., PROPOSED CITATION SYSTEM FOR WISCONSIN: REPORT TO THE BOARD OF GOVERNORS 24-25 (1994). This report and its recommendations were approved by the Wisconsin State Bar Board of Governors on June 22, 1994.

⁹ Recommendation 1 of the task force states that "[f]or those jurisdictions considering change to a medium-neutral citation form, the Task Force recommends the use of the following case citation form: case name, year of decision, court, opinion number and, where a pinpoint cite is needed, paragraph number." See REPORT, supra note 5, at ¶ 92.

¹⁰ MINUTES OF THE AALL EXECUTIVE BOARD, July 13, 14, 18 & 20, 1995, at 2107-08, American Association of Law Libraries Headquarters, Chicago.

¹¹ Id. at 2103.

¹² The Maine Supreme Judicial Court requires use of a universal citation together with a parallel citation to the Atlantic Reporter for cases from the high court issued on or after January 1, 1997. Order SJC-216 (Me. Sup. Jud. Ct. Aug. 20, 1996), available in AALL Citation Formats Committee, Vendor-Neutral Citation Rules (visited Feb. 4, 1997) <http://www.aallnet.org/committee/citation/rules_5.html> [ (visited April 21, 1998) <http://www.aallnet.org/committee/citation/rules_me.html>].

¹³ The South Dakota Supreme Court requires the use of the universal citation and a parallel citation to the North Western Reporter for any published opinion issued on or after January 1, 1996. S.D.R. Civ. App. P. 15-26A-69.1(2). Similarly, the U.S. District Court for South Dakota mandates the use of a universal citation with a parallel citation to the Federal Supplement for published decisions of the court issued on or after October 1, 1996. Order In Re: The Citation of District Court Opinions (D.S.D. Oct. 1, 1996), available in AALL Citation Formats Committee, Vendor-Neutral Citation Rules (visited Feb. 4, 1997) <http://www.aallnet.org/committee/citation/rules_6.html> [(visited April 21, 1998) <http://www.aallnet.org/committee/citation/rules_dsd.html>].

¹⁴ THE BLUEBOOK, supra note 2, at 62. The relevant portion of Rule 10.3.1 provides:

If the decision is available as an official public domain citation (also referred to as medium neutral citation), that citation should be provided instead. A parallel citation to the regional reporter may be provided as well. When citing a decision available in public domain format, provide the case name, the year of the decision, the name of the court issuing the decision, and the sequential number of the decision. When referencing specific material within a decision, a pinpoint citation should be made to the paragraph number at which the material appears in the public domain citation. The following fictitious examples are representative of the recommended public domain format:

Stevens v. State, 1996 S.D. 1 ¶ 217.
Jenkins v. Patterson, 1997 Wis. Ct. App. 45, ¶ 157, 600 N.W.2d 435.

¹⁵ See SPECIAL COMM. CITATION ISSUES, AM. BAR ASS'N, REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION (May 23, 1996), approved by the ABA House of Delegates on August 6, 1996. The full text of the resolution recommending use of the universal citation form proposed by the Special Committee is available on the Internet at ABA Special Committee on Citation Issues, Committee Report and Recommendation (visited Jan., 1997) <http://www.abanet.org/citation/home.html>.

¹⁶ One feature adopted from the ABA is a name change. Until Draft 4.0 of the User Guide, the AALL case citation has been described as a "medium neutral citation" but its new designation as a "universal citation" better conveys the notion that our next generation of citations must be vendor-neutral as well as medium-neutral. A second borrowed feature is the use of two-letter postal codes as state abbreviations. Earlier drafts of the AALL citation followed The Bluebook in using the older state abbreviations, which no longer seem useful. The third and final borrowing from the ABA proposal is the practice of using the ¶ symbol to introduce a paragraph number in a pinpoint citation. The original AALL Task Force was advised by online database publishers that ¶ symbols could be incorporated into their products only with extreme difficulty. These technical difficulties have been resolved and the ¶ symbol does clarify the citation. The ABA also recommended the inclusion of a parallel citation to a print reporter for a transitional period. Except for the court abbreviation, the resulting citation is similar to the AALL equivalent.

¹⁷ The ABA and AALL proposals use fundamentally different approaches to define court abbreviations for their respective universal citations. For federal courts, the ABA approach uses fragments from law book citations --- such as "US," "5Cir," and "SDNY." For state courts, the ABA uses postal abbreviations for high courts and appends the suffix "App" to identify intermediate state appellate courts. See generally REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION, supra note 15, at app. A. By contrast, the AALL approach uses a simple algorithm which builds a court identifier from a logical progression of abbreviations. See User Guide to the AALL Universal Case Citation, infra Rule 4.

