October 2nd, 2007
AltLaw offers a legal research alternative for federal courts
AltLaw, a free legal database created by Prof. Tim Wu of Columbia Law School, has officially launched, Ars Technica reports. Ars describes the service:
The database currently provides full-text search of Supreme Court and Federal Appellate opinions from the last decade or so. It also allows for easy downloading of decisions in PDF format or plain text. The goal is to make US case law at the highest levels easily available to citizens without requiring them to subscribe to specialized legal databases or learn the sometimes arcane art of navigating the various appellate court web sites.
If the site means to offer a public-domain alternative to the serious (expensive) legal research services LexisNexis and Westlaw, it will have to grow beyond 10 years of decisions. Assuming the database can be extended to cover most modern Supreme Court cases, back at least to the Warren Court, although really coverage back to the New Deal would be preferable, the site has some good potential to offer a reasonable alternative to Lexis and Westlaw.
For example, a search for the 2006 Supreme Court case of Panetti v Quarterman brings up a reverse chronological list of cases referencing that case. Switching to the relevance option brings up the actual case as the top hit. The legal services offer much more, of course, like a Table of Authorities view and “Sheperdizing” — checking whether citing cases are still good law.
But given how expensive the services are, Wu’s free service might help out solo practitioners and the public.
