How to Cite Legal Sources in Bluebook (Cases, Statutes, and Briefs)

How to Cite Legal Authority in Bluebook: Quick Answer

Open Table 1, copy the preferred reporter or code, and add a pincite for any quotation or holding. In a memo or brief, italicize the case name. In a law-review footnote, leave a full case name roman. If later history changes the force of the opinion, attach it. The 22nd edition's introduction, as the University of Washington Law Library reprints it, is the test every example below is built to meet.

The first sentence is Georgetown Law Library's About the Bluebook definition (opened 16 September 2026). The second is the Bluepages purpose Georgetown quotes from page 1 of the book. The third is the 22nd-edition introduction as UW reprints it. The fourth is Georgetown's citing-cases typeface rule. The fifth is Georgetown's reporter definition on that same page. The sixth is Harvard Law Library's retrieval test. For one reported opinion written four classroom ways, use How to Cite Legal Cases. For a single Bluebook case, use How to Cite a Court Case in Bluebook.

Georgetown's About page still prints that 20th-edition sentence, and it still says the book has "twenty-one rules." The 22nd edition (May 2025) added Rule 22 (Tribal Nations) and Rule 23 (archival sources). Harvard's Bluebook guide now lists the 22nd edition, 2025, but its own page-number references are still 21st-edition leftovers. Use both libraries for examples and wording. Do not copy their leftover edition counts or page maps into a 2026 paper.

What This Guide Is For

Use this page when you need a system: which book to open, which reporter Table 1 prefers, how a pincite differs from a first-page cite, when a state case takes a regional reporter instead of the official state reports, when to cite a session law instead of the code, and how a signal changes the claim. It is written for 1L legal-writing courses, journal candidates, and anyone moving from APA or MLA into court documents.

It is not a substitute for the book, and it is not the multi-style case page. Classroom APA, MLA, and Chicago case forms live on How to Cite Legal Cases. The style landing page is Bluebook.

Why Legal Citation Is a Hierarchy, Not a Bibliography

APA and MLA lists tell a reader where a source lives. A Bluebook citation also tells the reader what the source is worth. Georgetown's Supreme Court teaching cite, Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), is a cite to the Supreme Court of the United States. Georgetown's published circuit example, Universal City Studios, Inc. v. Corley, 273 F.3d 429 (2d Cir. 2001), is a published federal court of appeals opinion. Georgetown's district example, City of Millville v. Rock, 683 F. Supp. 2d 319 (D.N.J. 2010), binds almost no one outside that district. Same grammar; different weight.

That is why legal writers cite as they go, in footnotes or citation sentences, rather than collecting a reference list at the end. The reader of a brief or a law-review note needs to know, in the same sentence as the claim, whether the support is a statute, a majority opinion, a dissent, or a restatement. Missing a subsequent-history flag (overruled by, aff'd, rev'd, cert. denied) is not a formatting slip. It can misstate the law.

ABA Model Rule 3.3 (Candor Toward the Tribunal) is the professional-duty reason the form matters: a lawyer who knows of directly adverse controlling authority in the same jurisdiction must disclose it. Citation form is how that duty appears on the page.

The Bluebook in 2026: 22nd Edition

The Bluebook is compiled by the law reviews of Columbia, Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, and Yale, and published by the Harvard Law Review Association. The 22nd edition, released at the end of May 2025, is the first wholesale revision in more than a decade. Harvard Law Library and Northwestern Pritzker both list that 22nd edition (2025) as current. If a syllabus, a journal, or a court still says "21st edition," follow that instruction. If it does not, use the 22nd. Buy or subscribe at legalbluebook.com.

