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In England, the selection of cases to be reported is made by the publishers of the reporters, not by the judges.

SOURCES

Current print sources - There are currently over 50 different series of law reports covering the courts of England and Wales: several general reporters and several topical. No law report is official, nor is any complete. In addition, cases may appear in multiple reporters. The main general print reporters include:

• All England Law Reports (and reprint) (KD288 .A6) (1558 - )
• Law Reports (KD284 .I53) (1865 - ) (Appeal Cases, Chancery Division, Queen's Bench Division, and Family Division).
• Weekly Law Reports (KD285 .L39) (1953 - )

Historical Print sources

• All England Law Report, Reprints (KD288 .A6) (1558- 1935, selective coverage).
• English Reports, Full Reprint (KD270 1220 E53 – Reading Room) (1200s - 1865).
• Revised Reports (RB R32 - LSF) (1200s - 1860s, selective coverage).
• Law Journal Reports (RB L38) (1822-1949)
• Law Times Reports (RB L44 - LSF) (1859-1947, merged with All England Law Reports)

Current Online Sources - available at Yale Law School

• BAILLI – Good coverage of cases from the late 1990s forward (more details here) and important cases from core areas from earlier dates
• Lexis- English case databases include: The Law Reports (Appeal Cases, Queen's Bench, Chancery, Probate and Family) (AC, QB or KB, Ch, P, Fam); All England Law Reports Reprints; (All ER Rep) from 1558 to 1935; All England Law Reports (All ER) from 1936; Law Times Reports (LT) from 1918 to 1965; Lloyd's Law Reports (Lloyd's Rep) from 1951, and some cases from the Weekly Law Reports and many topical reporters
• Westlaw- English case databases include: Law Reports (1865-to date); Lloyd's Law Reports (1919-to date); and, many other topical law reporters.

Historical online sources - available at Yale Law School

• Lexis (mainly All ER Rep - 1558-1935)
• Westlaw (mainly Law Reports from 1865)
• CommonLII (English Reports, Full Reprint, 1220-1873)
• Justis(English Reports, Full Reprint, 1220-1873)
• Hein Online(English Reports, Full Reprint, 1220-1873)

FINDING CASES

By citation

In print, go to the reporter. To identify and locate the reporter use MORRIS. Online you can use the Westlaw find command or the Lexis lexsee command. The Hein Online and Justis databases support citation searching as well.

When converting a case from a nominative citation to an English Reports citation, use the English Reports table. Hein Onlinesupports nominative citation searching,

By name

Online databases support various methods of name searching. The print tools have tables of cases.

By subject

The Digest (KD296 .E5 – Reading Room) - this tool summarizes 400,000 cases and organizes them topically. You can search for a case-by-case name or you can search for cases revolving around a particular topic. Please note that the Digest index can be difficult to use.

Halsbury’s Laws of England (KD310 .H34 – Reading Room) is the major English legal Encyclopedia. It covers all areas of English law and is a useful starting point for virtually any research project. Halsbury’s Laws includes a consolidated index. This index will refer you to a volume and paragraph number. Halsbury’s contains many citations to cases. The Digest and Halsbury’s cover the entire period of English case law.

Current Law Yearbooks (KD296 .C82 – Lower East Side) and cover English case law from 1947. This tool summarizes all cases, legislation, and other developments on a particular subject that occurs during a particular year. It also contains a topical list of journal articles and books at the back of the volume. There are occasional cumulative indexes for example, the 1976 volume indexes 1947 to 1976.

Later case citations.

Use the Current Law Case Citator (KD296 .C84 - Lower East Side) to find later cases interpreting your case. This tool covers cases decided from 1947 to date. To trace earlier cases, use The Digest, the Law Reports index and the index to the All England Law Reports.

LawCite (Alpha): international case citator. The LawCite database is generated on an entirely automatic basis with no editorial input and includes a fairly complete collection of all common law cases cited in the past decade plus most of the important uncited decisions before this. Please note that this is an Alpha version. It is still being built and refined and is being released for public comment only.