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Bluebook Guide: Resources

This guide introduces the Bluebook's uniform system of legal citation.

Resources

Hon. Richard A. Posner, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, 1981 to 2017

Judge Posner had some interesting things to say about The Bluebook.  For example, he said the following in an ABA Journal article.  "The first thing to do, is burn all copies of the Bluebook."  Debra Cassens Weiss, Posner says Bluebook is '560 pages of rubbish,' suggests changes to improve jury trials, ABA Journal (Mar. 29, 2016).  Link

  • It is an homage to a line by Shakespeare:  “The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers.”  William Shakespeare, Henry VI, act IV, Part II, sc. 2, l. 73.
  • The 20th edition of The Bluebook was 560 pages with 183 pages covering Foreign Jurisdictions in Table 2.

See Richard A. Posner, Goodbye to the Bluebook, 53 U. Chi. L. Rev. 1343 (1986).  Link

See also Victor Feraru, Jargon, Legalese and The Bluebook: My Conversation With Judge Richard A. Posner, HuffPost (Dec. 30, 2016).  Link