The book has three working parts. The Bluepages at the front are the practitioner rules for memos, motions, and briefs. Georgetown quotes their purpose on page 1: they "provide easy-to-comprehend guidance for . . . everyday citation needs." The Whitepages in the middle are the full academic rules for law-review footnotes. The Tables at the back (and, for foreign jurisdictions, online) supply reporter abbreviations, court names, and preferred sources. UC Davis Mabie Law Library also notes the finding aids: Quick Reference inside the front cover (law-review footnotes), Quick Reference inside the back cover (court documents), plus the index. Harvard adds the same map and now lists Tribal Nations and Archival Sources as their own Whitepages headings.

What Changed in the 22nd Edition

The University of Washington Law Library's 22nd-edition notes and UC Davis's summary agree on the changes that affect everyday student work:

• Rule 1.2 adds the signal contrast, used when an opposing authority helps by difference rather than by comparison.
• Rule 18 was rewritten for digital sources and now covers AI-generated content. Web-based Whitepages examples expect an archived copy (often Perma.cc) as it existed when cited.
• Rule 22 is the first full system for citing materials of Tribal Nations; Table T1.5 lists federally recognized tribes and is freely available online.
• Rule 23 adds structured forms for archival and historical sources.
• Typeface language changed: the book now says "small capitals," not "large and small capitals."
• Bluepages B5.3 allows a "(citation modified)" parenthetical for cleaned-up quotations.
• Rule 12.4(f) lets writers omit some codification detail when the context already identifies the current official code.
• New Bluepages B22 and B23 cover tribal and archival sources in practitioner documents.

None of those updates replaces local court rules. Bluepages Table BT2 still collects jurisdiction-specific citation manuals. If a filing is going to a state appellate court that publishes its own style guide, that guide wins. Georgetown About still calls that table "Table 2 in the Bluepages"; the current book labels the practitioner jurisdiction table BT2.

How to Read a Case Citation

Rule 10 (Bluepages B10) is the case rule. A published case cite is a map through a reporter: a chronological set of opinions. The Library of Congress states the usual elements as party names, volume, reporter abbreviation, first page, and a parenthetical for court and year. Georgetown's federal-courts page is the clearest public walkthrough of those slots.

Georgetown's teaching example for a Supreme Court pinpoint is exactly that Roe cite: volume 410 of the United States Reports, the opinion beginning at page 113, the referenced passage at page 164, decided in 1973. No court name appears in the parenthetical because Table 1 makes U.S. enough to identify the Supreme Court.

Official Reporter First

If a case is in the official reporter, cite that reporter. For the Supreme Court, that is the United States Reports (U.S.). Unofficial reporters — S. Ct. (West's Supreme Court Reporter) and L. Ed. / L. Ed. 2d (Lawyers' Edition) — are fallbacks while the official volume is still being paginated. Georgetown's older teaching pair for Riley v. California shows the fallback. Once the bound U.S. volume exists, switch. University of South Carolina (the Spring 2027 LRAW guide, opened 16 September 2026) still prints a later S. Ct. teaching cite the same way.

Federal courts of appeals and district courts have no official government reporter. Table 1 therefore sends you to West's Federal Reporter (F., F.2d, F.3d, now F.4th) and Federal Supplement (F. Supp., F. Supp. 2d, F. Supp. 3d). USC also notes Federal Appendix (F. App'x) for some unpublished federal opinions that did get a West reporter page.

Those first two cites do extra work. 2d Cir. is required because F.3d is a national reporter. D.N.J. is required because F. Supp. 2d is also national. Omit the court only when the reporter itself names it, as U.S. does for the Supreme Court. The Library of Congress uses Ticketmaster to walk the same slots: volume 655 of F.3d, first page 1013, Ninth Circuit, 2011.

USC's spacing lesson is the one students lose marks on. Rule 6.1(a) treats ordinals such as 2d and 3d as single capitals, so there is no space in F.3d. There is a space in F. Supp. 2d and in S. Ct. Adjacent single capitals take no space (U.S., D.S.C.). A capital plus a longer abbreviation does (D. Mass., E.D. Va.). Rule 6.2(b) forbids superscripting the th in 4th Cir.

