 | This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
 | This page in a nutshell: Some law sources may not be reliable. Others may be very complicated to use. |
 | The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with the United States and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. (December 2013) |
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Information about the law should be based on reliable, third-party published secondary sources.
Law sources such as books about laws and articles about laws in magazines and academic journals may be reliable sources. Whether a law source is reliable or not needs to be assessed separately for each source. Law sources that are written by authoritative experts in law, such as legal scholars, and published by respected independent publishing houses are normally reliable sources. General information about laws that is provided on websites for the general public or which appears in general interest magazines such as Reader's Digest is often written by non-lawyers, and editors will have to determine in each case if the source is reliable. This essay is based on U.S. law, both federal and non-federal. This applies whether the subject is the U.S. Constitution or a lower-level agency branch office manual that nonetheless has the force of law, or something in between.
For guidance on how to properly format legal sources, see Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Legal.