Researching Local Government Law

Quick Links:

• Introduction
• Finding City and County Laws
• Secondary Sources On Local Government Law
• Cases on Local Government Law

1. Introduction

Local government law (sometimes referred to as "municipal law") encompasses the laws created by local governmental jurisdictions, including municipalities (cities, towns, and villages), counties, and special districts. The term is also used to refer to the legal framework in which local governments operate and their authority in relation to the state and other local governments. This guide is designed to help you locate sources of local government law, including sources covering the city and county of Los Angeles specifically as well as California and national sources.

2. Finding City and County Laws

The legal document that sets forth the governmental organization and framework for a local government is called a charter. Like the federal or state constitution, the local charter describes the powers, duties, and responsibilities of the various governmental branches and departments in a particular municipality or county.

The day to day laws enacted by local governments are referred to as ordinances. Like statutes and regulations at the state level, ordinances have binding authority on all individuals and entities within the local jurisdiction in which they are enacted. They are also published in subject compilations called codes. At the city level, the codes are typically referred to as municipal codes. Some local jurisdictions, including the city of Los Angeles, publish a regular code as well as an administrative code that focuses on the powers and duties of the various legal institutions within the jurisdiction. Local government codes, like state codes, are typically the best tools to use to find current laws on a particular topic.

Codes are divided into major divisions and subdivisions (sometimes called titles, chapters or articles) that ultimately get broken down into numbered sections. When citing to a code section, you generally include the abbreviation for the code and the section number (e.g., L.A.M.C. § 48.02 is a citation to section 48.02 of the Los Angeles Municipal Code). At the end of each code section, there will typically be a parenthetical note indicating the citation to each ordinance that created or amended that section (e.g., Ord. 96-0045 § 6, 1996, which is a citation to section 6 of Ordinance #96-0045, enacted in 1996).

For most major local governing units in the United States, there are both print and electronic versions of the charter and code(s).

• Print Sources of Los Angeles Charters and Codes at the USC Law Library
  

  At the USC Law Library, you can find print versions of charters and codes for the city and county of Los Angeles. The current versions of these sets (listed below with their call numbers) are located in the California Section on the Main Floor of the library. The library also has earlier print versions of most of these charters and codes, which are kept in the Law Library's Compact Shelving section on the Third Floor (with the same or similar call number).

  While each of these sets is updated with new looseleaf pages, the print versions are not typically as current as the online versions discussed in the next section of this guide. The print versions however contain indexes (typically located at the end of the sets) that can be very helpful when trying to find relevant sections. Also, it is often easier with the print versions to maneuver around different parts of the charter or code and see how different sections relate to each other.

  • City of Los Angeles Charter (KFX1621 .A6)
    

    The library has the current version of this charter as well as earlier versions for selective years (going back to 1927).

  • City of Los Angeles Administrative Code, 2nd ed. (KFX1621 .A6A)
    

    The library has the current version of this code and one earlier version (updated through 1981).

  • City of Los Angeles Municipal Code, 6th ed. (KFX1621 .A6M)
    

    The library has the current version of this code and three prior editions (the earliest of which was updated through the early 1970s).

  • Los Angeles County Code (KFC 1199 .L6 A34)
    

    This set contains not only the current Los Angeles County Code but also the current charter for Los Angeles County (in volume 1). Each volume (or major division) in this set has its own index.

    The library also has earlier versions of the Los Angeles county charter for selective years (going back to 1926) and two old editions of an administrative code for the county, one that was updated until 1973 and one that was updated until 1977.

• Local Government Laws on the Web
  

  The current charters and codes for many of the local governments in the United States (including Los Angeles) can be found for free on the web. Unfortunately, there is not one master website that contains all of these charters and codes. Rather, there are various municipal code websites, each covering a limited number of local jurisdictions. One of these sites is the Seattle Public Library's Municipal Codes Online website, which provides links to selected charters and codes (including the ones for Los Angeles) in about half of the states in the U.S. It also provides links to various publishers' municipal code websites, as shown in the middle of the screen below (above the state abbreviations). Therefore, if you do not find your particular local government through the Seattle site, you can try one or more of the additional publishers' sites listed on this webpage.

  

  Each online publisher uses its own search engine and interface. They all typically allow you to browse each charter or code's table of contents on the left portion of the screen to identify and link to relevant sections. They also all have a keyword search option that allows you to search the full text of each charter or code. If you decide to search by keyword, you should take a few moments to review the search tips for the website you are using. (These tips can often be found through the site's "Help" link.)

  Most of the publisher sites allow you to specify that all of your terms must appear in each document or that just one of them needs to appear. Most sites also allow you to truncate your words (usually with an *) to allow for different possible endings of a particular word (e.g., advertis* will look for advertise, advertising, as well as advertisement).

  It is important to keep in mind that a document in a particular charter or code database may consist of an entire subdivision (article, chapter, etc.) of that charter or code as opposed to an individual section. Therefore, it may be difficult to perform a very precise search when searching these codes online. Some sites however do allow you to express proximity relationships between your terms, which can help to improve the precision of your searches. For example, if you are using the American Legal Publishing's Boolean Search engine (shown below), the search "advertising tobacco"/50 will look for documents in which the word advertising appears within 50 words of tobacco.

