Where to Find It: Louisiana Law

On our new website designed to assist in your research, http://libguides.law.loyno.edu/, there is a guide specifically for finding Louisiana legal materials. Called “Where to Find It: Louisiana Law”, it’s a guide for finding Louisiana law and related materials, with preference given for Bluebook citation standards. There’s so many places to find information online that it can often be difficult to know what is reliable. This guide is designed to lead you to reliable sources, and also help alleviate some confusion that the Bluebook can cause.

You can visit the guide here, http://libguides.law.loyno.edu/findit_LA and then explore some of the other materials the LibGuides page has to offer.

Louisiana Constitutional Materials

Louisiana is on its tenth Constitution since 1812 and had a limited constitutional convention as recently as 1992. Those who vote in Louisiana are also aware that we amend the state constitution frequently. As of 2003 there were 111 amendments to the most recent 1974 Constitution, and there have been several amendment votes since that time. For a full listing, see Voting on Louisiana Proposed Constitutional Amendments 1978-2015, Public Affairs Research Council of Louisiana, http://www.parlouisiana.com/explore.cfm/conhistory/ (last visited Mar. 3, 3016).

Thanks to this long history, the Law Library has compiled a large selection of LA constitutional documents. We have copies of the majority of the constitutions, compilations that compare versions, delegate proposals, records for the constitutional conventions in 1921, 1973, and 1992, and more. The records of the conventions may include calendars, journals, and transcripts. Here you can see just of bit of what we have on the shelves.

Louisiana Legislative Session

The Louisiana Legislature will convene for the 2016 Regular Session on March 14, 2016 at noon. During March, we'll focus on publications related to LA legislation and have a post on compiling LA legislative history.

To learn about current bills and committee information, visit the Legislature's website at http://www.legis.la.gov/legis/home.aspx. From there, you can see bill text versions, committee agendas, watch committee meetings online, view votes, and find logistical session information.

The Legislature is scheduled to adjourn sine die by 6pm on June 6, 2016.