While the ABA approach has the beauty of using intuitively recognized abbreviations for most case citations, the approach ignores many complex judicial scenarios. Non-unitary state appellate courts are an unresolved problem --- decisions from the Ohio Court of Appeals, which is fragmented into twelve independent districts, cannot be so simply abbreviated as OH App. Specialized appellate courts --- such as the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals --- pose additional problems. Even more problematic are state trial courts, such as the New Jersey Superior Court with its Law and Chancery Divisions. However, the great untamed wilderness is administrative case law. The ABA suggests that its universal citation can be applied to decisions of federal administrative tribunals such as the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission --- using abbreviations which are reminiscent of existing printed reporters. No guidance, however, is offered for citing the explosion of state administrative law decisions now appearing in electronic formats. In fairness to the ABA, its Report offers only illustrations of its recommended citation which may not be intended to be viewed as a complete system for constructing court abbreviations.

So variegated is American case law that AALL decided to use a simple algorithm to devise unique court abbreviations. Under this formula, a citation begins with one or more geographical abbreviations, continues with any needed specialized court abbreviations, and ends with circuit or district information enclosed in a parenthetical. So a decision from the Ohio Supreme Court is abbreviated as "OH." One from the Fifth District of the Ohio Court of Appeals is denoted as "OH App (5th)." A case from the Ohio Court of Claims is abbreviated as "OH Cl Ct" while a decision from the Lucas County Court of Common Pleas is condensed to "OH Lucas County Ct C P." Thus by composing a logical sequence of abbreviations, a researcher can arrive at an unambiguous abbreviation for virtually any American court. For tables of standardized abbreviations to be used in composing court abbreviations, see User Guide to the AALL Universal Citation, infra app.

¹⁸ The 1996-97 Chair of the AALL Citation Formats Committee is Marcia Koslov, State Law Librarian, Wisconsin State Law Library, who can be contacted at (608) 266-1424 or mkoslov@ law-lib.state.wi.us.

Purpose. This guide indicates how researchers can cite American judicial decisions using the universal case citation developed by the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL).

Scope. These rules are intended to assist researchers in crafting accurate, unambiguous citations that enable readers to identify and locate cited legal authority in any format. Ancillary issues such as typeface, style or signal conventions are beyond the scope of this guide. For these and any other issues not addressed in this guide, the researcher should follow the most current edition of The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation. ¹

Throughout this guide, examples appear with redlining, which is used to show where and how a particular rule applies in a full citation.

1) the case name (Rule 2)
2) the year of decision (Rule 3)
3) the court (Rule 4)
4) the opinion number (Rule 5)
5) the notation U --- if the opinion is unreported or unpublished (Rule 6), and
6) the paragraph number --- if a pinpoint citation is needed to specific text (Rule 7).

Examples:
Godard v. Poole, 1995 US 353 ¶ 23
Price v. Bitner, 1996 WI 404 ¶ 12
Cohen v. Berring, 1997 OH App (2d) 66U ¶ 10
Gasaway v. Estes, 1998 US MI (W Dist) 90 ¶ 44
Billings v. Kehoe, 1999 LA Ascension Parish 104U ¶ 12
Roalfe v. Houdek, 2000 NY Sur (11th) 112 ¶ 245 

Rule 2. Case Name. [Related to Bluebook Rules 10.2. & 10.3.1]
Case names should conform to rule 10.2 and related rules of The Bluebook, except that a researcher may cite an opinion from any source so long as it contains the data elements used in the AALL universal case citation.

Rule 3. Year of Decision. [Related to Bluebook Rules 10.3.1 & 10.5.]
After the case name, indicate the year in which the decision was rendered. Express the year as a four-digit number, e.g., 1995 not 95.  

Rule 4. Court. [Related to Bluebook Rules 10.3.1 & 10.4.]
After the year, indicate the court which rendered the opinion. Identify the court by constructing an abbreviation using the sub-rules below.

Generally, use US to identify a federal court. Use the standard two letter postal code to identify a state or territorial court. For convenience, these postal codes appear in Appendix, Part A.  

Also use standardized abbreviations, provided in Appendix, Part B, to identify local or specialized courts.  

Omit periods and other punctuation within the court abbreviation as they are superfluous, e.g., US not U.S. Omit the abbreviation Ct --- unless its omission would make the abbreviation ambiguous.  

