Legal Encyclopaedias

Legal encyclopaedias provide statements of legal principle, arranged systematically, with case and statute law authorities.  There are two Australian legal encyclopaedias, Laws of Australia (Thomson) and Halsbury's Laws of Australia (LexisNexis Butterworths).

Laws of Australia Online

Laws of Australia is available via LawBook Online. The screen below shows the homepage for Laws of Australia, with the screen split into 2 panels. The left panel lists the Titles or subject categories of the encyclopedia and from this panel you can browse for a topic or subtopic by clicking on the + to expand the categories. The right panel displays the search options by which you can search the encyclopedia, by legal principle, words and phrases, case or legislation.

Browsing Laws of Australia

If we select as an example, Administrative Law, we can 'open up' this section as we would open the chapters in a book, and then 'tunnel down' to the desired section of text.

For example: the screen below shows the chapters in the section on Access to information / Freedom of information. The right panel then displays the legal principles which fall within this topic. By selecting a particular legal principle, for example, "Each jurisdiction within Australia, apart from the Northern Territory, has a Freedom of Information Act" you will find commentary on this statement, together with any relevant case or legislative authority, located near the bottom of the screen (next screenshot).

Searching Laws of Australia

You can conduct a free text search of this database, or case search for case or legislative references.

A free text search for any legal principles relevant to the 'voir dire' yields 13 results (see screens below) or legal principles on the voir dire. Selecting any principle you get fuller commentary on the principle statement, together with any statute and case law authority in support. The left panel displays the context of your search result within the classification scheme: for example, the first statement of principle is classified under Criminal procedure / Summary proceedings / Voir dire / General.

Halsbury's Laws of Australia

Halsburys Laws of Australia is available online via LexisNexis AU. Produced by LexisNexis Butterworths, Halsbury's Laws of Australia provides statements of principle on the law of Australia in 89 subject titles arranged alphabetically.

Within each Title, the text is organised by numbered paragraphs [indicated by square brackets] for ease of cross-referencing and updating. Each paragraph number has two components; the first number represents the Title within which the paragraph is located, then second number indicates the numerical position of that paragraph within the Title.

For example: [110-200] is a reference to paragraph number 200 within Title 110 (Contracts) of Halsbury's Laws of Australia, and concerns: Contracts – Formation of contract – Importance of agreement.

Browsing Halsburys Laws of Australia

Selecting the Browse option within Halsbury's Laws of Australia offers you 2 further choices – Browse the table of Contents (TOC), or Browse the Index and Tables (which would include tables of Cases and legislation). Selecting the TOC option provides an alphabetical topic listing of the areas covered by the encyclopaedia. Clicking on the adjacent + opens up the subtopics, and further sub-subtopics. The Quick Find boxes enables you to search for a particular topic or sub-topic.

The right panel displays the text with the topics. Note the structure of this text which provides a date of currency, (indicating you may need to update the content by referring to later years of Australian Current Law) and is peppered with paragraph references to other realted topics within the encyclopaedia. Footnote references may also refer you to other sub-topics.

Searching Halsbury's Laws of Australia

Halsbury's Laws of Australia can be searched in a number of ways. For example, you can enter a general search of keywords, search for references to a specific Act or case, or by topic heading. If you retrieve a large number of results from your search you can then narrow your search with more search terms, or perhaps use the Results Group function from the left panel, to sort your results by Table of Contents - meaning sort by where the information is sourced.

For example: if we submitted a simple keyword search on bailment, we get 15 results arranged alphabeltically by topic. Selecting the option to sort by Table of Contents shows how may results fell within each category.