Law - Legal Citation Guide

General format:

Author, Title of the Book, edition (place of publication: publisher, year of publication) pinpoint reference if applicable.

Examples:

Bruce Ziff, Principles of Property Law, 5th ed (Toronto: Carswell, 2010) at 148-155.

HG Beale, ed, Chitty on Contracts: Specific Contracts, vol 2, 30th ed (London, UK: Sweet & Maxwell, 2008).

Note:  If a multi-volume work uses the same title for all volumes, treat the volume designation as a pinpoint (see below).

 

Author:

• Use the name on the title page of the book, including titles such as The Honourable, Professor, and Lord. Do not include academic degrees or other credentials, such as Q.C.
• Include any initials the author uses, but do not include periods (e.g., Stanley M Corbett). If there is more than one initial, do not leave spaces between them (e.g., JP Belliveau).
• If there are multiple authors, follow these examples:
  • two authors:  Janet Walker & Jean-Gabriel Castel
  • three authors:  Nancy McCormack, John Papadopoulos & Catherine Cotter
  • more than three authors:  Joost Blom et al

 

Editor:

• Example:  Michael Geist, ed, In the Public Interest: the Future of Canadian Copyright Law  (Toronto: Irwin Law, 2005).
• If there is more than one editor, follow the examples under Author above and use eds for editors.

 

Title:

• Include the full title. If there is a subtitle, use a colon between the title and subtitle as shown in the Geist example above under Editor.
• Capitalize the title according to the conventions of the language of the title, regardless of the capitalization used on the title page. For English language titles, capitalize the first letter of the first word; also capitalize the first letter of each additional word except for articles, conjunctions, and prepositions (e.g., a, the, and, or, in, around).

 

Edition:

• Use ed for edition.
• Abbreviate edition numbers as follows (which is different than the format used for law reporter series):  2nd ed, 3rd ed, 4th ed, 5th ed, etc. 
• Do not use superscripts. 
• If there is no edition statement, then 1st ed is assumed.

 

Place of Publication:

• Use the first place of publication listed on the title page or verso.
• Use the English spelling if it exists (e.g., Turin not Torino).
• Add the state/province/country if necessary to avoid confusion (e.g., London, Ont).

 

Publisher:

• Use the name on the title page.
• Omit the initial “The” if one is listed.
• Omit terms of corporate status (e.g., use Canada Law Book, not Canada Law Book Inc).
• Omit “Publishing” or “Publishers” unless an integral part of the name of the publisher.

 

Year of Publication:

Use the copyright date of the book unless a specific year of publication is given.

 

Pinpoint:

To refer the reader to a specific page or section, add a reference following the publication information.

Examples:

• at 214 (refers to page 214)
• at 214-18 (refers to pages 214 through 218)
• at 214, 218 (refers to pages 214 and 218)
• at 214, n 2 (refers to page 214, footnote 2)
• at 214, nn 2-5 (refers to page 214, footnotes 2 though 5)
• at para 32 (refers to paragraph 32)
• at paras 32-37 (refers to paragraphs 32 through 37)
• ch 5 at 83 (refers to chapter 5, page 83)
• vol 3 at 27 (refers to volume 3, page 27 of a multi-volume work published under one common title)

If a book is published in a loose-leaf format so that it can be updated, it is not fixed in time like a book that has been bound. It is important to let the reader know how current the book was when you consulted it. You will find the records of when the loose-leaf book was updated at either the front or back of the book. 

Example:

Mr Justice G Peter Fraser, John W Horn & The Honourable Madam Justice Susan A Griffin, The Conduct of Civil Litigation in British Columbia, 2nd ed (Markham, Ont: LexisNexis, 2007) (loose-leaf updated 2014, release 16) vol 2 at para 39.12.

Some books are not written by a single author or group of authors. Rather, an editor (or multiple editors) may compile a collection of essays around a common theme.

General format:

Author, “Title of Chapter” in Editor of Book, Title of the Book, edition (place of publication: publisher, year of publication) first page of essay and pinpoint reference if applicable.

Example:

Mark Perry, “Rights Management Information” in Michael Geist, ed, In the Public Interest: the Future of Canadian Copyright Law  (Toronto: Irwin Law, 2005) 251 at 254.

General format:

Author, “Title of Article” (year) volume:issue | Abbreviation of Journal | first page of the article | pinpoint if applicable.

Electronic format:

Some journals are published exclusively in electronic format. Follow this form:

Author, "Title of Article", online: (year) volume:issue | Abbreviation of Journal | first page or number of the article | pinpoint if applicable.

Examples:

• Lionel D Smith, “The Province of the Law of Restitution” (1992) 71:4 Can Bar Rev 672.
• Andrew J Reid & Julian V Roberts, "Revisiting the Conditional Sentence of Imprisonment after 20 Years: Is Community Custody Now an Endangered Species?" (2019) 24:1 Can Crim L Rev 1 at 3.
• Antonios Broumas, “Code, Access to Knowledge and the Law: the Governance of Knowledge in the Digital Age”, online: (2005) 5:1-2 U Ottawa L & Tech J 221 <http://www.uoltj.ca/>.