4.1 High Courts.
Identify a high court decision by using only a geographical abbreviation,e.g., use US to cite a United States Supreme Court decision and MS to cite a Mississippi Supreme Court decision.  

Examples:
1996 US 212 ¶ 8
1997 MS 33 ¶ 17


4.2 Intermediate Appellate Courts.
Given the tremendous diversity in American court names, two citation forms are needed to create unambiguous abbreviations for appellate courts. A general citation form is offered for the majority of intermediate appellate courts which are simply denominated as courts of appeals. A special rule is provided for courts with more elaborate names.  

Use the general citation form in Rule 4.2.1 for the United States Courtof Appeals and any state intermediate appeals court which is formally named a "Court of Appeals," "Appeals Court" or "Appellate Court." Use the special citation form in Rule 4.2.2 for all other appellate courts.  

Examples:

Use Rule 4.2.1 for:
Court of Appeals of Ohio for the Sixth District
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
Appeals Court of Massachusetts
Appellate Court of Illinois  

Use Rule 4.2.2 for:
Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York State --- First Department
Court of Special Appeals of Maryland
Intermediate Court of Appeals of Hawaii
Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas


4.2.1 General Appellate Court Citation.
To cite a federal or state court of appeal:

1) use US or a state or territorial abbreviation, e.g., 1996 OH App (6th)...
2) followed by App, e.g., 1996 OH App (6th)...
3) followed by the number or name of the judicial circuit, district or equivalent subdivision in parentheses, e.g., 1996 OH App (6th)... or 1997 US App (DC)...

Omit the parenthetical if the circuit or district is part of a unitary appellate court and the opinion binds all coequal divisions of the court.

Omit the abbreviations Cir or Dist unless the omission would make the abbreviation ambiguous.  

Examples:
1996 OH App (6th) 212 ¶ 8
1997 US App (8th) 33 ¶ 17
1998 MA App 212 ¶ 8
1999 IL App (4th) 33 ¶ 17


4.2.2 Special Appellate Court Citation.
To cite any other appellate court of general or special jurisdiction:

1) use US for a federal court or a state or territorial abbreviation, e.g., 1997 NY App Div (1st)...
2) followed by any additional standard abbreviations needed to unambiguously identify the court issuing the opinion, e.g., 1997 NY App Div (1st)...
3) followed by the number or name of the judicial circuit, district or equivalent subdivision in parentheses, e.g., 1997 NY App Div (1st) . . .   

Omit the parenthetical if the circuit or district is part of a unitary court and the opinion binds all coequal divisions of the court.  

Omit the abbreviations Cir or Dist unless the omission would make the abbreviation ambiguous.  

Examples:
1996 NY App Div (1st) 212 ¶ 8
1997 MD Sp App 212 ¶ 8
1998 HI Interm App 212 ¶ 8
1999 TX Cr App 212 ¶ 8

4.3 Other Courts.
To cite any trial or other court:

1a) use US for a federal court, followed by any state or territorial abbreviation needed to identify a federal district, e.g., 1995 US MI (W Dist) . . .

OR

1b) use a state or territorial abbreviation, followed by any local geographical abbreviation needed to identify the local court issuing the opinion, e.g., 1996 MS Adams County...

AND

2) followed by any additional standard abbreviations needed to unambiguously identify the court issuing the opinion, e.g., 1996 MS Adams County . . .   

3) followed by the number or name of the judicial circuit, district or equivalent subdivision in parentheses. e.g., 1995 US MI (W Dist). . . 

Omit the parenthetical if the circuit or district is part of a unitary court and the opinion binds all coequal divisions of the court.  

Omit the abbreviations Cir or Dist unless the omission would make the abbreviation ambiguous.  

Examples:
1995 US MI (W Dist) 111 ¶ 10
1996 MS Adams County 33 ¶ 17
1997 LA Dist (10th) 212 ¶ 8
1998 US Cl Ct 111 ¶ 10
1999 DE Fam 33 ¶ 17
2000 NY Sur (11th) 212 ¶ 8  

Rule 5. Opinion Number. [Related to Bluebook Rule 10.3.1.]
Courts implementing the universal case citation will assign a unique number to each opinion upon its release. Include this opinion number after the court abbreviation.

Example: 1996 US 212 ¶ 8  

Rule 6. Unreported or Unpublished Status. [Related to Bluebook Rule 10.8.1.]
If an opinion is unreported or unpublished, as determined by the issuing jurisdiction, append the letter U to the opinion number.

