Secondary Sources
Law Review Articles
Law review articles address issues that are of current interest, argue for law reform, or analyze a problem from a new and usually high-level perspective. They are usually written by academics and directed to other academics, judges, and policy-makers.
Law review articles are helpful if
- You are researching a new or unsettled area of law
- You want to support a particular interpretation of the law OR
- You are making policy arguments
However, due to the academic/scholarly nature, law review articles would not be a good starting point for your research if you are just looking for a routine matter of state law (e.g. "what are the elements of battery in Nevada?")
(Law Reviews are mostly published by law schools. Boyd Law has two law journals: The Nevada Law Journal and The UNLV Gaming Law Journal)
Locating Law Review Articles
If you already know the article's citation, all you need to do is type the citation to retrieve the article. For example, you would like to access the following article: Nancy B. Rapoport, On Shared Governance, Missed Opportunities, and Student Protests, 17 NEV. L.J. 1 (2016). Simply type 17 Nev. L.J. 1 in the search box to access the article.
If you are searching for relevant articles, you may access Westlaw's law review databases and then try keyword searches. To access Westlaw's law review databases, select Secondary Sources and then Law Reviews & Journals.
Notes on Coverage:
- The online databases do not contain every single law review articles ever published. Click on the information icon to see the coverage for your publications.
- For example, if you click on the icon next to Akron Law Review (you will see the alphabetical list of law reviews after selecting Secondary Sources from the main page and then selecting Law Reviews & Journals), you will find that Westlaw provides selected coverage beginning with 1982 and full coverage beginning with 1993. This means Westlaw does not have any Akron Law Review article published before 1982.
- If you are looking for articles published within the last 20 years, coverage is not an issue since Westlaw/Lexis Advance/HeinOnline all contain recent law review articles. However, older articles (e.g. articles published in the 1950s) may not be available on Westlaw & Lexis Advance.
- Use HeinOnline to find older articles.
Like Westlaw, you can retrieve a law review article on Lexis Advance by typing its citation (e.g. 17 Nev. L. J. 1) in the search box.
If you are searching for law review articles, you may access Lexis Advance's law review databases and then try keyword searches. To access Lexis+ law review databases, select Law Reviews & Journals under Secondary Materials.
HeinOnline offers a database of law review articles in searchable PDF format. Like Westlaw and Lexis Advance, you can retrieve an article by typing its citation or run keyword searches. If you are on campus, go to HeinOnline.org to access HeinOnline. You are off campus, you need to access HeinOnline via My Boyd Law.
1. Click on "Login" to access HeinOnline.
2. If you have a citation, select the Citation tab above the search box and type your citation to access the article.
3. You can also search relevant articles by (1) selecting Law Journal Library and (2) typing your keywords in the search box. In addition, click on Advanced Search or Search Help for more sophisticated searches.
Since many law reviews provide open access, you can use Google and Google Scholar to search for articles. In addition, if you are on campus, your Google Scholar search results may provide links to HeinOnline.