Author:

• See notes above in the Books section.

 

Title:

• See notes above in the Books section.

 

Year of Publication:

• Include the year the article was published.

 

Volume and Issue:

• Including the issue number for journals if there is one. Note that not all databases include issue numbers and thus you may need to consult another database to find it.
• Note that many older references to journals will include the volume number only. The use of the issue number was reserved for the few journals that restarted the page number with each issue, to make finding an article easier. Now, many journals are available online and are not bound together as a single volume and so including the issue number makes the article easier to find.

 

Journal Title:

• Abbreviate the full title of the journal.  See Journal Abbreviations.
• If you can’t find an abbreviation, write out the full title.

 

First Page of the Article:

• Note that if you are viewing an html version of an article, you may need to access the pdf version of the article to find the page numbers.  However, sometimes the first page number will be included in citation information provided near the beginning of the article.

 

Pinpoint:

• See notes above in the Books section.
• Note that if you are viewing an html version of an article, you may need to access the pdf version of the article to find the page numers.  If you can not access a version of the article that includes page numbers, use paragraph numbers instead if the article has paragraph numbers.  If neither page nor number paragraph numbers are available, you should refer to section numbers or letters in the article if they exist (e.g., at s 3).

A case comment is a special type of journal article. Often, a journal article will comment on a case, and perhaps compare and contrast a case with others, with no mention of the term "case comment." Cite these articles like other journal articles.

Sometimes, an article will actually indicate that it is a case comment. These articles may, or may not, have a title.  If the article indicates that it is a case comment, follow these citations rule:

General format:

Author, “Title if Applicable”, Case Comment on Case Name, (year) volume:issue | Abbreviation of Journal | first page of the article | pinpoint if applicable.

Note:  Do not include the case name if it is part of the article title.  Also do not include the term "Case Comment" if it is part of the article title.

Examples:

• Lionel Smith, “Public Justice and Private Justice: Restitution After Kingstreet”, Case Comment on Kingstreet Investments Ltd v New Brunswick (Department of Finance), (2008) 46 Can Bus LJ 11.
• Freda M Steel & Marta J Smith, “A Comment on the Application by LEAF for Intervenor Status in Klachefsky v Brown”, Case Comment, (1989) 4 Can Fam LQ 57.
• Emily Luther, "Case Comment on Cussan v Quan", (2009) 72:2 Sask L Rev 295 at para 21.

Dictionaries are not normally cited, but are used as one begins research to learn the meaning of words and phrases, and to develop a research vocabulary. After the bibliographic information, introduce the word or phrase with sub verbo, which means "under the word." See the following examples.

Commonly Used Dictionaries:

Black’s Law Dictionary, 5th ed, sub verbo “restitution."

Canadian Online Legal Dictionary, sub verbo "Curative provisor," accessed July 11, 2014 <http://www.irwinlaw.com/cold>.

The Dictionary of Canadian Law, 4th ed, sub verbo “estoppel."

The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed, sub verbo “domicile."

 

Specialized Dictionaries:

Walter Goode, Dictionary of Trade Policy Terms, 4th ed (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) sub verbo “re-exports."

Legal encyclopedias are not normally cited, but are used as one begins research to learn about a legal issue and find references to primary sources of law. Examples for the print and electronic versions of the two Canadian encyclopedias follow.

Canadian Encyclopedic Digest (CED):

The CED is currently in its 4th edition (shorten to 4th).  The loose-leaf set of the CED is published in two versions - Ontario (Ont) and Western (West). There is an alphabetical arrangement of subjects (known as "titles"). The online version, available via WestlawNext Canada, sometimes refers to the Ontario or Western versions; include this information in your citation if it is provided.

Examples:

Print:  CED (West 4th), vol 49, title 139 at para 460.  This citation refers to paragraph 460 under the subject Restitution (title 139), which is found in volume 49 of the set. 

Online:  CED 4th, Remedies 6.3.f at para 460. 

 

Halsbury’s Laws of Canada:

Halsbury's is currently in its 1st edition but reissues volumes periodically. It is important to include this information in your citation because it is similar to an edition statement. Halsbury's uses an alphabetical arrangement with no volume numbers. Note that in the print version and online version, available via Lexis Advance Quicklaw, a shortened designation for subjects is used. For example, HLP stands for Halsbury's Legal Profession. 

Example:

Print or Online:  Halsbury’s Laws of Canada, Legal Profession (2013 reissue) at para 228. 

In this example, it is not necessary to include the designation HLP-228 because all of infomation is provided in the citation, and it is too cryptic for anyone unfamiliar with Halsbury's.