Example: 1996 OH App (8th) 312U ¶ 15  

Rule 7. Pinpoint Citation by Paragraph Number (Optional). [Related to Bluebook Rule 10.3.1.]
Courts implementing the universal case citation will number each paragraph of text within an opinion. After the opinion number, a researcher may cite to particular text by a ¶ symbol followed by the appropriate paragraph number.

Example: 1996 US 212 ¶ 8  

Rule 8. Parallel Citations. [Related to Blue Book Rule 10.3.1.]
The AALL Universal Case Citation requires no parallel citation as a supplemental device to identify or locate materials. When a parallel citation is required, the researcher should consult appropriate rules of The Bluebook for guidance on constructing parallel citations.

Use the following geographical abbreviations to identify American jurisdictions, including states and territories.  

Alabama Alaska American Samoa Arizona Arkansas California Canal Zone Colorado Connecticut Delaware District of Columbia Florida Georgia Guam Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas S Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri

AL AK AS AZ AR CA CZ CO CT DE DC FL GA GU HI ID IL IN IA KS KY LA ME MD MA MI MN MS MO

Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota North Marianas Islands Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Puerto Rico Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas United States Utah Vermont Virgin Islands Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming

MT NE NV NH NJ NM NY NC ND MP OH OK OR PA PR RI SC SD TN TX US UT VT VI VA WA WV WI WY

Words in brackets [ ] indicate where a proper name is required in a citation. Words in parentheses ( ) denote information which should actually appear in a parenthetical.

Admiralty Appeals Court Appellate Court Appellate Department Appellate Division Appellate Term	Adm App (Number/Name) App (Number/Name) App Dep't App Div App Term
Bankruptcy Bankruptcy Appellate Panel Borough Court	Bankr BAP [Name] Bor
Chancery Children's Court Circuit Court Circuit Court of Appeals City Court Civil Appeals Civil Court of Record Claims Court Commerce Court Common Pleas Commonwealth Court County Court County Judges Court Court of Appeals Court of Appeals Districts Court of Civil Appeals Court of Claims Court of Criminal Appeals Court of Customs & Patent Appeals Court of Customs Appeals Court of Errors Court of Errors and Appeals Court of General Sessions Court of International Trade Court of Military Appeals Court of Military Review Court of Special Appeals Court of Special Sessions Criminal Appeals Customs Court Cust Ct	Ch Child Ct Cir App (Number/Name) [Name] City Civ App Civ Ct Rec Cl Ct Comm Ct C P Commw Ct [Name] County County J Ct App (Number/Name) App (Number/Name) Civ App Cl Ct Crim App CCPA Ct Cust App Ct Err Ct Err & App Ct Gen Sess Ct Int'l Trade CMA CMR Sp App Ct Spec Sess Crim App Customs Court Cust Ct
District Court District Court of Appeals Domestic Relations Court	Dist Dist Ct App Dom Rel Ct
Eastern District Emergency Court of Appeals Equity Court or Division	E Dist Emer Ct App Eq
Family Court High Court Intermediate Court of Appeals	Fam High Ct Interm Ct App
Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation Justice of the Peace Court Juvenile Court	JPML J P Ct Juv Ct
Law Court Law Division	Law Ct Law Div
Magistrate's Court Middle District Municipal Court	Magis Ct M Dist [City Name] Mun Ct
Northern District Orphans' Court	N Dist Orphans' Ct
Parish Court Prerogative Court Probate Court Police Justice Court	[Name] Parish Prerog Ct Prob Ct Police J Ct
Southern District Superior Court Supreme Court Supreme Court Supreme Court, Appellate Division Supreme Court Appellate Term Supreme Court of Errors Supreme Judicial Court Surrogate's Court	S Dist Super (federal) US (other) Sup App Div App Term Sup Ct Err Sup Jud Ct Sur
Tax Court Temporary Emergency Court of Appeals Territory Tribal Court Water Court Western District Youth Court	T C Temp Emer Ct App Terr [Name] Tribal Ct Water Ct W Dist Youth Ct

* ©American Association of Law Libraries, 1997.

** The principal draftsman for the AALL Citation Formats Committee was Bruce Kennedy, Law Librarian and Associate Law Professor, University of Toledo College of Law, Toledo, Ohio.

¹ As of March 1997, the date of Draft Release 5.0, the most current edition is the sixteenth. THE BLUEBOOK: A UNIFORM SYSTEM OF CITATION (16th ed. 1996).

© 1996, American Association of Law Libraries
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