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Moritz College of Law
Cases on U.S. election law can be found at both the state and federal level. As with any case law research, be mindful of the appropriate jurisdiction.
Cases can be found in any number of places - Thomson Reuters Westlaw and Lexis Advance, of course, but also Bloomberg Law, Google Scholar, and any number of government and court websites. To locate those cases that are particular relevant to your research project, consider using the following tools:
Using terms and connectors or natural language searching can both be effective ways of finding cases, but Westlaw, Lexis Advance, and Bloomberg Law all use their own systems of headnotes and topics to classify cases by subject. These topic systems or outlines can be browsed to find all the cases dealing with that particular subject. The different topic systems vary in their level of detail, but all will allow you the option to further filter and sort the cases under a particular topic.
Elections (142T) is the topic heading that you would want to start with, although relevant cases may be found under other topics as well.
On the home page, you can use the Browse dropdown menu at the top to drill down from broader to narrower Topics. Under Constitutional Law, you will find Elections, Terms & Voting. Other topics may also be worth exploring for relevant cases.
On the Search Court Opinions screen, below the Select Topic bar, you can use the Browse Full List dropdown menu to see the topics. Clicking on a topic will add it to your search. Election & Politics would be a good topic to start with, but there may be relevant cases under other topics as well.
Several areas of election law are governed by statutes at the federal or state level. Official versions of these statutes can be accessed using the following:
Annotated codes contain the actual text of the statutes as well as supplemental content created and compiled by the publisher. This content includes Notes of Decision (Westlaw) and Citing Decisions (Lexis), cross-references, research references, and even some legislative history materials.
Some aspects of election law are governed by federal or state regulations. You can find and access regulations using the following:
The following federal statutes and regulations and state statutes govern several areas of election law.
Title 52 of the United States Code contains statutes concerning voting and elections. This Title contains the following federal Acts:
Federal regulations implementing the Voting Rights Act of 1965 can be found in the following Parts of Title 28 of the Code of Federal Regulations:
Title XXXV of the Ohio Revised Code contains statutes on election administration, voting requirements, and campaign finance. This Title includes the following Chapters, among others:
Secondary sources of law are useful for a variety of reasons, not least of which is providing citations to relevant primary sources. For example, many of the sources on the Books and Journals page of this guide can help you find cases.
