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Cases are often published in several reporters simultaneously. U.S. Supreme Court cases, for example, are published in U.S. Reports (U.S.), the official publisher of Supreme Court cases, as well as Supreme Court Reporter (S.Ct), U.S. Law Week (USLW), and Lawyer's Edition (L.Ed) and all of these sources might appear in the citation. No matter where you find it, the text of the opinion is always the same although some sources offer extra notes.

Usually, you only need to use the official reporter citation when citing a case in text or in a bibliography or works cited page. In the example below, it would be sufficient to cite the case as Campbell v. Acuff-Rose, Inc. 510 U.S. 569 (1994) the first time you use it and then as Campbell v. Acuff-Rose or Campbell in subsequent in-text references.

Now that cases are published on the Internet, you might come across recent opinions that don't have a full citation yet. You can use the docket number and decision date instead.

The reporter indicates the court that decided the case, since every court has its own reporter. Federal Court of Appeals cases are reported in Federal Reporter (F., F.2d, F.3d), federal District Court opinions are published in Federal Supplement (F. Supp.), Connecticut Supreme Court opinions are published in Connecticut Reports (Conn.), and so on. State opinions are also published in regional reporters, the equivalent of the commercial Supreme Court reporters. Connecticut decisions are included in the Atlantic Reporter and Connecticut Reporter. For lists of abbreviations, see the sites listed at the bottom of this page.

The following examples illustrate citations for three cases:

The case Campbell v. Acuff-Rose, Inc. was decided in 1994. The case is published in volume 510 of U.S. Reports beginning on page 569. The case is also published in volume 114 of Supreme Court Reporter beginning on page 1164, and in Lawyer's Edition Second Series beginning on page 500. The case Warner Bros. v. ABC was decided in 1983 by the Court of Appeals and is published in volume 720 of the Federal Reporter Second Series beginning on page 231. The case McConnell v. Beverly was decided in 1989 by the Connecticut Supreme Court and was published in volume 209 of Connecticut Reports beginning on page 692. It was also published in volume 553 of Atlantic Reporter Second Series beginning on page 596. Note the 2d in A. 2d, F.2d and L.Ed.2d. Reporter sets often have more than one series, and volume numbers repeat: 47 F. 335 is not the same as 47 F.2d 335 or 47 F.3d 335.

How do you know what reporter the abbreviation stands for?

The sources below list most of the standard abbreviations for reporters:

Susan Clerc
Reference Librarian