To cite law under the standard American conventions, you match the format to the type of authority: cases use a case name, reporter volume, reporter abbreviation, page, and a court-and-year parenthetical; statutes and regulations use a title number, code abbreviation, section symbol, section number, and edition year; constitutional provisions use the constitution abbreviation followed by the subdivision. Learning how to cite law well is mostly about learning these patterns, knowing which manual applies, and checking the court’s local rules before you file.
Which Citation Manual Applies
Almost all American legal citation traces back to one of two manuals. The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation is the dominant standard, published jointly by the law reviews at Columbia, Harvard, Penn, and Yale. The ALWD Guide to Legal Citation, published by Wolters Kluwer, covers the same ground and is often considered easier to learn. Since its fifth edition, the ALWD Guide conforms to Bluebook formats, so the two now produce essentially identical citations.
Neither manual controls in every courtroom. Many courts publish their own style guides that override Bluebook conventions on specific points. California’s Supreme Court adopted the California Style Manual as its official citation guide. New York’s Law Reporting Bureau publishes the New York Law Reports Style Manual with the approval of the Court of Appeals, and while it is not binding on attorneys, many practitioners follow it when filing in New York courts.1New York State Unified Court System. The Style Manual Used by the New York State Law Reporting Bureau Before filing anything, check the court’s local rules. That step matters more than memorizing every Bluebook detail.
Practitioner Format and Academic Format Are Different
The Bluebook contains two parallel systems, and mixing them up is a common mistake. The practitioner format (also called court document format) is what lawyers use in briefs, motions, and memos. It appears in the Bluepages at the front of the Bluebook. The academic format is what law review editors use in footnotes and appears in the main body of rules.
The differences are mostly typographic. In practitioner format, most citation elements sit in ordinary roman type, with italics (or underlining) reserved for case names, signals, and short-form references. In academic format, law reviews add a third typeface, small capitals, used for book authors and periodical names. Academic citations also live in footnotes rather than in the body text. Pick the system that matches your document and stay in it.
Citing Cases
A case citation has a fixed pattern: case name, volume number, reporter abbreviation, first page of the opinion, and a parenthetical with the court and year.
Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984)
Here, “466” is the volume, “U.S.” is the reporter (United States Reports, the official reporter for Supreme Court decisions), “668” is the first page, and “(1984)” is the year.2Supreme Court of the United States. U.S. Reports The parenthetical drops the court abbreviation because “U.S.” already tells the reader this is a Supreme Court case. For lower federal courts, include the court abbreviation: Jones v. Smith, 500 F.3d 200 (2d Cir. 2007) tells the reader this came from the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.
To point the reader to a specific passage, add a pinpoint citation (a “pincite”) after the starting page, separated by a comma: Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687 (1984). For a page range, use an en dash: 668, 687–94. If the source is organized by paragraph numbers, cite the paragraph with the ¶ symbol.
Unpublished and Electronic Opinions
Many trial court orders and unpublished appellate opinions exist only on Westlaw or Lexis. For these, replace the reporter information with a database identifier and give the full date rather than just the year:
United States v. Bennett, No. 05-CR-6050 CJS, 2005 WL 2709572 (W.D.N.Y. Oct. 21, 2005)
The docket number replaces the volume, “2005 WL 2709572” is the Westlaw database identifier, and the parenthetical gives the court and full decision date. If the opinion is a slip opinion not available in any database, drop the database identifier and keep the rest.
Vendor-Neutral Citations
A growing number of states use a public-domain or vendor-neutral citation format that does not depend on a commercial reporter. The court itself assigns each opinion a sequential number, and the citation gives the case name, year, court designator, and opinion number: State v. Doe, 2024 ND 15. For a specific passage, add the paragraph number: 2024 ND 15, ¶ 22. States using some form of this system include Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. Check the Bluebook’s Table T1 for the state you are citing to see whether vendor-neutral form is required or optional.
Citing Statutes and Constitutions
Statutory citations follow one structure: title or chapter number, code abbreviation, section number, and the edition year of the code. A federal statute looks like this:
29 U.S.C. § 2601 (2018)
“29” is the title within the United States Code, “U.S.C.” is the code abbreviation, “§ 2601” is the section, and “(2018)” is the edition of the code you consulted. When a statute spans multiple sections, use the double-section symbol: 29 U.S.C. §§ 2601–2654. Older citations sometimes use “et seq.” after the first section, but modern practice prefers the specific ending section because it tells the reader exactly where the range stops.
State statutes work the same way, substituting the state code abbreviation for “U.S.C.” A Texas statute might read: Tex. Penal Code § 31.03 (2023). Bluebook Table T1 lists the proper abbreviation for every state code.
Constitutional Provisions
The U.S. Constitution has its own compact format: constitution abbreviation, then the subdivision (article, amendment, section, or clause):
U.S. Const. art. I, § 9, cl. 2
U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1
No date is needed for provisions currently in force. If a provision has been repealed or superseded, add “repealed” or “superseded” in a parenthetical with the relevant year. State constitutions follow the same pattern with the state abbreviation: Cal. Const. art. I, § 7.