State Cases, Regional Reporters, and Parallel Citations

State opinions are the place first-year writers most often copy the wrong reporter. Georgetown's state-courts page is the free walkthrough of Rule 10.3.1: Bluebook generally prefers the unofficial regional reporter, not the official state reports. Cite the official reporter as well only when a court rule demands a parallel citation.

Georgetown's teaching case is a 2000 Nebraska Supreme Court opinion. The parenthetical is only Neb. because Rule 10.4(b) drops the court name when you are citing the state's highest court. N.W.2d is the regional reporter; Neb. as a reporter abbreviation is the official Nebraska Reports. Do not invent a parallel cite to look complete. If the court you are filing in does not require both, the Bluebook default is the regional cite alone.

Case Western Reserve prints that regional map next to a published Second Circuit illustration: United States v. Prince Line, Ltd., 189 F.2d 386, 388 (2d Cir. 1951). California students still have to keep the court names straight: Cal. App. 4th / Cal. App. 5th is the Court of Appeal; Cal. 3d / Cal. 4th / Cal. 5th is the Supreme Court.

Subsequent History

Rule 10.7 requires later history that changes the opinion's force. Case Western Reserve prints the Roe teaching pair every 2026 writer still needs. University of South Carolina adds a reversal that students actually meet in a whistleblower statute:

Other common history phrases: aff'd, cert. denied, abrogated by, superseded by statute. Do not invent a later history to make a sentence look complete. If KeyCite or Shepard's shows none, omit the clause. USC also prints the later Supreme Court opinion standing alone: Lawson v. FMR LLC, 571 U.S. 429 (2014). One earlier line on that USC page drops the comma after rev'd; copy the comma form the same page prints in the subsequent-history section.

Short Forms and Id.

After a full citation, Rule 10.9 (academic) and B10.2 (practitioner) allow a short form. Use the first party's name unless that party is a geographic unit or the United States, in which case use the second party. USC's Roe pair is the set editors expect. Georgetown's short-forms page walks the same rule with Corley at page 435.

Id. is available only when the immediately preceding citation is the same authority (and, in law-review footnotes, usually the same footnote). If another source sits in between, return to the named short form. Never write a short form that could name two cases. Georgetown also accepts 273 F.3d at 435 when the volume-reporter string can only mean Corley.

Unpublished Opinions (Rule 10.8.1)

Most opinions are never printed in a reporter. Georgetown's unpublished-opinions page is the free walkthrough of Rule 10.8.1(a): case name, docket number, database identifier, court, and the full date (month, day, year). Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 32.1 lets parties cite unpublished federal opinions issued on or after 1 January 2007; local rules still control older ones. USC restates that 2007 cutoff on its Spring 2027 LRAW page.

Copy the docket number and the WL or LEXIS identifier from the record in front of you. Do not invent a Westlaw number. If the opinion later appears in F.3d or F. Supp., switch to the reporter and drop the database cite. USC prints hypothetical Lawson LEXIS/WL strings labeled "it might look like this"; those numbers are teaching shapes, not records to copy.

Statutes (Rule 12)

Cite a statute currently in force to the current official code when that code exists. For federal law that is the United States Code (U.S.C.). Georgetown's federal-statutes page uses the fair-use statute as the teaching example. Unofficial annotated codes (U.S.C.A., U.S.C.S.) are for when the official code is not yet current or when you are citing a database's currency statement under Rule 12.5. Georgetown's statutes-online page is the live Rule 12.5 walkthrough.

Copy the Westlaw or Lexis currency line from the screen in front of you; do not reuse the 2015 / 2016 / P.L. 115-72 dates unless that is the compilation you actually opened. The 22nd edition's Rule 12.4(f) lets you drop some codification clutter when the sentence already makes the current official code obvious. Keep the year when you are citing a historical version, a supplement, or a commercial database's "through Public Law …" statement. Georgetown also prints two teaching templates for a supplement (Supp. I 2014) and immediately says § 107 was not actually amended that way — treat those lines as shapes, not as a 2014 fair-use cite.

