Best Guide to
Canadian Legal Research
Copyright © 1995-2008
Catherine P. Best
Conditions and terms of use
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Best Guide to
Canadian Legal Research
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IntroductionThe Canadian Legal Information Institute, or CanLII, was created to enable free access to authoritative versions of Canadian case law and statutes on the Internet through a uniform search interface. CanLII is a non-profit corporation funded by all of the law societies across Canada, and is being developed and operated by the LexUM team at the Université de Montréal. CanLII's goal is to publish a comprehensive collection of Canadian case law dating from January 2000, as well as earlier material made available by the courts. CanLII publishes statutes and regulations from all Canadian jurisdictions except British Columbia. CanLII is also publishing rulings of some tribunals.
Scope of coverageThe databases on CanLII and their date range are listed in the Scope of Coverage link on the CanLII home page.
Search optionsHome page searchThe CanLII home page contains a search box that allows full text key word searches (line 1) and also allows searches by name or citation (line 2).
The home page search is run on all of the content in the CanLII collection unless you de-select collection types or restrict the date range. Jurisdiction searchYou can restrict your search by jurisdiction, by clicking on the name of a jurisdiction from the list on the left of the home page. From there, you can search all databases for that jurisdiction or restrict your search to individual databases within that jurisdiction. The page for each jurisdiction contains external links for legal information relevant to that jurisdiction. The page for individual courts displays lists of recently added cases as well as links to practice directions and rules of court. Advanced searchThe Advanced Search template appears when you click on Advanced Search at the bottom left of the home page. In addition to the search features described above, the Advanced search template allows you to
For a summary of CanLII search syntax as compared to other research tools, see Search Syntax for Canadian Legal Databases and Search Syntax for Internet Legal Sites.
Search results, refining your search and viewing documentsThe search results are ranked by relevance, but can be re-sorted by date or by citation frequency. Cases are listed with computer-generated keywords to assist in quickly determining their relevance. The search results page allows you to refine your search by
When viewing a document, the highlight tool allows you to specify which terms you want to locate. The document can be viewed and printed in HTML or PDF format. Neutral citations and parallel citations are included to allow proper citation to reported cases.
LegislationStatutes collections include tables listing statutes by name with links to associated regulations. Earlier versions of the legislation are included and can be searched if desired. Searches can be carried out
The federal statutes and regulations are searchable by section and permit printing by section or by whole Act. Provincial collections are searchable only by whole Act, but you can print selected portions using the features of your web browser.
Hyperlinks, Noteup and RefLexThe RefLex project on CanLII has enhanced the ability to create links between documents and has also enabled the addition of parallel citations to cases. RefLex results showing cases that have judicially considered a particular case can be refined further using the options in the Advanced Search template. The Noteup feature is dependent on hyperlinks, and only lists documents for which hyperlinks have been added.
RSS feedsA link entitled RSS Feeds at the bottom of each page allows you to subscribe to receive all judgments released by a particular court or tribunal. |
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