Legal citation: Either Bluebook or ALWD Style, please!

sjaspr
I am a practicing lawyer. I find Zotero to be extremely useful, but unfortunately, none of the citation styles currently available are usable in legal documents, whether these be papers filed in court, or articles published in law journals. The dominant citation style in the United States for legal citation is the Harvard Bluebook style, with the Association of Legal Writing Director's style a close second. Either one will do. Are there any plans to create a CSL template for either of these citation styles?
  • Tjowens
    There is a bluebook style. You can find it on the styles page. It is still underdevelopment, see this thread for ongoing discussion.
  • hannahwhalen
    What about the The ALWD Citation Manual?
  • bwiernik
    If you are doing a lot of legal referencing, you probably want to check out Juris-M, a fork of Zotero with extended legal support (https://juris-m.github.io/downloads). It has excellent Chicago and Blue/Indigo Book legal referencing. Given that AWLD is extremely similar to Bluebook, I imagine its Indigo Book style also likely fits AWLD fairly closely.
  • fbennett
    The ALWD is apparently no longer a separate style, from the standpoint of citation formatting, so Bluebook rules are what there is, as far nationwide conventions go.
  • adamsmith
    I thought those were indigo book rules now?
  • fbennett
    edited April 5, 2016
    They will be when Indigo Book is backed up by a continuing editorial process - and the sooner that happens, the better for all concerned.
  • jamesdiamond
    I am working with a dissertation written in Bluebook style. I built my library in Zotero, with the BibTex format,Zotero does not seem to cite in Bluebook style. I downloaded Juris M after reading the post above. I assume Juris M does cite in Bluebook style?

    How do I link the two, or import my library to Juris M, if in fact I can cite to Bluebook from Juris M?
  • adamsmith
    sorry, I do not understand "with the BibTeX format, Zotero does not cite in Bluebook style"
    Could you describe what you're doing and what's not working correctly?
  • jamesdiamond
    I am editing a manuscript where the original sources were cited in Bluebook style. Then, I built a Zotero library. Now, I can't figure out how to get Zotero to cite in Bluebook style.
  • adamsmith
    You have found the bluebook citation style? https://www.zotero.org/styles?id=bluebook-law-review and you're just not getting correctly formatted citations?
    Sorry, I have no way of knowing if you're a complete Zotero novice and need a basic introduction on how to use and install citation styles or if you know everything about Zotero but have specific problems with Zotero's bluebook style. It would really help if you could spend a little more time describing where you're at.
  • jamesdiamond
    I am a novice. If Bluebook can be installed that's news to me. I'd love to and I will try your link right now, thanks!
  • jamesdiamond
    Ok. I downloaded it to my computer, but what is the next step to getting it to pop up when I click on "cite" and getting it listed as an option there?
  • adamsmith
    OK, you'd then need to install the style: https://www.zotero.org/support/styles#zotero_style_repository

    Once it's installed, it will show up as an option when your right-click on any item or set of items and select "Create Bibliography" and will also show up as an option in the Document Settings of the word processor add-ons (see https://www.zotero.org/support/word_processor_plugin_usage for the latter).

    Note that our bluebook style works pretty well for secondary materials, but for the intricacies of legal (in particularly case) citations, you would indeed want to use juris-m (for which most of this works the same way).
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