Session Laws When the Code Is the Wrong Text

Cite the session law when you need the act as Congress passed it, a section that is not yet in the official code, or a historical version the current U.S.C. no longer prints. The U.S. Copyright Office states the official public-law line for the 1976 Act. Harvard Law Library's statutes guide walks the same slots with Dodd-Frank.

Harvard's Dodd-Frank line is the session-law anatomy first-year writers need: popular name, public-law number, pincite inside the act (§ 929-Z), Statutes at Large volume and first page (124 Stat. 1376), page of the cited section (1871), year, and a codification parenthetical. Georgetown's federal-statutes page currently mistypes the Copyright Act as Pub. L. No. 94-533. The official number, on the Copyright Office title-17 page and on the enrolled Public Law 94-553, is 94-553. Copy the official line, not the libguide typo.

Constitutions (Rule 11)

Constitutional citations are short on purpose. Abbreviate the constitution, then the subdivision. U.S. article and amendment numbers are roman. Do not add a year to a provision still in force. Georgetown's other-resources page uses the two-Senators clause as the official illustration.

Article I, Section 3, Clause 1 is the clause that gives each state two Senators. If you are citing a repealed provision, add a parenthetical such as (repealed 1933) — and only when the provision is actually dead. State constitutions follow the same pattern with the Table 10 state abbreviation: Cal. Const. art. I, § 7 is the form, not a URL to a commercial reprint.

Regulations and Court Rules (Rule 14 and Rule 12.9)

Federal regulations currently in force are cited to the Code of Federal Regulations. The annual edition year belongs in the parenthetical. Georgetown's teaching regulation is the National Park Service pet rule. Court rules of procedure and evidence have their own compact forms; they do not take a year unless you are citing a historical version.

36 C.F.R. § 2.15 is the National Park Service regulation on pets. Copy the C.F.R. edition year from the volume or e-CFR compilation you used; Georgetown's 2017 is a teaching date, not a command to keep citing 2017 forever. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56 is summary judgment. Federal Rule of Evidence 401 is relevance. If a professor asks for "the rule," this is the form — not a URL to a commercial reprint.

Secondary Authority: Books, Law Reviews, and the Record

Primary authority is what a court must or may follow: constitutions, statutes, regulations, and cases. Secondary authority explains or restates that law. Cite it when it helps, and never dress it up as a holding. Georgetown's citing-other page prints a treatise and a journal article that first-year writers can reuse.

Wright & Miller is a multivolume treatise: volume 9C, section 2552, third edition, 2008. Burk and Cohen is the standard illustration of a consecutively paginated journal cite: authors, italic title, volume, Table 13 periodical abbreviation, first page, year. The Dames deposition is Georgetown's record-cite example for a fact in a brief. Writing at before the page is generally not required in trial-level record cites; appellate records often do use at (B17.1.2). Georgetown also points first-year writers to Rule 15.8 for Black's Law Dictionary and the legal encyclopedias; copy the edition you opened, not a remembered year.

Signals, Typeface, and the Sentence Around the Cite

A citation sentence starts with a capital and ends with a period. A citation clause sits inside a textual sentence and takes commas. Introductory signals (Rule 1.2) tell the reader how the authority supports the sentence. Using no signal means the cited authority directly states the proposition. That is a stronger claim than see.

Typeface is the other half of the same problem. In practitioner documents (Bluepages), case names in citation sentences are italicized or underlined; id. and signals are italicized. In law-review footnotes (Whitepages), full case names in citations are generally roman, journal titles take small capitals, and signals stay italic. Georgetown's warning is the one students miss: do not italicize a full case name in a Whitepages footnote just because Word's default looks "legal."

