Tutorial Index

• Introduction
• Treaty Research
• Finding  U.S. Treaties
• Finding Non- U.S. Treaties
• UN Research
• Specialized Agencies
  of the U.N.
• Finding U.N. Documents
• E. U. Research
• European Union Institutions
• Finding European Union Documents
• Foreign & Private
  International Law Research

 

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International and Foreign Law Tutorial

FINDING EUROPEAN UNION DOCUMENTS

EU law is generally divided into two categories. Primary law consists of the Treaties Establishing the Communities (see About EU Law: Process and Players for more information), the agreements amending or supplementing the treaties, and the Treaty on European Union. Secondary legislation comprises the binding legislative acts taken by the institutions of the EU and includes:

• Regulations, issued by the European Commission, which have general application, are binding in their entirety, and are directly applicable in all member states.
• Directives, issued by the Council of Ministers, which are binding upon each member state as to the result to be achieved, but leave to each national authority the choice of form and method.
• Legislative Decisions, issued by the Council of Ministers (and not to be confused with court decisions), which are binding in their entirety only upon those parties to whom they are addressed.

Council Directives and Decisions and Commission Regulations are published in the Official Journal of the European Communities. The Official Journal is divided into two parts: Legislation and Information and Notices. The Legislation section contains the directives, decisions and regulations. Citations take the following forms:

• Directives - 1990 O.J. (L 266) 1.
• Decisions - 1990 O.J. (L 319) 1.
• Regulations - 1990 O.J. (L 264) 1.

The Information and Notices section contains the various miscellaneous documents generated by the Commission and the Council, such as Declarations and Resolutions, which are used when a political, but not a legislative, consensus is reached, and Notes, Opinions (not to be confused with Case Opinions from the Court of Justice), and Policy Statements, which are used to interpret national or EU law. Each month, the EU publishes an index to the Official Journal; the index cumulates annually. The Official Journal can be found in the Library at JN 15.A3 (Legislation) and JN 15.O36 (Information and Notices).

In addition, the EUR-Lex page on the EU's Web site gives you access to: the Official Journal of the European Community; an index of "Community Legislation in Force," which tells you where to look in the Official Journal for laws on a particular subject; and "Consolidated Texts," which is similar to a codification in that the original text of EU laws in force are presented as amended by subsequent legislation (the latter two items can be found from the "Legislation in Force" link at the left of the EUR-Lex page).

EU court decisions can be found in the Library in the Reports of Cases Before the Court of Justice and the Court of First Instance (KJE924.5 .R46), or on the official Web site of the ECJ.

Commerce Clearing House (CCH) publishes a couple of useful print sources for finding older EU law in English: the Common Market Law Reporter (KJE947 .C652), and its successor, the European Union Law Reporter (KJE949 .E96) (legislation, regulations, and case law); and European Community Cases (KJE923.7 .E97) (case law; this resource is up to date). For a good summary of EU law, you can also look at European Union Law in a Nutshell (KJE949 .F55 2008 - 10th floor Reserve).

On the Web, EUR-Lex posts ECJ Judgments, Opinions, and Orders from 1997 to the present (from the "Case Law" link on the main page).

EU court decisions and legislative materials can also be found on Lexis and Westlaw:

• LEXIS: From the main page, choose Legal (excluding U.S.), then European Union. You can find EU Case Law, Legislation & Regulation, Treaties, and Commentaries & Treatises.
• WESTLAW: From the Directory, choose International /Worldwide Materials, then European Union. You can find legislation (Database Identifier EU-LEG), cases (EU-CS), and treaties (EU-TREATIES).

 

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