Citing Regulations
Federal regulations sit in the Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R.), organized by subject across 50 titles. A regulation citation mirrors a statutory citation: title, “C.F.R.,” section, and edition year.
36 C.F.R. § 2.15 (2024)
That points to Title 36, Section 2.15 of the C.F.R. If the regulation has a commonly known name, include it up front: Pets Rule, 36 C.F.R. § 2.15.
One detail to keep in mind on the year: the official printed C.F.R. is updated once each calendar year, with volumes issued on a rolling quarterly basis so different titles refresh in different quarters.3National Archives. About the Code of Federal Regulations The electronic version (eCFR), maintained by the Office of the Federal Register, is updated daily and generally current within two business days.4eCFR. Updates for April 2, 2026 The year in your parenthetical should match the edition you actually consulted.
Citing Secondary Sources
Cases, statutes, and regulations are primary authority, but you will often support arguments with secondary sources. Law review articles are the most commonly cited, and their format under Bluebook Rule 16 is: author name, article title in italics, volume number, abbreviated journal name, first page, pinpoint page if applicable, and year.
Pamela Samuelson, Functionality and Expression in Computer Programs, 31 Berkeley Tech. L.J. 1215, 1258 (2016)
Journal names are always abbreviated according to the Bluebook’s tables, and issue numbers are never included even if the journal prints them. In academic format the journal name appears in small capitals; in practitioner format it stays in roman type.
Books and treatises follow a different pattern: author name, title (small caps in academic format), the section or page, edition number if not the first, and year. Restatements and model codes have their own compact formats in Bluebook Rule 12.9.1.
Introductory Signals
Signals are italicized words placed before a citation to tell the reader how the source relates to the point just made. Using them correctly is one of the marks of polished legal writing.
- No signal: the source directly states or supports the proposition. This is the default when you quote or closely paraphrase.
- See: the source clearly supports the proposition but does so indirectly, requiring an obvious inference.5Basic Legal Citation. Signals
- See also: the source provides additional support beyond citations you have already given. A parenthetical explanation is usually helpful because the connection is less direct.
- Cf.: the source supports the proposition by analogy, dealing with a different but comparable situation. A parenthetical explaining the analogy is almost always necessary.5Basic Legal Citation. Signals
- Contra: the source directly contradicts your proposition. Use this to acknowledge authority going the other way.
- E.g.: the cited source is one of several that could support the point. It can combine with other signals: see, e.g., means several sources indirectly support the proposition and you are citing one.
Signals are italicized when they begin a citation sentence but not when they act as the verb of a textual sentence. No comma separates a signal from the citation that follows, except for e.g., which always takes a comma before and after.
Short-Form Citations
Repeating the full citation every time you refer to a source would be unreadable. Short forms handle the repetition.
Id. (from idem, “the same”) refers to the immediately preceding citation. You can use it only when that preceding citation contains a single authority. If you cited two cases in the last sentence, id. is ambiguous and cannot be used. To point to a different page in the same source, add the new page: Id. at 687. The period in id. is italicized.6The Bluebook Online. 4.1 Id.
Supra refers back to a source cited earlier but not immediately preceding. It works for books, law review articles, legislative hearings, and similar materials. It does not work for cases, statutes, constitutions, or regulations. Those get other short forms: a shortened case name with volume and page (Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687), or just the code and section for statutes (29 U.S.C. § 2601).
Hereinafter lets you assign a short label to a source with a long or awkward name. On first citation, add a bracketed label: [hereinafter Smith Report]. After that, cite it as Smith Report, supra note 12, at 45. This is far more common in academic footnotes than in court filings.
Ordering Multiple Authorities
When you string citations together with semicolons, the Bluebook asks you to order them logically by type of authority, jurisdiction, and hierarchy. Constitutions come first, then statutes, then cases, then secondary sources. Within each category, higher courts outrank lower courts, and federal authority typically precedes state authority. The 22nd edition of the Bluebook loosened this somewhat, advising simply that authorities “should be ordered in a logical manner,” but following the traditional hierarchy is the safest approach and what most courts expect.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
A few errors show up often enough to flag. First, forgetting the year parenthetical on statute and regulation citations. The year tells the reader which edition of the code you consulted, and omitting it makes verification harder. Second, using id. when the preceding citation contains multiple authorities. Third, confusing the section symbol (§) with the paragraph symbol (¶); statutes and regulations take §, while sources organized by numbered paragraphs (some looseleaf services, vendor-neutral opinions) take ¶.
Fourth, ignoring local court rules. A perfectly Bluebooked citation is worthless if the court requires a different format. Check the court’s rules before drafting, not after. Most courts post their style preferences online, and a few minutes at the outset saves hours of reformatting later.