Internet Sources, Archives, and AI (Rule 18)

Print or official electronic versions still beat a random URL. When you must cite the web, the 22nd edition wants the reader to see the page as you saw it. UW Law Library notes that Whitepages web examples now incorporate Rule 18.2.1's archive requirement: preserve the page with a tool such as Perma.cc, or keep a copy on file with the author or the journal.

Rule 18's AI provisions are for generated output you are actually discussing, not for a chatbot that helped you outline. If the paper is about the output, cite the tool and the date. If the paper is about a case the tool mentioned, cite the case — and open the reporter. For academic (non-Bluebook) AI forms, see How to Cite AI.

Update Before You File: Shepard's, KeyCite, and Free Citators

A perfectly formatted cite to bad law is still wrong. Before a brief, a journal cite-check, or a seminar paper that states the holding, run the authority through a citator.

• KeyCite on Westlaw flags history and citing references.
• Shepard's on Lexis does the same in Shepard's language (questioned, criticized, overruled).
• [Google Scholar](https://scholar.google.com/) case law is free and shows a "How cited" trail, but it is not a substitute for a professional citator on a filing.
• [CourtListener](https://www.courtlistener.com/) (Free Law Project) is the best free full-text starting point and links into PACER.

Look for negative direct history first (reversed, overruled, vacated). Then scan citing cases in your jurisdiction. A Seventh Circuit opinion that distinguishes Corley does not erase Corley; it may still keep you from overstating the holding.

Court Rules Beat The Bluebook

The Bluebook is the default in law-school writing and in most federal practice. It is not always the document the clerk will apply. Check the local rules of the court you are filing in, and check Bluepages Table BT2 for a jurisdiction's own citation manual. Some state appellate courts want public-domain cites (year, court identifier, and opinion number) in addition to or instead of a reporter page. Some trial courts still want underlining rather than italics because they print in black and white.

ALWD's Guide to Legal Citation is the other teaching book. A number of legal-writing programs assign it instead of The Bluebook. The two systems agree on the reporter map and disagree on some abbreviations and typeface defaults. If your syllabus says ALWD, do not "fix" the paper into Bluebook form the night before it is due. The University of Chicago Manual of Legal Citation (the Maroonbook) is a third, simpler system used at Chicago. Harvard also points students who are "over it" to the free Indigo Book — a Creative Commons implementation, not a substitute when a journal or court requires The Bluebook.

Outside the United States, do not force Bluebook onto a UK, Australian, or Canadian assignment. Use OSCOLA for UK law schools, AGLC for Australian law schools, and see OSCOLA vs Bluebook or Bluebook vs AGLC when a comparative paper has to declare a house style. Field context lives on Law & Legal Studies citation styles.

A First-Year Citation Workflow

Harvard Law Library reduces first-pass Bluebooking to six steps: identify the source type, find the rule, read the examples, gather the components, draft, then edit against the tables. The checklist below is that process written for a memo.

