Law reports or reporters are series of books that contain judicial opinions from a selection of case law decided by courts. When a particular judicial opinion is referenced, the law report series in which the opinion is printed will determine the case citation format.
Historically, the term reporter was used to refer to the individual persons who actually compile, edit, and publish such opinions.[1] For example, the Reporter of Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States is the person authorized to publish the Court's cases in the bound volumes of the United States Reports. Today, in American English, reporter also denotes the books themselves.[2] In Commonwealth English, these are described by the plural term law reports, the title that usually appears on the covers of the periodical parts and the individual volumes.
In common law countries, court opinions are legally binding under the rule of stare decisis (precedent). That rule requires a court to apply a legal principle that was set forth earlier by a court of a superior (sometimes, the same) jurisdiction dealing with a similar set of facts. Thus, the regular publication of such opinions is important so that everyone—lawyers, judges, and laymen—can all find out what the law is, as declared by judges.
- ^ Friedman, Lawrence M. (2019). A History of American Law (4th ed.). New York: Simon & Schuster. pp. 308–310. ISBN 9780190070915. Retrieved 7 November 2020.
- ^ Putman, William H.; Albright, Jennifer R. (2014). Legal Research (3rd ed.). Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning. p. 138. ISBN 9781305147188. Retrieved 14 December 2020.