May 3, 2017 – Do you hear the phrase "50-state survey" and cringe at the thought of this seemingly insurmountable task?

Fear not: many sources are available to help you jump-start state survey research of statutory and regulatory law. This article explores the top resources for multijurisdictional statutory or regulatory research, as well as a few recommended research strategies.

Rev Your Engines: Planning and Framing Your Research

For starters, familiarize yourself with the area of law. Conduct preliminary research to gain a sense of the overall area of law and whether the topic is handled in statutes, regulations, or both. A secondary source such as a law review article, ALR annotation, or treatise may well serve as a useful starting point.

Keep in mind that jurisdictions can and often do use different terminology to express the same concept, such as non-compete agreement, noncompetition agreement, covenant not to compete, or agreement not to compete for what Wisconsin refers to as restrictive covenants in employment contracts. Factor in this variant terminology when crafting searches to find statutes and regulations in multiple jurisdictions.

Look for a Precompiled Survey as a Roadmap

Precompiled surveys or survey creation tools save time so you need not reinvent the wheel. If you already started on your own survey or need to update an existing survey, precompiled surveys serve as a useful source to double-check research findings.

Precompiled surveys are available via various free websites and fee-based commercial legal publishers, with the best bets summarized below. Services on fee-based commercial sites are priced and licensed per your organization's individual contract.

National Conference of State Legislatures

The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL), a bipartisan nongovernmental organization, offers several subject compilations of state laws and pending legislation. While the NCSL does not cover state statutes and legislation on all topics, it is a key starting point, particularly for laws on emerging and developing topics.

Public searchable databases are offered for current legislation on a myriad of topics, ranging from autonomous vehicles to prescription drugs. NCSL provides strong coverage of hot topics and developing areas of law, such as unmanned aircraft. The site is full of helpful charts and maps, as well as historical information, such as overviews detailing same-sex marriage laws prior to the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

Searching by NCSL’s Topic or Key Word

Use NCSL’s search feature to search by topic or key word. For example, a search for the term “bathroom” yields legislative tracking on state legislation relating to restrooms and locker rooms. A search for “privacy” yields tables of state laws and pending legislation on topics including security breach notification laws and state social media privacy laws. Searching “drunken driving” yields a wealth of resources, including a listing of states with ignition interlock laws.

Most of the compilations via the NCSL site list the state, the statutory or legislative citation, and a summary of the existing or proposed laws.

Browsing

If you would rather browse, simply click the research link on NCSL’s main page, and browse to the navigate section, which allows you to browse by subjects such as education, health, and immigration. For example, the section on health law offers information on new and emerging health issues, including state medical marijuana laws, and legislation aimed and preventing opioid misuse.

Westlaw, Lexis, and Practical Law

Both Westlaw and Lexis alike offer state survey aggregation tools for statutes and regulations. Browse these sources via a table of contents, or search by keyword or Boolean search strategy. Subjects covered are exhaustive, including sweepstakes, automobile lemon laws and warranties, and laws protecting breast-feeding mothers in the workplace.

Practical Law, a Thomson Reuters research tool now available via Westlaw, contains State Q&A Comparison Tools, covering big picture topics such as corporation laws across the nation, and also enabling the user to select a topic, identify specific questions, choose jurisdictions, and compare states. Using the Q&A tool, for instance, users can determine the specific laws that dictate the timing for when notice must be sent to individuals affected by a data breach.

Wolters Kluwer Cheetah / CCH Intelliconnect Smart Charts

The Wolters Kluwer Cheetah research platform and its predecessor, the CCH Intelliconnect research platform, both offer Smart Charts in multiple practice areas to generate on-demand surveys.

For example, the State and Federal Employment Law Compare tool can be used to generate a chart of labor and employment laws in all or selected jurisdictions on topics ranging from conceal carry laws in the workplace to plant closings, layoffs, and Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act laws. To download a chart in Word or Excel format, use the Smart Charts tool, select your topics, and identify the states. Smart Charts functionality is available in several practice areas, including tax, securities, and franchise law, just to name a few.

Bloomberg Law Chart Builders

Bloomberg Law features Chart Builder functionality, which operates similar to Cheetah and Intelliconnect. Select a topic, narrow it down, identify your desired jurisdictions, and voila: instant 50-state survey. For example, in 60 seconds, I navigated to the section on privacy and data security laws, then medical records access, retention, and disposal, and quickly generated a chart on minimum medical records retention laws across the nation.

National Survey of State Laws

Rich Leiter's book National Survey of State Laws is available at selected government and academic libraries, and electronically via HeinOnline. Now in the 15th edition published in 2015, each section begins with a general overview, followed by a table that summarizes each state's statutes on specific aspects of law, providing full references to each state's statute or code section.

Caution: Update and Be Wary of Bias

When using a precompiled survey from a publisher, vendor, or association, updating is critical. Check the dates on your sources and update accordingly. It is conceivable that a recently enacted session law or regulation is not yet reflected in a compilation, and you must update your research for accuracy and currency.

Many professional associations, trade associations, and other groups offer surveys of laws and legislation on specialized topics. While these tools are useful starting points, be wary of bias, and be sure to update and verify the research. For example, the Distilled Spirits Council offers a map indicating which states allow consumer tastings of distilled spirits (Wisconsin on the list of states that offer on premise tastings), although specific statutory citations or summaries are not offered. Such sites frequently offer summaries, lists, and maps, but often lack complete citations, and should be updated and verified accordingly.

Making Your Own Chart

In the event you are unable to locate a precompiled survey on point, you will need to consult each state's statutes and/or regulations to create your own chart. Many of the tips here are still applicable when creating your own chart. You may use government websites, commercial databases, or Fastcase – free with your State Bar of Wisconsin membership – to begin researching and populating your own chart. Again, updating and allowing for variant terminology are critical steps in the research process.

Start with the Secondary Sources

There is often no need to reinvent the wheel when conducting multijurisdictional research. Start with the sources and strategies suggested here, and you will shave significant time off a time-consuming research task.

Should you need to start from scratch, secondary sources of law will help you edify yourself before diving in to your research, which should help you craft more informed queries. If you need help, just ask a law librarian!