Common Mistakes

• *Citing S. Ct. after the U.S. volume exists. Table 1 prefers United States Reports. Georgetown's Riley* pair is the fallback, not the permanent form.
• *Dropping the court from an F.3d or F. Supp. cite. Those reporters are national. Corley needs 2d Cir.; Millville needs D.N.J.*
• Citing the official state reports as if Bluebook preferred them. Georgetown's Beachy default is 609 N.W.2d 648 (Neb. 2000). Add 299 Neb. 299 only when a court rule wants a parallel cite.
• Calling a California Court of Appeal opinion a "state supreme court" cite. Cal. App. 4th / Cal. App. 5th is the Court of Appeal; Cal. 3d / Cal. 4th / Cal. 5th is the Supreme Court.
• *Superscripting 4th or putting a space in F.3d. USC's Rule 6 lesson: 777 F.3d 658 (4th Cir. 2015); 520 F. Supp. 2d 733 (D.S.C. 2007); 724 F. Supp. 2d 167 (D. Mass. 2010)*.
• Skipping the pincite on a quotation. Rule 3.2 requires the page you used. Georgetown's Roe teaching cite is 410 U.S. 113, 164.
• *Writing see on a case that states the rule.* No signal is the stronger, and usually the correct, choice.
• *Leaving Roe without Dobbs.* Subsequent history that overrules is not optional color.
• Inventing a Westlaw number. If the opinion is unpublished, take the docket number and the WL cite from the database record in front of you, the way Georgetown does with Bennett.
• *Copying Georgetown's Pub. L. No. 94-533. The Copyright Act of 1976 is Pub. L. No. 94-553, 90 Stat. 2541*. The libguide is one digit off.
• Reusing Georgetown's 2012 / 2015 / 2017 code years as if they were current. Copy the year from the volume or the database currency statement you actually opened.
• Copying leftover edition counts from teaching pages. Georgetown About still says 20th edition; Harvard still maps 21st-edition page numbers. The book in 2026 is the 22nd.
• Translating case names or reporter abbreviations in a non-English paper that is still citing U.S. authority. The reporter cite stays in English.
• Trusting a generator for signals and history. Software can assemble 410 U.S. 113. It cannot tell you whether the case is still good law.

Authoritative Resources

• [The Bluebook Online](https://www.legalbluebook.com/): official text, Quick Style Guide, and T1.5.
• [Georgetown Law Library Bluebook Guide](https://guides.ll.georgetown.edu/bluebook): the best free Rule 10 and Rule 12 walkthrough, including the Corley, Millville, Riley, Bennett, Beachy, and § 107 examples used above. Its About page is still labeled 20th edition.
• [UW Law Library, Bluebook 101 — 22nd edition](https://lib.law.uw.edu/bluebook101/22nd): edition-change notes aligned with the 2025 text.
• [Harvard Law Library, Bluebook Legal Citation System Guide](https://guides.library.harvard.edu/law/bluebook): 22nd edition (2025) listing, six-step workflow, and leftover 21st-edition page numbers.
• [Harvard Law Library, Find Statutes by Subject](https://guides.library.harvard.edu/c.php?g=310451&p=2072058): Dodd-Frank session-law anatomy.
• [UC Davis Mabie Law Library Bluebook guide](https://libguides.law.ucdavis.edu/bluebook): structure of the book plus 22nd-edition table changes.
• [University of South Carolina, Citing Federal Cases](https://guides.law.sc.edu/LRAWSpring/LRAW/citingfedcases): Lawson reversal, Roe short forms, spacing, and unpublished LEXIS/WL patterns.
• [Case Western Reserve, Cases](https://lawresearchguides.cwru.edu/c.php?g=825981&p=5896885): Roe overruled-by Dobbs teaching pair and the regional-reporter map.
• [U.S. Copyright Office, Copyright Law of the United States](https://www.copyright.gov/title17/): official Pub. L. No. 94-553, 90 Stat. 2541 line.
• [Library of Congress, case-law citations](https://guides.loc.gov/case-law/citations): reporter anatomy, including the Ticketmaster illustration.
• [Peter W. Martin, Introduction to Basic Legal Citation](https://www.law.cornell.edu/citation/) (Cornell LII): free tutorial indexed to Bluebook and ALWD.
• [CourtListener](https://www.courtlistener.com/) and [Google Scholar Case Law](https://scholar.google.com/): free retrieval, then verify in a reporter or official slip opinion.
• ALWD Guide to Legal Citation and Garner's The Redbook: teaching alternatives for form and for prose.

Related Guides and Style Pages

• How to Cite Legal Cases and Court Documents (APA, MLA, Chicago, Bluebook)
• How to Cite a Court Case in Bluebook
• How to Cite a Government Document in Bluebook
• Bluebook style overview
• APA vs Bluebook
• OSCOLA vs Bluebook
• Law and legal studies citation styles
• How to Cite AI