  

  After you run your search, you can usually jump right to the place(s) in each document where your search term(s) appear(s). The terms will generally be highlighted in the documents.

  If you are not able to locate a charter or code using one of the websites listed above, you can also check the website for the local city or county in which you are interested and see if it contains a link to their charter or code. The State and Local Government on the Net website includes links to all city and county websites in the United States.

• Finding Charters and Codes at Other Libraries
  

  In addition to the sources described above, you can also search other library catalogs to see if the particular charter or code in which you are interested is available at another library. When searching, you may wish to include "ordinances, municipal" or "charters" as part of your search, since these are the standard subject headings that appear in catalog records for local government codes and charters.

  The LA Law Library in downtown Los Angeles collects a large number of local government charters and codes for the cities and counties in California. Therefore, if you are having difficulty locating either a current or older version of a particular charter or code for a local jurisdiction in California, you may want to check the LA Law Library online catalog.

3. Secondary Sources on Local Government Law

The USC Law Library's collection contains books and treatises that examine the powers of local governments in relation to state and federal law. Listed below are three of these publications that are particularly helpful in understanding the major legal issues related to local governments and identifying important cases that have addressed these issues. Among the topics covered in these sources are the formation of local governments, limits on local government authority, municipal legislation, public officers and employees, local government finances, the local operation of utilities, zoning, eminent domain, city planning, local regulation of individuals and businesses, and local government liability.

• Antieau on Local Government Law, 2^nd ed. (Open Reserve, KF 5300 A62 1998- )
  

  This six volume treatise is the library's most comprehensive, in-depth, and current source that focuses on the topic of local government law. The treatise includes extensive references to state and federal cases and is regularly updated with looseleaf supplements.

• Local Government Law, 2^nd ed. (West Hornbook Series) (Main Floor Stacks, KF 5300 R38 2001)
  

  This single volume book provides a more selective approach to the issues related to local government law, though it is heavily footnoted with references to cases and other sources. It is particularly useful for students studying this topic in a law school or law related course.

• Local Government Law in a Nutshell, 5^th ed. (Open Reserve, KF 5300 Z9 M3 2003)
  

  This book provides the most concise treatment on the subject of local government law and contains very few references to specific cases. It is however a particularly useful source if you are looking for a quick overview of one or more of the key issues related to this topic.

To find other books on the topic of local government law, you can search one or more library catalogs, including the USC Law Library catalog, ADVOCAT. The following are three standard main subject headings related to local government that are used in most catalogs, including ADVOCAT:

• Municipal Corporations
• Municipal Government
• Local Government

These main headings are subdivided further through subheadings (e.g., Local Government Law and Legislation California). When you enter one of these main headings as a "subject" search on ADVOCAT, you will retrieve an alphabetical list of all of the subdivisions. You can browse through this list and then choose the one(s) that best reflect(s) your research interest. Another option is to include one of these headings as part of a "keyword" search on ADVOCAT, since the subject headings are considered keywords in this catalog.

In addition to the subject specific sources listed above, standard secondary sources like legal encyclopedias, law journal articles, and American Law Reports often provide discussions of significant legal issues and cases related to local governments. For guidance on how to find relevant information in these types of sources, consult the USC Law Library guides Starting Points to Begin Your Legal Research and How to Find Law Journal Articles.

4. Cases On Local Government Law

Courts play an important role in both interpreting local laws as well as ruling on the powers of local government and their authority to act in different contexts. As mentioned above, secondary sources can be helpful in identifying relevant cases from the courts. You can also use case law websites to search for cases directly. For guidance on using some of these sites, consult the USC Law Library guide How to Find Cases. If you are interested in finding cases discussing a particular city or county code or charter section, you may want to include the city or county name and the section number as part of your search statements when using these case law websites.

There are also two additional case finding sources that may prove useful when researching local government law:

• Shepard's Ordinance Laws Annotations (Main Floor Stacks, KF 5305 A5 S54)
  

  This multivolume print set provides summaries of cases that interpret or apply city and county ordinances from throughout the U.S. The set is organized like most encyclopedias, with alphabetically arranged broad topics that are divided into specific sections. There is an index at the end of the set to direct you to the broad topic and specific section that is most relevant to your topic. The set is updated with pocket parts and supplements (though the USC Law Library's set is only current through 1996).

• Shepard's California Citations: Statute Edition (Part 5) (California Section, Main Floor)
  

  The five part Statutes Edition of Shepard's California Citations contains a section on ordinances (at the end of part 5). You can use this section to find California cases pertaining to California local ordinances on specific topics. The section is organized first alphabetically by city or county name and then by topic. There is also a topical index at the very end of the volume that you can use if you want to find all of the California cases on a particular topic (regardless of which local jurisdictions are being discussed in the cases). The set is regularly updated with both hardbound and softbound supplements.