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Federalism is alive and well! Several recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions have reinforced the constitutionally mandated division of power between national and state government. This has increased the need to compare state laws' differences, and to assist you with your research, there are many sources of 50-State surveys, both statutory and regulatory, that may be used as a starting point.
In the Westlaw search bar, begin typing 50 State and autofill will lead you to suggested Content Pages (usually near the bottom).
Existing surveys may or may not meet your research needs.
Begin with a broad topic, such as EMPLOYMENT, then narrow to your subject matter, RANDOM TESTING OF EMPLOYEES.
While you can download the survey, you may consider linking to the survey instead, to keep the content current with KeyCite flag updating as various state laws change. Look for the Copy Link icon in the upper left.
The survey may not meet your exact research criteria, but it will provide you with the codification of existing state laws, which can be a huge timesaver.
From the State Statutes chart, follow the link(s) to the State(s) you need, then follow instructions to create a Jurisdictional Survey (below).
Consider reviewing more than one existing survey (Westlaw, Lexis, National Survey of State Laws, etc.) BEFORE you begin to create your own. Vendors respond to their client's needs and will create surveys to reflect their patron groups.
Additionally, when you cannot find an existing survey, your subject may be too narrow or may only be enacted in a few states.
If you need to contact Westlaw, reach out to their Government Customer Service team at statesupport@thomsonreuters.com.
The National Survey of State Laws, 9th edition (2022), by Nebraska College of Law Librarian Richard A. Leiter, provides an overall view of some of the most sought-after and controversial legal topics in the United States. It is available in print in the law library or a searchable, digital version is available through HeinOnline. Surveys are organized under these broad topics:
Find the most comprehensive and complete 50-state information in NCSL's 50-State searchable Bill Tracking Database. Select a topic from the list find complete bill information. The status of bills listed in these databases is updated every week. Search by subtopics, year, status (e.g., pending, enacted, to governor, etc.) or enter keywords to identify bills.
If your issue of interest is not listed, enter topic terms in the white search box at the upper right of any NCSL webpage for additional resources.
Subject Compilations of State Laws (1960-2018) features more than 26,000 bibliographic records from Cheryl Nyberg's Subject Compilations Bibliography Series. Records contain annotations linking directly to articles & other documents residing in HeinOnline or freely accessible web resources..
This resource serves primarily as a finding aid to other surveys. It is NOT a collection of surveys itself, but it will direct users to the source of a survey, often as a law review article, or other source.
Every survey has been assigned to one or more pre-defined subject headings. Selecting a subject heading will retrieve all surveys that have that subject heading.
NOTE: The older the survey, the greater the likelihood the law has changed and is no longer relevant and/or the statutes may still be in effect, but their citations/codification may have changed over the years.
The following example demonstrates this point.
The American Law Reports, often referred to simply as ALR, is a print resource available in the Law Library in Carson City. It is also available on Westlaw.
ALR annotations (or articles) are intended to be an exhaustive survey of laws across jurisdictions on a very narrow issue. The author of an annotation selects one representative case as the basis of the article, and then proceeds to provide citations to every other similar case in every jurisdiction within which there is a published judicial opinion.
Annotations are usually non-statutory in subject matter for state-law issues, but federal law annotations frequently focus on interpretations of federal statutes across federal jurisdictions.
If searching on Westlaw, make use of the advanced search option (after first limiting your search to ONLY American Law Reports). Specifically, search for your terms only in the title field as a first search. For example, if you were looking for an annotation covering other states' laws on covenants not to compete, you might enter a search such as:
ti(covenant /3 compete)
This query will search only the title of ALR annotations that contain the word compete within 3 words (either before or after) of covenant.
An act is designated as a “Model” Act if uniformity may be a desirable objective, though not a principal objective, and the act may promote uniformity and minimize diversity even though a significant number of jurisdictions may not adopt the act in its entirety, or the purposes of the act can be substantially achieved even though it is not adopted in its entirety by every state. For a list of Model Acts, please visit the Uniform Law Commission (formerly knows as NCCUSL).
The Uniform Laws Annotated (ULA) is published by Thomson Reuters/West. It is available in print in the Law Library as well as on Westlaw.
For more information, please visit the law library's guide on Uniform & Model Laws,.
To access the Lexis+ State Law Comparison Tool, begin by selecting Practical Guidance.
Then, follow these steps:
The following example compares California and Nevada Statute of Limitations for an Action based on Contract and When Does it Begin to Run?
Bloomberg Law offers hundreds of topics in their State Law Chart Builder. Begin by selecting Practitioner Tools, Chart Builders.
Then, select from a list of over 100 topics.
Here is an example of a Property Tax Chart comparing California and Nevada:
If a survey does not already exist, you can create your own survey, with a little help from Westlaw's Jurisdictional Surveys.
There are two ways to use this service:
1. When you have the citation or text of a statute in one state and want to find similar statutes in other states, click the icon that looks like a price tag.
2. Alternatively, you can initiate this type of search directly from the Westlaw Edge home page.
If you need to contact Westlaw, reach out to their Government Customer Service team at statesupport@thomsonreuters.com.